The Ritter stuff is too much art for art's sake for my taste. But they certainly are boutique basses. From a two man boutique that only produces about 50 of them in a year. Ritter has refused offers fron Far-Eastern firms to license his name to basses they produce according to his specifications and he also refused a golden offer from a US millionaire to move everything to the states and build his basses there (in somewhat larger numbers).
Ritter is actually a mechanical engineer, not a luthier or artist. So there is nothing on those basses that gets in the way of sensible playing, believe it or not. And he holds up the doctrine that wood means everything, hardware and pups very little, so all his basses have relatively neutral sounding electronics to bring out the wood. You can bet your ass that that S shaped alignment of thoses neck bolts is most likely based on some fancy computer program deciding where goes what.
All that said, I find those basses overdone. People who have played one say, however, that you immediately gel with them and feel at home on them like on no other bass. He even measures your arms' length and has that go into the design of his basses. Bespoke tailoring.
Uwe
