The Punisher sounds like an active TBird, imagine an active Nikki Sixx Blackbird. And a sound engineer would probably tell you that, especially in a stadium, making a P Bass get heard is pretty much fool-proof. Just listen to Steve Harris.
Simmons has never made a secret of the fact that he plays what sounds good in the studio, brand plays no role (nor would it to me). Revenge was recoreded with a non-descript P'ish ho he liked the sound of even though he described the bass as a "cheap piece of shit". But it recorded well. So well that he asked his technician to get a few more, but none of them sounded like the first.
I've seen pics of the Monster sessions where he plays a vintage Ripper into the mixing desk. Certainly the sound on the CD sounds ripperish, but that is essentially a Fenderesque sound anyway.
The Punisher is a beast born under the comsiderations of a Kiss live scenario. Gene likes:
- basses with a symetric body, "two horns, not one like Fender, animlas have two horns too",
- a double-octave neck,
- with easy upper register access, the Punisher is perfect in that regard,
- he is obsessive about a bass balancing out: "when I raise both my arms live, and I do that often, I don't want the bass to tip down hangimng from my shoulder",
- he has no issues with the split coil look or sound which is why the Punisher has one, the Jazz Bass pup was only added as an afterthought and for commercial considerations ("people want some variety"), hence nearly all of Gene's own Punishers only feature the split-coil.
The Punisher is a reasonable flexible bass that makes good sense under many of its construction aspects, quite contrary to Gene's sales bla that "it is not a bass for everyone". Take off his autograph and it is quite an elegant, well-balanced double octave-bass with which you could no doubt play jazz rock. Not too far away from a Yamaha Attitude in fact, even though I find that the more idiosyncratic signature model.
