I am still on my first set of EP Slaps after nearly 2 years of almost daily use. I have them on a '43 Kay and as someone who loves the sound of Sam Jones, Oscar Pettiford, Paul Chambers, Charlie Haden, etc. they are a real treat. I had used Velvet Garbo (a fully synthetic set) previously on this bass, which was also great but those strings are no longer available and the "upgrade" to real gut made the Slaps a very attractive option. Real gut can be challenging to adjust to if you are accustomed to steel core strings like Spirocores, or even synthetics like the standard Evah Pirazzi. There are trade-offs that will not be worthwhile for many players - you should do a little online research about playing gut strings if you have no prior experience with them: Changes to your set-up, pizz and arco sound and technique, and even some (minor) maintenance. Having said all that, if you already know you like unwrapped gut for jazz playing, I highly recommend these. They've really been super. They broke in relatively quickly and, for gut, have very decent pitch stability. I have never bothered using real gut on the A and E on my basses, but I can say that the synthetic A and E from this set blends seamlessly with the gut G and D strings. After almost two years my set is still delivering with no perceptible compromise, which is pretty great. I do oil the G and D about once a month, you may need to oil more or less frequently depending on your climate, and, I'm told, the pH of your skin... Also, for what its worth, I've somehow gotten away with virtually no mini hairs that come off gut and need to be clipped. There were maybe 3 instances of that when I was first breaking them in, and literally none since. Usually clipping the little hairs is just part of the regular maintenance, so that's a bonus as far as I'm concerned.
