A new kind of fretted bass instrument - and it's smaller than a guitar

singemonkey

It's the Kala U-bass. Polyurethane strings. Sounds almost more like a bass fiddle than a bass guitar:

http://www.kalabrand.com/instrumentsU-bass.html

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Averatu

Its a small bass?

epictring

These have actually been around for a while now if I'm not mistaken. Basically a ukulele bass?

Scorched

Cute! But it's a stupid concept, I can't imagine any working musician trading his normal bass for that. At least it's green ?

The guy is a good player though. Would like to hear him play a normal bass.

singemonkey

epictring wrote: These have actually been around for a while now if I'm not mistaken. Basically a ukulele bass?

That ignores that it can lay down the full bodied, reasonably tight sound in a tiny package. As I mentioned: sounding more like a bass fiddle than a bass guitar. It does what a bass guitar does - arguably better (at least til someone catches me up on the debate) - in a much more portable form.

Scorched: why stupid? 'Cos it's little?

Scorched

From what I gather from the video, it's is being marketed as a viable replacement -but smaller, bass for a gigging bassist.

I don't see a professional compromising his sound (although it doesn't even sound like a bass) for something that is debatably more transportable.

singemonkey

Scorched wrote: From what I gather from the video, it's is being marketed as a viable replacement -but smaller, bass for a gigging bassist.

I don't see a professional compromising his sound (although it doesn't even sound like a bass) for something that is debatably more transportable.

It doesn't sound like a bass guitar. But a bass guitar was meant to sound like a bass fiddle - something at which it failed. It can be easily argued that this sounds more like a bass fiddle than a bass guitar does. So I wouldn't leap to quickly on the stupid concept concept.

deefstes

I like the sound of it. Of course, some music would demand a more bass guitar sounding bass but i can imagine many applications for this. I wonder how readily one would be able to get hold of those odd strings.

epictring

deefstes wrote: I like the sound of it. Of course, some music would demand a more bass guitar sounding bass but i can imagine many applications for this. I wonder how readily one would be able to get hold of those odd strings.

Would probably need to buy online. The Aquila Strings are top notch for ukulele type instruments.

Psean

I played around on one of those a while ago. It sounds pretty fat! No bright sounds at all though and the rubbery strings feel weird but it must have a place somewhere.

epictring

I'd try something like that in an Indie project.

makepeace

Cool!

I see... A guitar sized instrument, similar scale length to a guitar aswell, 6 strings each made out of that fat rubbery stuff - with a metal core maybe, mag and piezo pickups and a slightly wider neck - 7-string width or so. Same (or lower) bottom frequency of a bass fiddle.. ? Could be majorly kiff.

Jayhell

It looks eatable , or is it just me? Looks like it's made from candy.

Nicholas-L

mmmm candy yes ?

Still pretty cool stuff though