It is truly blissful to play a large acoustic instrument. The body of the bass sits against our own rib cage and our ear is close to the fingerboard and in the good moments, it seems like it is part of you and you are part of the music in a deeply personal way.
We spend years looking for our bass and years after we get it setting it up and getting to know it and this very personal bond forms and it's all that we want to do…then the realities of the world set in and we have to plug them into something with a speaker so that we can be heard in whatever space we're performing and sit appropriately in the mix with the band.
Unlike bass guitars, there aren't a lot of pickup options and they vary pretty greatly in design, so it takes a while to find what you can live with and takes longer to accept that they all suck compared to not needing one at all. And amps are temperamental with piezo pickups and expensive. They are sometimes lighter than they used to be, but they aren't light, at least not those with the ability to cover your loudest gigs.
Whenever possible, I love to play without amplification. There is a saying among bassists that the best amplifier is your fingers and it's true…up to a point. I could do a piano trio with Wayne and Jon in a good room without an amp, but virtually any other drummer would have made that risky. I once played hard bop in a bar with an upright piano, drums, and two horns, because I was told there would be a house amp, but when I got there, there was not. It worked, but I felt like I had gone 3 rounds with Floyd Mayweather afterwards. So, I generally resign myself to amplification. I don't have a small option right now. I have a heavy option and a less heavy option.
Last night I played with Jon Reingold on keys and Mariia Pozhar on vocals in a medium sized spot that we had not played before. It's on an urban block, which is under construction and I had to park about 3 blocks away. Of course, nothing in Seattle is flat. I don't leave my bass in my car EVER, so I carried it and the bag with all the stuff in it, then went back for the speaker cabinet. Got set up and dialed in. The room sounded good. A few musician friends at the bar said that it sounded good and that the mix was right. At the set break, I unplugged the bass from the pre-amp to save the battery, got a drink, chatted with friends. Finished the second set strong, a few more people came in, which always changes the sound, but I left everything alone and it went well, but I did notice that I was working pretty hard.
When the night ended and I turned around to shut off my amp, I realized that I never plugged my bass back in. I played the second set acoustic and didn't notice, though I am sore today. I went back to musician friends at the bar and said “wait, before we get into that, how was the sound that set?” They said “great!” “better”.
The best amplifier is your fingers, but I still had to carry that thing out of there and get it back home for next time.