FWIW, I had a series of discussions with Tim several years ago, about the possibility of ordering a pair of BassBomb 2x12 cabs. Things never progressed to the point of me actually placing an order at that time, or even getting close. Thankfully.
He didn't strike me as being particularly crazy, but probably at least a little
eccentric (So what else is new? It's the music biz!).
While Tim was very enthusiastic about the alleged tone & performance of his cabs, he was pretty short on detail about exactly how he achieved all his impressive results - except for the whole "tonewoods" thing. Tonewoods, tonewoods, tonewoods!
This ultimately raised a red flag for me. I'm no acoustical engineer, but I'd always been led to believe that a
good bass cab is one with a resonant frequency peak that's higher than the power range of the bass itself - and that the
ideal bass cab is one that doesn't resonate at all. Now this guy is telling me that his bass cabs are superior - because of how much they resonate! It just didn't add up.
The one other thing that put me off was Tim's very stubborn, doctrinaire refusal to accommodate me on a couple of small, relatively minor features. I explained to him that, while a beautiful natural wood bass cab might make for a great piece of furniture, I was far more interested in a product that would be very durable & roadworthy. I asked if he would build a couple of cabs for me with a basic black Line-X exterior coating, standard metal grills & heavy-duty plastic/rubber corner protectors.
The entire tone of the dialogue abruptly changed. Tim immediately became very defensive, almost adamant: He would not under any circumstances consider covering up his beautiful handmade work with some kind of ugly black industrial black coating. And he absolutely refused to install locking corners.
His cabs would
always have feet - and nothing but feet. No exceptions, no negotiations.
I can understand pride in one's work, but this seemed like a
very strange attitude for a businessman to take. Clearly he took my request very personally - and very negatively. It was almost as if I'd just asked him to sacrifice his puppy to The Fire God!
Well after that exchange, my "spidey sense" was tingling - big time. I decided to allow my little correspondence with Mr. Paulsen to cool off, while I considered other options. Ultimately I decided to go in a different direction. In retrospect, I'm
so glad I did!
MM
