NS Design WAV5c-OB-BK Omni Bass

As a bass guitarist and improviser I was long interested in an electric upright with enough fingerboard curvature to be bowed and a standard bass guitar scale for a minimal learning curve. Several years ago NS did a very good thing having designed such an instrument, and recently they did another good thing introducing the affordable Indonesian-built WAV series, so that's what I went for.

First of all, the build quality is very good. I'll probably replace the tuners some day, but everything else is flawless. Also, the Indonesian series has rosewood fingerboard - of course I'd prefer ebony or some other harder wood, but I hope the flatwounds won't eat it too much.

I like the tone the polar pickup delivers, pizzicato with strong fundamental and very powerful arco. It took me some time to realize that you can get more authentic (less metallic) pizzicato tone plucking with two fingers, like on a full-size urpight - I first deemed it needless because of the low action, almost like on a bass guitar.

The string spacing on this 5-string is even narrower than on my Ibanez SR - it took a little time to adapt, but feels comfortable at the end of the day. Interesting that it's constant between the _sides_ of the strings, so it actually gets narrower between the thinner strings, but it feels quite comfortable.

It's hard to get good intonation and almost impossible to bow on a boomerang strap, so I'll have to get a stand for it. Meanwhile I just place it on top of a chair.

Overall, very good quality, great tone and a lot of fun to play!