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Acoustic Bass Guitar -- too genre-oriented?

#23
Benefits of acoustic bass:

Play in an apartment without headphones
Play anywhere outside without amplifier

That alone is worth the $100 my Fender BG-31 cost. Will I ever use it plugged in? Not likely. Is it loud enough to play with an acoustic guitar? Not really. But ya know what, I'll be darned if the convenience of playing without adjusting tone, plugging in cables and disturbing fellow apartment-dwellers doesn't inspire me to practice more often.

Those naysayers of buying an acoustic bass guitar, go away. He's not asking for your opinion.
 
#24
cydeweys said:
Next time I get a chance I will, but I was more interested in the "acoustic" abilities of the instrument. Maybe I would like the sound of a fretless with flats??? Do they even exist?
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To date, I have not played a fretless that didn't have flats. One of the benefits of being fretless is being able to vibrato like a fiddler and slide to the next note. Round wounds would cause too much noise.
 
#26
I've never played one that I liked. They're good if you want to noodle around outside or something. But with your money, why not just get something else?

I've seen one example of an acoustic-electric bass whose tone I liked. John Lodge was playing it on a Moody Blues concert dvd I watched (live at Royal Albert Hall). Then again, it was probably a really expensive bass, and plus it was in the hands of a very great bassist.
 
#27
I play a Washburn AB-34 with a B band preamp.I've had it for years and its Grand Auditorium size. I recently played out with a full size jazz ensemble and it sounded wonderful. I got some positive comments afterwards. The strings I use are Labella nylons. They don't make the bass anymore and my son has dibs on it someday.
 
#28
bassist4dalord said:
Benefits of acoustic bass:

Those naysayers of buying an acoustic bass guitar, go away. He's not asking for your opinion.
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I think opinions are exactly what he was looking for when he said:

foq1978 said:
What are your impressions on acoustic bass guitars?
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There is plenty of room for dissenting opinions in civil discussion.

I stated my preferences for flatwounds on my ABGs. If someone came on and said they preferred bronze strings, I would not tell them to "go away". Likewise, those whose "impressions" are that ABGs are pointless are also entitled to voice their opinions.
 
#29
I like bronze strings and ..................................

funny-pictures-history-old-school-bat-man.jpg
 
#32
The Dean is not a bad starter ABG either. Pretty loud acoustically with one of the larger bodies of current ABGs. Check the intonation, I've seen some that were pretty bad, others spot on. I picked a Johnson for my first ABG because it has a nicer onboard preamp, but I use an outboard Fishman anyway.
 
#33
This forum has many threads on buying an ABG!

Look it's not going to be a Double Bass at best, but if like me you buy a decent one, then you will happily play acoustically in a sitting room with a few acoustic instruments.

Anything more, even the acoustic guitars get put through a PA

I always recommend these:

and only these so far:

Tanglewood - at big pinch

Guvnor - at a big pinch

Hofner - very nice for the price.....

Ortega - which I have, and can't fault it!

Or if you are loaded - Fruch!

3 German 2 English....... :)

Yes Fruch is in the Czech republic, but the name is German so he's obviously Bohemian! That's a Rhapsody for you...
 
#34
I'm in the camp of "As soon as you plug it in -- because you can't play with other musicians without doing so -- it's not an acoustic bass." So why bother? And for that "acoustic/standup-ish" sound, I have a Hofner...But I can see ABGs do have some application.

And yes Nathan East w/Clapton. It's funny, I'm now in a Clapton tribute where we essentially duplicate that exact show/DVD. The last song in the "acoustic" first half is "Change the World," but it's easy for us to forget that it's still the "acoustic" set because Clapton's band, mostly driven by Steve Gadd crankin' it up, sounds anything BUT acoustic on it. The other part of it though, is that Nathan's Yamaha ABG doesn't sound anything at all like an ABG. Of course, state of the art amplification plus lots of signal processing, but just to show what they CAN sound like.

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#36
In the warm-but-not-so-woolly department, I used to have a fretted 4-string Epiphone El Capitan.

IME, the acoustic sound of an ABG isn't all that important, other than for the effect it has on the plugged-in tone. Between the short decay and the piezo setup on the Epi, I got a big sound with a powerful punch and bite. It sounded halfway between a hollow-body fretted EBG and an upright. Kind of like a Beatle bass, but with big, hairy balls...

I think ABG's get a bum rap. When properly amplified, they have an interesting and unique tone that's useful for much more than woodshedding and living room jams. I used mine successfully for everything from Rockabilly to Alt-Pop to up-tempo church music. Various bands I was playing with were upset with me when I sold it, but I got tired of carrying two basses. The short decay and punch that made it such a good instrument for up-tempo stuff were counter-productive on ballads, and it seemed like no matter what the setting, there were always songs that required my 5-string solidbody.

In the end, the flexibility of my fiver won out, but in a perfect world where I had more money and a stronger back, I'd still have an ABG. Ironically, I just picked up a Squire VM fretless, hoping that it would fill a similar sonic space, in a more portable package. Judging from my first gig, it works, but doesn't hit the spot quite as well as the El Capitan did.
 
#37
AZJim said:
I'm in the camp of "As soon as you plug it in -- because you can't play with other musicians without doing so -- it's not an acoustic bass." So why bother? And for that "acoustic/standup-ish" sound, I have a Hofner...But I can see ABGs do have some application.
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So when I amplify my Martin acoustic guitars they are no longer acoustic? C'mon ... :rolleyes:
 
#38
Since I bought my ABG I simply practice more because, yes, it's just so convenient.

It has it's place.

Playing a birthday gig with plenty of elderly folks, country and traditional folk/gospel/americana music, the crowd absolutely LOVED it when they saw my ABG (had it plugged into my Ampeg B210), most never knew such a thing existed, and several bluegrass musicians wanted to check it out after the show.

But my favorite is just what I did this evening, jammed with it along with my daughter (13) while she sang and strummed her acoustic in the living room, while Mrs. Dogbone listened and smiled. :)

I run D'Addario Chromes on mine. Incredible tone!
 
#39
RustyAxe said:
So when I amplify my Martin acoustic guitars they are no longer acoustic? C'mon ... :rolleyes:
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Well, good point, but that's not what I said. It's just that ABGs and acoustic guitars are very different animals. The words "optimize" and "compromise" come to mind. A good acoustic guitar being an "optimal acoustic machine" as it were, perfected over the last couple centuries, while the ABG is a series of compromises...scale length, soundboard size, body size/volume, physical comfort, all compromised in an effort to produce those frequencies, etc.

There are far more settings in which you can just take out your acoustic guitar and be heard without having to play hard than there are in which you can do the same with an ABG. You almost always have to plug them in to get them to send good. Not so with a fine acoustic guitar.
 
#40
With acoustic instruments it is just as much the person playing the instrument as the instrument itself. It helps when you play with musicians that listen to each other and adjust as necessary.The trick is getting the instruments to sound as one until a solo is required. Unfortunately there are guitarist. who think just the guitar is importan
t and play as such.
 

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