What are your favorite bass tones?

[Endrik]

And I know that it probably won't sound the same on a recording as it does live. I learned that a long time ago and was very disappointed about that.

Aside that the microphones and how they are placed, different ways of DI'ing, pre-amps, consoles etc. change the sound you can still get that type of tone with some effort. I mean it doesn't have to be exactly the same but with the same kind of impact.
First it's the bass. Some basses can get the tone in the same ballpark but in the mix there's something missing. You can't feel the BASS. That's why a good bass is so important, it has those thick, punchy low frequencies that make the mix so thick and makes you really feel the low end.
Then of course it's the way how you record it. You can't do that shit with just one line.
Two lines at least. One clean, one dirty.
For clean you can use either a good tube or SS amp, depends what you like.
For dirty tone, definitely a good tube amp.
The driven tone can bring up some nasty lo freqs, that's why there's a crossover often being used, the low end signal comes from the clean amp and the the higher one from the overdriven amp. Or the nasty freqs are just cut off in the mix. The crossover thing works very well for live rig.
But you can also use a guitar amp for overdriven tone. The good thing about a guitar amp is that it doesn't have so much lows, it kinda cuts off that nasty lo end from the bass. Marshalls and Mesa Boogies work very well with basses.
You can also add a direct line. Either straight to the preamp, or using a DI box, or specific DI type pedal like those Sansamp boxes.
Hell you can record with 4 or 5 lines too if you want. In the mix you can always turn down what you don't like.
And of course in the mix, there's a lot of messing with the EQ to bring out specific tonalities and whatnot but that's another story.
The point is, just experiment, record with many lines to get different tonalities which you can later mix together.
With one line for that kind of specific tone you are most likely going to make a compromise.

[jim777]

Another great tone is Tom Kennedy's tone with Mike Stern's band. Standard Fodera sort of sound with the Pope preamp and the Duncan pickups through a MarkBass amp, but still a great modern tone.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjQ4YCJhZ5M

Tony Grey gets a very simlar tone in Hiromi Uehara's band, and he plays another Duncan/Pope Fodera as well.

[pro-fusion]

Some of my favorite tones:

--Geezer Butler in the early '80s
--Bootsy Collins
--Chris Squire
--Geddy Lee on Permanent Waves
--Jaco
--Alphonso Johnson
--Duff McKagan (really!)
--Bob Daisley on "No More Tears"

[jcburn]

Rex Brown - check out the start of the song "I Cant Hide"
Steve Harris on Killers
Pat Badger from Extreme
Bill Gould on anything Faith No More

[Buslady]

My absolute #1 comes from Tarot...Marco Hietala to me has the most awesome of sound, he's a distortion freak...tunes down and growls. He uses Warwick though. Some good bass is on Crows Fly Black.