opinions on natural finished basses (additional question)

[bon viesta]

well, read the title. tell me! i personally love natural finish basses. they look raw and awesome, and what’s more raw of a sound than a low boomy punch to the gut. but my question i really want to ask is what, in your opinion, is the best wood to use for a natural finish. looks alone. or at least mostly. i don’t want to hear about “the tone man!!!!” for the most part, i want to hear about the pretty look of those chopped down trees. but if you want to talk about tone that’s okay too like seriously i don’t want to gate-keep over here.

 

[A9X]

I generally like the simpler woods for finishes, such as ash, maple even with a mild figure, wenge, walnut etc. That said, my newest bass has a very busy poplar burl top, and whilst it's generally a bit OTT aesthetically for me, it's growing on me.

 

[luciens]

My favorite is maple, but somehow I always end up with ash bodies on my "naturals"....

L

 

[jd56hawk]

Those really fancy ones always catch my eye.
Maple in birdseye, burled, glamed, quilted, spalted, and all the exotic woods look nice, but I prefer it simple, and I prefer stained...ash.

 

[bon viesta]

My favorite is maple, but somehow I always end up with ash bodies on my "naturals"....

L

View attachment 4097482

you really don’t see maple bodies at all on basses, save for rickenbackers

 

[A9X]

you really don’t see maple bodies at all on basses, save for rickenbackers

My early Woodbergers are maple bodies, such as they are.

 

[GlassToMouth]

I love the grain of swamp ash. But figuring in general is very appealing to me. Whether raw, stained, translucent finishes, etc. I tend to not enjoy the look of solid color finishes. For my next, I'm likely going for a coffee table type look. Walnut top, swamp ash body.

 

[luciens]

you really don’t see maple bodies at all on basses, save for rickenbackers

Well, true. Though if it were convenient to do so, I'd custom order an all-maple, say, L2000 in a heartbeat...

L

 

[wraub]

I like Ash... also, Sen.

 

[JoshS]

I'm a Walnut man for Ric.

 

[MotorCityMinion]

Grain is good.
Too much of anything can spoil it though. IMO, those high end Alembics or Ritters, to name a couple, can get carried away with all the multi laminates of different species and colors and starts to cross over into the Art or even Jewelry realm.

 

[Pings Bass]

5 of my 6 bass guitars are natural or burst; none of them are fancy figured woods. Just your normal ash, etc. I kind of like the look of those coffee table basses with a top layer of exotic wood, but I couldn't see paying extra for that.

 

[HOTCARL]

I owned a natural finish Fender American Pro Jazz that I simply drooled over. However, I found it uncomfortable to play and ended up selling it. Since then I've owned a bunch of other basses that didn't have a natural finish but they always caught my eye. What ended up catching BOTH of my eyes was this Serek Sacramento that has a maple body and neck. I love it!

What's odd is that I am not a fan of non matching natural woods. EX: a natural ash body with a rosewood neck. I feel like I see that in Stingrays quite a bit and I immediately move past them with a hearty "nooope".

 

[bon viesta]

I owned a natural finish Fender American Pro Jazz that I simply drooled over. However, I found it uncomfortable to play and ended up selling it. Since then I've owned a bunch of other basses that didn't have a natural finish but they always caught my eye. What ended up catching BOTH of my eyes was this Serek Sacramento that has a maple body and neck. I love it!

What's odd is that I am not a fan of non matching natural woods. EX: a natural ash body with a rosewood neck. I feel like I see that in Stingrays quite a bit and I immediately move past them with a hearty "nooope".View attachment 4097671

totally! my first ever real bass i got that will arrive here in a month or two is a walnut body with a maple neck and fretboard. something is a little off-putting about using a light wood, say ash, next to just a sliiiiightly different color light wood, maple. it’s just enough to be like “man i wish they were the same color”. plus i think dark finish things look deeper and richer.

 

[bon viesta]

you may be wondering “walnut body with one piece maple neck? how does that have to do with what i said?”, and it’s just that it’s simplicity. two woods on the whole bass, they look different, simple colors, serve different but ordinary purposes, and both beautiful woods.

 

[Koog]

I love natural wood finishes. I've been on a Buckeye Burl kick recently.

Koog.

 

[jmattbassplaya]

I like Ash... also, Sen.

View attachment 4097559

Need more pics of this one!

 

[JoshS]

you may be wondering “walnut body with one piece maple neck? how does that have to do with what i said?”, and it’s just that it’s simplicity. two woods on the whole bass, they look different, simple colors, serve different but ordinary purposes, and both beautiful woods.

Yep, got two of 'em.

 

[Vinny_G]

you really don’t see maple bodies at all on basses, save for rickenbackers

But there's a lot with a maple top

 

[GretschWretch]

Glarry burleywood bass made from paulownia. As figured as ash and much, much lighter.