Gretsch Hollow Body Bass Guitar

I bought this at the same time as the Epiphone Jack Cassady bass and it is a very different instrument. I was on a hollow body bass kick and I risked this one without even playing it. Just saw it on their website and ordered in from Guitar Center. My one big disappointment: the pickups. Instead of making these with TV Jones pickups it had some kind of weak assed guitar pickups that sounded horrible. And I mean horrible. Unplayable. It simply wasn't a bass. I emailed Gretsch about this and got no reply. So I ended up contacting TV Jones and got the right pups for it (Thundertrons). The whole problem cost me an extra $600 though! That is shameful for Gretsch! They have since discontinued this model and have an ugly white one but with the right pickups! Damn!
The acoustic sound of this bass is weird and really fun to play. It is growly and sort of nasal but punchy and even as well. I find that I enjoy playing it without an amp more than plugging it in. I'm still not sure what kind of music the amplified sound would be appropriate for... It sounds full and very woody and acoustic-ish.
I still have a problem, though, with the pickup's polepieces not being completely centered under the string, so when I bend a note in the upper register (where else?) I get a drop in the amplified signal. I've heard this in lots of basses with pickups with polepieces, but I guess I expected the TV Jones to be above this. It might just have more to do with the pickup placement being a bit off. Can't change that though. It hurts me that one has to curtail one's musical creativity because of instrumental limitations.
I ended up gutting out all the electronics in this bass; it is passive, but has 3 switches I found useless. Two were for changes in the midrange and one for on-off. Yeah, on-off. Just the switch you want to hit by mistake as you rock out on stage. Then spend 10 minutes trying to figure out what happened to your bass signal! Checking cables, amps, pedalboards, etc... Yeah, that switch was disconnected. Now the three switches are for show only. I use them when I make a mistake during a song... I start to mess with the switches so the audience thinks it was the bass' fault!
It never is.

www.gretsch.com/guitars