LeftyBassist.com

Of the items mentioned so far I have heartily embraced the relatively recent D-class amps for their light weight and easy transportation. I sure wish those were around when I was younger, but they are especially a Godsend now that I am older!

I also got into graphite as a viable material for bass and have a few Status Graphite basses. The necks are very stable and stay true, but dead spots are not totally eradicated. I like the headless concept too, which makes the bass lighter and more compact. I would like to get the all-graphite Stealth model from SG, but its not available left handed. Grrrrr!!

Side dot LEDs have been helpful from time to time.

I have always wanted a Pedulla Buzz Bass for the shiny epoxied fretless fingerboard (a Jaco inspired innovation), but they are so expensive and I'd probably be so protective of it I'd never play it. So I had my fretless MIJ/Warmoth Jazz epoxied for relatively cheap and it has been a great poor man's Buzz Bass. I'd still like to get a Pedulla someday.

D-tuner is a great gadget on many levels. Easy to install with no mods, very robust, simple and fast operation, stays in tune. Standard equipment on all my headed 4 strings. I just wish they had a D-tuner device for headless basses. Wasn't there one that was like a knurled knob right past the nut?? It looked simple and fast, but it vanished from the market.

Although they were not available lefty (to my knowledge), I was very intrigued by the Guild/Ashbory bass and always wanted to try one. They were discontinued long ago, but the small size and silicone strings were so oddball at the time. I don't even think I have every heard one on a vid or soundbite. But if it had a viable sound and playability factor that would be the ultimate portable rig with some class D amps.

I recently tripped out on a vid of Muse bassist Chris Wolstenhome playing a double neck Status Graphite tablet bass. Not sure how it all works or how gimmicky it is, but it looked very interesting. http://www.musewiki.org/File:Statuskitara.png

another great idea someone needs to start working on is balanced strings.
makings strings in a way which will enable all of the strings to have a similar envelope.
like using a bunch of different metal wires on each string to compensate for mass\flexibility.
it might make the low b much more manageable.
we'd be buying strings according to their adsr's instead of just "bright sounding\ dark sounding"

I've got two (build them myself, 36 to 32 inch scale), within a couple of minutes of playing it feels familiar and natural, I also think it is less stressful on my right wrist because it is in a more natural and relaxed position while paying.

And then there is the sound, the B string sounds really tight and focused, the G string feels and sound like on a short scale bass.

The only thing that I still have some problems with is the placement of my left hand, I play mainly finger-style and normally I prefer to rest it on the bridge pickup, when I do that on these basses the fingerpicking is done to close to the bridge for the D and G string and doesn't sound and feel as well as it could, I still need to force myself to use the neck pickup or the neck itself as a rest.





And to get on topic again: I think fanned frets and the extended range bass are great bass innovations.

Also worth my respect is the Steinberger paddle bass, but that's more for the way in which Ned was looking at how to design an instrument than his actual result.