Well, I christened the Bird last night. I can only echo what everyone has been saying - great bass! It plays and sounds just great right out of the box. The tuners do feel a little looser than I'm used to, but I didn't have to tune it too much. Considering there was no A/C in the club last night, and it was up in the nineties inside, I'd say that was a pretty good acid test. I should have some pics available later from our MySpace page. I'd say this bass was well worth the wait.
Oh, and I did christen the bass right. I already have my first cymbal ding in the headstock. My old Embassy was riddled with them by the time I sold it.