I thought I'd recorded the best bass tone ever on a track over the weekend using my non-reverse thunderbird with cobalt flats plugged straight into my focusrite interface and using a bass amp model and compressor built-into logic. It sounds awesome in the track — but when I solo the bass track it sounds all clanky and weird on its own.
You mentioned you looked at short scales, how about a JMJ mustang? They're great little basses that get a lot of praise — I like 'em so much I own three of them and out of all my basses they're the only ones that get taken to rehearsals & gigs.