Like some sadistic genetic experiment gone tragically yet entertainingly awry, NS Design has fused an upright bass with the neck scale length of a bass guitar, and installed 28 frets on a bow-able high-radius fingerboard.

OK, so the design isn't that radically novel: the first fretted instruments were, in fact, cellos and other bowed instruments with only a few courses of gut near the nut. And there are other fretted electric cellos on the market. Still, NS Design has a reputation as being one of the finest makers of electric bowed instruments, and I;m sure the Fretted Bass Cello won't disappoint.

Other than the addition of frets, the Fretted Bass Cello shares all the same high-grade specs as the Bass Cello introduced a few months ago. There's the NS Design transducer pickup, which can be variable blended with the special EMG magnetic pickups (one for each string).

Also included is NS Design's Boomerang strap, which allows the player to orient the instrument as either a standup or a guitar with out adjusting the strap. The Fretted Bass Cello will be available in 4-, 5-, and 6-string models.