I'll say that all of us here at RGW are pleased overall, and very thankful for BassGearMag offering us this opportunity to have a pair of basses included in their review. considering the many big bass building guns that have been reviewed before us with very similar results, it was a great review indeed
![Cool 8-)](./images/smilies/icon_cool.gif)
True - the versatility of a passive P is probably a 2 when compared to a dual pickup model with highly optioned preamp ... but had we received a 4 or 5, I'd have been a little confused if you know what I mean. a good P can cover a wealth of stylistic avenues, but it'll still be right there in your face sounding just like a P should no matter how hard the sound tech attempts to murder it in the mix
Just so you know, we took two of our production units and sent them off as they were. these basses didn't get any special primping beyond what we do for every bass we make. Our intent was to offer basses detailed just like any customer would receive them if they had purchased that bass, and use this to get a barometer reading for how we rate with our everyday product. There's quite a few things we could have done 'special' for a review bass, but we decided that it wasn't right to do so because those little things aren't part of a typical production unit. in our eyes, that would be willfully misrepresenting our product in hopes of tickling out a slightly better review score - definitely not how we roll here
we have no idea if our approach to what we sent is typical of other builders, but based on how many basses we see reviewed that are lavished with significant optional upgrades, our guess is that not everybody takes the same approach we did. nothing wrong whatsoever with juicing up the options on a review bass, just not what we wanted to do for our review instruments.
both of these basses will be on display and available for test driving at the upcoming NAMM Show, although the 4-string will be sporting a different split-P pickup set than the Nordy NP4 installed during the review
all the best,
R