Using right hand thumb for dynamic control

[BryanM]

One of the techniques that I employ pretty commonly is to use a very light touch or heavier touch from my right hand thumb for muting and dynamic control. I play fretless so another benefit is if I half my intonation and track well I can get a lot of fun false harmonic runs and even occasionally chords with false harmonic overtones. I've never seen this particular technique employed elsewhere though and was wondering if anyone has any examples of players using this or similar techniques?

[ACNick]

Is that similar to the technique Jaco Pastorius uses in the intro for Birdland?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQDfMqLlFPU

I've tried to pull that off, but to be honest I never dedicated any real practice time to it =/