Our “Bass of the Week” series debuted in 2011 and has always been a popular one. Kevin’s goal since the beginning was to feature “low-end instruments ranging from beautiful to bizarre.”
Here are the top 10 reader-favorite BoTW’s for 2023.
Nate Navarro may be the new champion of every bassist’s favorite game of “How Low Can You Go?” The bassist, who has been on the road with Porcupine Tree, collaborated with Lignum to create a sub octave bass.
There’s always something exciting about seeing elements from different bass styles coming together. This week we’re checking out a bit of a Frankenstein with the Thunderstang by Island Instruments.
This week we’re checking out another jaw-dropping instrument built by Rob van den Broek of Brooks. The Brooks QB is a twelve-string bass built as a tribute to the Quad Bass built by Jol Dantzig of Hamer for Cheap Trick’s Tom Petersson.
The Smithsonian is home to many priceless pieces of history. Its vast collection includes numerous musical instruments and this week, we’re featuring a bass I was lucky enough to visit recently: Ray Brown’s 7/8 Size Double Bass.
Chris Seldon’s bass designs are always so striking. This week we’re checking out his Scout 434 model, which he says was designed to be a “straightforward yet well-appointed workhorse.”
This double neck by MG Bass Guitars sports both a fretted fingerboard and a fretless fingerboard to offer the best of both worlds. We reached out to luthier Mauricio Costa for the scoop.
Lawalin Guitars’s latest build takes his Guit-Fiddle body shape and applies it to a super short scale four-string. The violin-styled, single cut body and its fretboard are composite with a Southwest swirl design.
Today we’re checking out the Element Bass, a new concept designed by Tom Germann of Torillo Basses and Steffen Fendt of Fendt’s Finest. Available in four and five-string versions, the bass was created using their collective experiences in bass playing.
Rick Link of Beardly Customs shared one of their latest builds, and even he’s not sure what to call it. The four-string bass was ordered to mimic the unusual instrument used by a famous bassist.
Today, we’re sharing a tribute instrument built by Mister MikeV. His fretless “Fish On” bass takes some pretty obvious cues from legendary luthier Carl Thompson to celebrate one of his favorite players.
Corey Brown is the founder of No Treble and serves in an advisory role. He’s also Head of Editorial at Muse Group. Learn more about Corey on his website and LinkedIn.
