Which type of bass guitar is the best?

Question

As in Gibson, etc

And I do mean acoustic bass by the way...

I want to learn to play the guitar so I thought I would start out with an acoustic bass....I dont know if thats the easiest but I do love the sound that it makes compared to the electric guitars

Answer 1

I have tried both but the bass one really hurts my fingaas.

Answer 2

Acoustic hurts my fingers but i love them more than electric guitars since electric hurts my ears.

Answer 3

Acoustic basses are sort of a niche market - they can sound cool, but you can easily get the same sound out of an electric bass with a bit of EQ adjustment and a cheap amp. Also, there aren't a lot of acoustic basses that are loud enough to compete with an acoustic guitar.

There are a few companies that make acoustic basses you could check out...

Dean - Pretty cheap (like the rest of their basses), but I'd play one before I bought it; quality isn't always the greatest.

Tacoma - Good basses, but a bit on the expensive side

Olympia - These are budget versions of Tacoma - the quality is still good though, and has very good volume (try the Olympia OB3CE)

Takamine - Nice quality, good value

Again though, most acoustic basses are fairly limited in the areas of tone, volume, and sound quality - you'd probably be better off getting a cheap Fender Jazz Bass or something from the Ibanez Soundgear line. (Also, I wouldn't get Gibson basses - their quality has really gone downhill lately - their guitars are great, basses...not so great =P )

Also, in case you're looking at amplifiers too, there's a brand (ironically enough) called Acoustic, which is specially designed for Acoustic/Upright basses, though it still sounds good with Electric basses.

Acoustic AB50 (50W, 10" Speaker): http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/A...

Acoustic B100 (100W, 15" Speaker): http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/A...

Acoustic B200 (200W, 15" Speaker + Tweeter): http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/A...

The AB50 would probably be good enough, since you're just learning and probably won't be playing any major gigs any time soon =P - 50W is just fine (even more than you need) for a practice amp...and Acoustic is a quality brand.

Hope that helped you out a bit, answered some of your questions.

Cheers!