I was a trombone player as my first instrument unless you count all the weird stringed noisemakers I used to make in the garage.  So working in microtonality is something I'm pretty comfortable with. I play slide a LOT as well and I've always enjoyed playing upright so this just seems to be the route.

I seriously looked at the Jaco signature bass but found that just getting a fretless J Bass was the way to go...to get similar tone yet not have to pay for his name, hence the "a la Jaco Pastorius" comment. Sorry that was misleading. This Bass actually has fret markers on it which I didn't want, but what the hell...they're just little lines.  Since this is just for demos and my own experimentation, I went with a bass amp modeler to go straight onto disc rather than spending a grand on an amp. I have a friend who has a wonderful old Ampeg so if I ever record in the studio, I'll probably just use that.

I'm concerned though...should I go with flatwound strings on this?  Some folks go with those because they say it does less damage to the fretboard but Ilike the swell I get from regular roundwound.  Just wonderin...

PRH