In 1971 I was in a band with a real good bassist. His three favorite players were Rick Danko, Jack Casady, and Phil Lesh. He loved Jack's tone, so ordered himself the same bass jack was at that time playing: A Guild Starfire.
The bass arrived, he plugged it into his Sunn 200s (considered by many the best bass amp available at the time), and was very disappointed with the sound. He didn't yet know that all he had to do to get Jack's tone was change the strings on his Fender P-bass from flat wound to round wound ;-) .