Basses - Spot The Difference

[Armistice]

I think the "tone is in the hands" thing is more people referring to, for instance, Eric Claptrap sounding like Eric Claptrap irrespective of whether he's playing a strat, a Les Paul, or a $200 Ibanez with a broken string because he plays the things that Eric Claptrap plays, in the style of Eric Claptrap - thus he sounds like himself, although the actual pure tones being generated are completely different, and thus they're referring more to the musicality of what's being played than the audiality (I just made that up ) of what's being played.

Next shock revelation - people who review albums for a living don't know the first thing about actual music...