EssentialTension

I saw the axcellent and fanatstic show a couple of weeks ago ... and very nice to see you in action.

Jack, you just had to bring up the Beatles again, oh dear.

Here's the Motown guitar and bass preamp if you've not seen it before ...

What do you think of this?

http://www.bobbabbitt.com/smf/index.php/topic,148.0.html

https://soulfuldetroit.com/archives/1/541.html?1020196543

Red Mitchell tuned his double bass like a cello; it can be done. And I think the French electric bassist Jannick Top plays, or has played, cello tuning.

I had a Tony Franklin fretless Precision and it's the one bass I strongly regret selling.

I played fretted for over thirty years without ever thinking about even trying fretless. Then I got a gig, without any audition, with a band who, it turned out later, thought I did play fretless - no-one seems to know why they thought that. I liked the band so I bought a lined fretless Fender Jazz and it turned out that I could play fretless at least well enough. The Jazz got replaced by an unlined fretless Fender Precision which in turn was replaced by a Takamine B10 hollow bodied bass. It also led me to an NS electric upright and then to a double bass, which, although I could get a tune out of it, did prove either beyond my ability or beyond my motivation or beyond both. After eight years that band is no more and I am without any unfretted instrument.

And due to being no dullard I agree with discreet.

Adjusting pickup height may help. However, some people think that substanitially lowering action, or substantially raising action, also can affect tone as the strings have less (or more) space in which to vibrate giving a richer (or not) harmonic spectrum. That's why with a lowered action one needs to play with a lighter touch; with a higher action one can more freely dig in. But I think it's fair to say that this claim is disputed.

The difference, if I am not even imagining it, is to me too small to matter and may be nothing to do with the fretboard material anyway. Even if it is to do with the fretboard material, it tells us nothing about any other pieces of ebony or rosewood which might sound different again. And I have no idea which is ebony and which rosewood.

I don't do anything I can't do on a four string with flats. That's it.

I don't usually have this problem even if my playing is a bit dodgy. Maybe it's because I am old and grey and look like I might have a few dineros in my back pocket. Last time I was in GAK, they even ordered me a taxi.

http://faroutmagazine.co.uk/gibson-guitar-ceo-henry-juszkiewicz-women-arent-comfortable-going-to-guitar-stores/

http://faroutmagazine.co.uk/gibson-guitar-ceo-henry-juszkiewicz-women-arent-comfortable-going-to-guitar-stores/

http://faroutmagazine.co.uk/spotify-valued-at-23-billion-goes-public/ ... but I also read that they lost $1.5 billion last year.

Guitar market retail sales in the United States from 2005 to 2016 (in million U.S. dollars)*

I didn't get the paywall banner but I do now - strange. But yes, in US at least, guitar sales are on the up. From a low of $820million in 2009 to $1221million in 2016.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/440131/us-guitar-market-retail-sales/

Bargain and very nice anyway.

... and if you are playing with another fretless instrument - bottleneck guitar in my case - it can get complicated and spicy.

A used Lakland 55-01 would be well within your budget, 35" and is a very good bass and could be resold probably without much loss . But, as people say, best to try a few if you can.