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Poll: Tone and Playability or look?

Tone and Playability Or Looks?

  • Tone and Playability.

    Votes: 248 92.9%

  • Looks.

    Votes: 19 7.1%
  • Total voters
    267
#81
Sounded awesome
 

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#82
MonetBass said:
Yeah, for me, it's both. Call me OCD, but a relic'd bass, either naturally or manufactured, doesn't do it for me.
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You know I am right there with you on that. I find taking a perfectly nice looking bass and making it look like it was owned by a person without pride of ownership, AKA reliced, is just silly. I mean, who goes out and buys a brand new car and sandpapers the finish to make it look like it has been driven a lot and left out in the elements? I find doing this to be a poser move and in my encounter experience, done by hipsters that can't keep time. You know the ones that pay way too much money for 1960's technology because it is the thing to do, right now. I am not poo pooing that tone, just pointing out a trendy thing that irritates me. Wow, how did this all happen. I was just going to agree with you on the relic thing.
 
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#83
The looks aren't crucial, but playability is. Tone can usually be enhanced to an acceptable point. Your gig is in a dark room with a killer back line. What's more important now? Or, you're lip synching and performing low budget choreography maneuvers while dressed in a silly costume at an outdoor gig where the PA consists of those 1950's megaphone speakers. I guess looks would win that one.
 
#85
Playability is first for me.... but in many ways playability and looks are intertwined.. For instance.. I don't like basses with sharp edges so no matter how it played.. a pointy edged bass will not be "playable" for me.. I don't like basses with long horns.. ornate horns.. or fat bottoms.. so for me anything like that would not be as playable.. or basses with too much wood.. so in that respect any bass with the aforementioned traits which in many cases can be determined by sight would not get to the actual playing stage with me.. I think that most basses can achieve a wide range of tones with some tweaking or if worse came to worst changing out the electronics..
 
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#86
Playability is a must. If it doesn't play right it's only for display IMO.

Price comes as a close second. If it plays well, and the price is right, you can modify it into whatever you want, and not go broke or feel bad about it.

You can usually change pickups, strings, electronics for tone.

And can usually reshape it some, and refinish it for the look you want.

I can justify a bass that is ugly if it sounds and plays good. But I could never justify a bass that looks good but plays bad, or sounds bad and cost a lot.

I really don't like the looks of a Rick. But if I could afford one, and it played well for me, I'd go for it because they sound great.
 
#87
Come to think of it... there were only two basses I bought where I was not thrilled with the looks but bought them anyway for tone, ergonomics ... both were 6ers .. and both were red basses.. One bass I sold because the playability factor was not what i thought it was.. The bass was a lot heavier than i initially was led to believe.. so I sold it to someone with a stronger younger back... The other one I still have .. and the red not quite as fire engine red ... but more of a darker cherry syrup red. I prefer wood tones of burst though ...
 

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