Trader Fish

[Paul K]

One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish. I traded for this fish:

 

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w166/ptkbass/Curbow%20photos/Curbow3.jpg

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w166/ptkbass/Curbow%20photos/Curbow4.jpg

 

 

Hooray for me. I just traded for a five string fretless Cort Curbow. A very nice Basstalk fellow didnt like the tighter string spacing of the Curbow, I didnt like the rather wide spacing of the Warmoth, so we settled on a one-for-one trade. This Cort Curbow is a little different than the rest. Its a five string fretless without lines, while Corts current lineup only has fretted fives. And it was signed by Greg, so it was originally set up or sold through the Curbow shop.

 

I think shes a real beauty. The lower horn is useless for sitting, but I keep a strap permanently attached to my basses anyway. Judging from the little bits of extra drillings I found in the control cavity, luthite might be an injection molded dense kind of foam material. The result is sexy contour of the body along with the classy indentations where the vol and tone controls go, ala Paul Reed Smith guitars, that you don't see on a budget bass. The burled maple finish is painted on; looks very presentable. The extended neck makes for a great place to put your thumb; it feels as natural as using the neck pickup on a J-bass. The neck is slim and fast, like an Ibanez SR series.

 

Setup took time. On string removal I found that the bridge rocked back and forth a little. The flat spot where the bridge sits isnt perfectly flat; a drawback of my presumed injection molding???. I built up the underside of the tail end of the bridge with a dozen layers of the metal tape I used on the heating ducts of my house (the same ducts that I was sealing when the water pipe burst.). It now rests flat and tight. Truss rod needed a whole lot of tightening to reduce the bow, even after I swapped the low B string for a high C. The ebonol fingerboard is very smooth and flat. Right now, the strings buzz just a tiny bit; but buzz equally all up and down the neck. The roundwound strings I removed from the bass left almost no markings on the ebonol fretboard. The bass plays like butter, as good as the Warmoth did but with less material. The ebonol does give a pretty good slap sound even without the benefit of rounds or frets. In spite of Gregs apparent personal attention to this ax, the nut still needs to be cut down just a fraction. Also, the side dots are teeny-tiny, but I expected that. Ill try those glow in the dark stick-on ones that were posted in the D.I.Y. side dots thread. After the truss rod was tweaked, I flipped over the little black cover; Ill just tell people its a Curbow; theyll never know.

 

The lone Bart pickup doesnt really adjust for height. Controls are Vol, bass, middle, treble, (center detents included), with the fancy Slap Switch, which adds a preset amount of mid cut, plus bass and treble boost while defeating the on board EQ controls. Two screws on the back cavity plate adjust this EQ change and volume level. Its been called a slap contour, but booty switch is more fun to say. Ive adjusted it to slightly boost volume with a little increase in booty; Ill try it on solos as a quick sound and volume change. Worst case is I turn it into a mute switch.

 

It sounds great in the headphones, very good over the home studio speakers. Typically needs a bit of bass boost. Ill have more of an opinion after I play out with it a couple of times.

 

I think even Eric will admit that it's dead sexxxay!

Peace

Paul K

[Tom Capasso]

I've played fretted versions in stores. I liked them, and found I could sit the body on my knee. I'd pull the neck up and have to reach a bit :wink:

 

I like the smaller body design that Greg Curbow developed.

 

Enjoy !!

 

Tom

[Paul K]

Having lived with my Cort Curbow fretless for awhile now, here's what I got.

 

Playability is wonderful. For fingerstyle, the strings are a little farther apart than on my Bass Collection 5 string. But that's to be expected since that was originally a four string. For fingerstyle I like the closer spacing better, but it does make for an easier switch back and forth from my fretted 5 string. The ebonol/ebonal/plastic fretboard gives a wonderful slap sound; I'm slapping and snapping more than on my other fretless basses, where that extra string spacing comes in handy. Many more players ask, "what in hell kind of bass is that?" The on board bass-mid-treble controls are proving to be much more useful than I'd expected. Especially so since my Ashdown Superfly head has that graphic EQ computer-y interface that takes too long to tweak.

 

Downside is that the bass does not at all like large temperature changes. When coming in out of the cold car into rehearsal that I'm late for, this bass is WAY WAY flat, then twenty minutes later is way way sharp. MUCH more so than any other bass I've owned. Other frustrating issue is that the booty controls on the back side cover plate are mis marked. The little volume control controls the booty, the booty controls the volume. That, and the mini pots go the wrong way: Clockwise is off/down. The first five minutes of adjustment had me thinking that I'm retarded.

 

THe lower horn is way unusable for sitting position. It's just enough so you can play for a minute/tune up. Strap-on only. Shoulder strap, that is....oh...nevermind....

 

All in all, I like it lots better than what I traded away.

 

Peace

Paul K

[Joe Bloe]

Whoa, that's a pretty bass! I'm drooling...red is my favorite color, and a fetless is so much fun to play. I've got bassist envy!

[jlrush]

Nice looking fish Paul. Don't know how I missed this one in February. The body contour makes the neck look looong.

[Paul K]

Update on the booty switch. I've taken to making it the "unbooty" switch. The little "slap depth" and "overall gain" mini pots on the back cavity cover are such a pain to adjust, and different rooms require different amounts of booty. Since the booty switch bypasses the bass-mid-treble controls on the front, I've adjusted the booty switch position to be essentially flat so it functions like an EQ bypass, and then use the on board EQ to bring more booty when I flip the switch back off. It's easier, and more flexible.