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A number of hardwoods are porous. Take wenge for example. Very porous and it too is harder than maple. Definitely not spongy. Keep in mind, too, that maple fretboards are treated.
Bob Taylor is one of those types of people that thinks things through very carefully - and Taylor is the type of company you like to patronize. I have a Taylor 414CE guitar that was purchased in 2012 that they started using ebony with "marbling" as they call it - and I called them to offer my opinion that initially I thought it looked funky. However, after living with the guitar for a few years now, I think it gives the instrument its own personality and I'm okay with it.
I sincerely hope that the market and the world can embrace working with and using the materials that Mother Earth gives us. I also hope that we can figure out ways to ensure that the next generations will be able to have access to good wood.
You played a few cheap instruments that just happened to have light coloured fingerboards, therefore you equate the lighter wood with poor workmanship. That to me sounds irrational. However I realize that our purchases aren't always based on rational decisions.
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The guitarist from my old band had a brand new LP studio where the neck was creaking in the pocket.
You could hear it squeaking everytime he would move the neck and....BAM!! The neck popped out of the body.
This is a real Gibson I'm talking about, not a Epiphone.
It weird that the truly bad Gibbys that were made during the Norlin era are better than the crap that's coming out of it's Nashville factory. Back in the 70's Ibanez, Aria, Electra and Grecko copies of Gibsons were better than the real thing.
I never seen a neck pop out of a body before, sloppy workmanship indeed.
If Fender is worried about the supply of rosewood drying up, why don't they go back to using a veneer like they were using during the CBS era.
Once, in high school, a couple of us went out and drank a bunch of Boone's Farm wine and got pretty hammered. I had a hangover like no other the next day. For a long time after that the smell of wine made me physically ill. Not quite the same thing but sort of.
the point being
I wouldn't probably be able to tell the difference without reading the specs either
The guitarist from my old band had a brand new LP studio where the neck was creaking in the pocket.
You could hear it squeaking everytime he would move the neck and....BAM!! The neck popped out of the body.
This is a real Gibson I'm talking about, not a Epiphone.
It weird that the truly bad Gibbys that were made during the Norlin era are better than the crap that's coming out of it's Nashville factory. Back in the 70's Ibanez, Aria, Electra and Grecko copies of Gibsons were better than the real thing.
I never seen a neck pop out of a body before, sloppy workmanship indeed.
If Fender is worried about the supply of rosewood drying up, why don't they go back to using a veneer like they were using during the CBS era.
My guitar buddies have told me about all the cheap shortcuts Gibson Nashville is currently doing in materials and assembly methods. Sounds like they're making a bunch of poor instruments these days.
You're misusing or misunderstanding the word.
Wow....
Facts are formed from hypothesis. Hypothesis can be formed from certain opinions, but not all.
"PF looks cheap" is nothing more than an opinion. It cannot be proven. There is no science to support that opinion. It is held exclusively in the mind of the beholder, and while others may hold the same opinion, it cannot be proven as fact.
"PF is wood" is a fact. It can be proven that it comes from a certain tree, and is categorized as wood by both genus and species.
Do we see the difference? I'm not sure I've got the energy to explain this one any further.....
That just might be the most ridiculous thing I've ever herd!!
i do appreciate the info and find in interesting......Still, Ive yet to play any rosewood board that has the more solid response of maple...as far as this player is concerned, rosewood is spongier than maple (this also seems to be the consensus on most guitar sites Ive just visited)
My Reggie Hamilton CS bass came from Fender with a Pau Ferro board. It's a good bass. I like it. Truthfully I couldn't tell the difference between it and rosewood. I would say Fender's decision is fine with me. I am sure other companies including Warmoth will continue to offer rosewood if that is your preference.
50 years from now there will STILL be thousands of rosewood necked instruments available in the used market. And they will be cheap because nobody will be playing them anyways. The futuristic Apple iRecord console music will rule and we will mostly all be dead....
50 years from now there will STILL be thousands of rosewood necked instruments available in the used market. And they will be cheap because nobody will be playing them anyways. The futuristic Apple iRecord console music will rule and we will mostly all be dead....
Well, if you prefer maple then you're in luck. We're doubtless going to be seeing a lot more of it in the coming years!
I've got pau ferro on my #1 and it is great. Looks good, and very smooth. I've played (and owned) some truly dreadful feeling Indian rosewood boards, even on high end instruments
I heard in the media that the president of Gibson is a major a-hole to everyone inside and outside the factory,
because of that Gibson has a very high turnover. They would train a person to do a particular job and that person would be let go or quit, keep repeating that would explain all the shoddy work. Once I cut a finger on a jagged fret on a Gibson guitar (a J-200 of all things at Mars Music). If Heritage made a Thunderbird, a "real" one like the ones made in the 60's and 70's, I would jump on that so fast.
BTW Rickenbacker has been using Pau Ferro for ages.
Like I originally posted, I prefer harder wood surface feels.......I love ebony....However, I have some basses with rosewood: we are just having a discussion on TB as we generally microscope things -- I prefer maple to rosewood and I feel rosewood has a spongier feel.....this probably effects the tonality of my delivery/articulation and probably why I think its slightly darker for the sake of microscoping a conversation on TB -- It in no way implies that I wont play rosewood
(My Sire V7-5 is my primary bass and its rosewood 
)
I knew a guy who worked at Gibson around the time Henry took over. He hated that guy with a passion
If ANY fretboard wood feels spongy, you're fretting way too hard
I mean SERIOUSLY. I wish that teacher in junior high that gave me those whacks had one of those spongy paddlesIf ANY fretboard wood feels spongy, you're fretting way too hard
