Violin/hollowbody basses

Hey I just wondered: are violin basses (hofner) also good for accoustic playing? Let me know in the comments.

The bass player in my band has one. They couldn't compete really, with an acoustic guitar, and drums unplugged.

They suck. Weak tone both electronically and acoustically. They're really bad.

Well it depends what you're doing. Low maintenance stuff yeah they're fine, but anything complex then they're pretty bad, and physically hard to use: Ever tried to slap a hofner?

had a pretty nice Japanese hofner copy given to me, sold it for all the reasons previously mentioned, kinda miss it when I am doing british invasion type stuff that calls for the early Paul sound that doesn't have the 60s American deep lows he got with the Ric and fender/selmer amps a lil later, not good for much else, very short scale is uncomfortable for a lot of bass styles

unless its your 3rd bass or something then skip it... acoustic projection is negligible, less volume than an unplugges 335 or casino

So im looking for a third bass, My main onstage bass is my vintage modified fretless jazz bass, my backup/slapbass is a fleabass (finally found the good strings for it). So I was thinking about getting an accoustic or hollowbody.

Acoustic would give you alot of diversity for sure.

The very worst acoustic bass IMO is the Dean EAB. Stay away from that giant. It sounds small, is very hard to play, and the body is too large to get around easily.

My suggestion would be to go try out a Oscar Schmidt OB100B Acoustic/Electric Bass Guitar. Oscar Schmidt is to Washburn as Squire is to Fender. It's very comfortable, has a thin body - guitar like, and has a great loud tone. It is the only acoustic bass I will ever own again... probably.

Is it a cutaway or a normal one?

Btw I am going to the music store somewhere at the end of this month so ill test some stuff.

Cut-away

http://www.oscarschmidt.com/products/acoustics/ob100.asp

Ok i don't really like the sound of cutaway guitars but haven't tried a cutaway bass so ill try it soon.

upright? that's the real acoustic bas

and about $8000 :)

I mean a accoustic bass guitar, upright realily hurts me after a while you know. I've only tried upright 5 times and only half of the time I got a good note out of it, it's way harder than fretless electric bass.

Also they don't have to be that expensive, if you can get an old one from around 1850 for 900 euro's you don't have to pay much.

yeah, for a great new one... flea markets are a good place to find old, well-made uprights that need a little love for under the $1k mark, a buddy of mine has restored a couple fantastic 60s stand up basses he got at flea markets and estate sales... people don't try to sell old basse o ebay or they are listed for local pickup only, their huge size means there are deals to be had if you know what you are looking at

I don't know what I'm looking at and can't give advice, but I don't want an acoustic bass sound and don't even own an electric right now, I just borrow from one of my favorite bass buddies if I need to play bass for some reason... with a kid, space is at a premium so I like to have all my clutter come from electric guitars, tube amps and speaker cabinets (even then I have paired down substantially, there was a time when I had at least this many guitars, a bass, an ampeg tube head, 2 or 3 guitar heads, a 1x10, 1x12 and ac30 combo, my 2x12 cab, a couple of 4x10s and an oversized marshall cab just layin' around as well as 2 drawers of old fuzz pedals before I got practical about things and dumped stuff I don't play regularly)

but yeah, if you have space and about a grand or so to play with in initial purchase price andrestoration costs then an upright of quality is in reach for those who are patient and knowledgeable