suggestions for this project bass?

[Wademeister63]

I've been considering building another bass and would like to get some input from some experienced folks.

I have a nice new G&L Tribute L-2500 bass that is ok but doesn't thrill me as much as I had hoped. It has the swamp ash top over <basswood?> body, bolt on maple neck with maple fretboard. I also have a small stack of wood suitable for a couple of nice basses at least. I have bloodwood, hard maple, a very nice piece of ebony big enough for at least three 5 string fretboards, a 2" thick piece of birch, a piece movingui suitable for a top, and a beautiful curly redwood bookmatched top. I also don't really have a budget for tuners, pickups etc...
SO...how about replacing all the woodwork on my tribute? I have been kicking around some neckthrough designs and have built one bass and one guitar which both turned out well so I'm not afraid to start building. What I am concerned about is building for tone. My L-2500 can get very nasal sounding with a lot of treble and clankiness, and takes more knob twisting than I would like to get tones that make me happy. I had planned on building a maple and bloodwood neckthrough bass with maple body, redwood top, and ebony fingerboard, but that may sound worse that what I have with the electronics that are available.

Can anyone suggest how the neckthrough construction might differ in tone from the bolt on, and maybe if I should buy one or two more pieces of another kind of wood to produce a mellower acoustic sounding instrument.

[taviswardlaw]

hey... this might be more basic than what you're wanting, but the main pro for neck thru's is sustain, the main loss is little less attack... (that's why you should always slap on a bolt on) And therefore they tend to have a 'smoother' sound.

And just along with your J&L... I'm not too sure what they use, but you may find that the clicky nasal sound comes from exposed pole pieces.. If you're not as used to them in your pup's it can be slightly off putting... I actually play slightly differently with my right hand (i'm right handed) when playing with exposed pole pieces... just to prevent it getting too clicky. Dunno if that's any help... but there ya go

[Wademeister63]

Thanks Tavis.

I pretty well knew about the sustain/attack thing and I do use right hand technique to control the sound. I can and do get nice tones from the tribby as it is, but wanting to build another bass, I would prefer to build for a mellower character.

I didn't know about open polepieces having a different sound. although I have heard of many people lowering the polepieces on their G&Ls to make them "less aggressive" sounding. I don't know if the sound I don't care for is what gets lost in the adjustment, but I'll mess around with that this weekend and see what I can learn.