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Fretless - lined or unlined? Let's survey this question..What's your preference?

#41
1) I haven't been able to afford a fretless for a few years. I had to sell all of my basses except for one, which was a fretted one my wife bought me. But at that time I played fretless 80% of the time.

2) I preferred fully unlined but with side dots every few frets (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 12, 15, etc)

3) unlined

4) I would seriously look at other/custom options. Worst case scenario, I would lacquer the board black (to make it look unlined) and would finish it with CA glue or something to seal the paint.

5) started lined, and found myself staring at the lines to see if I was on pitch or not. I didn't trust my ears. I ended feeling very restricted and was not having an enjoyable experience. I also found out that the fretlines were never all 100.0% accurate at the same time (due to neck relief and other factors) and realized staring at the neck/lines was a horrible thing to do and that I had to learn to trust my ears, but I simply couldn't stop looking. I decided to buy an unlined neck and see what happened. I had no choice but to use and trust my ears. After only a few days, the weight of insecurity and the restiveness of staring at the lines was gone and it was great. Lined fretless? Never again.
 
#42
This guy must not have read the posts on TB that marks on the fingerboard are uncool looking.
IMG_0033.JPG


LOL. What's his problem, anyway?
 
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#44
1) are you a regular fretless electric bassist? - Y/N

2) does the fingerboard or top edge of your favored fretless bass have lines, or is it fully unlined? - Lined/Unlined

3) all other things equal, if you bought your next fretless bass from a brand that offered the choice of either a Lined or Unlined fretless neck, which would you purchase? - Lined/Unlined

4) if you only had the one choice (as with Godin) of your less favored fingerboard preference, from your favored fretless bass brand, would you buy one? - Yes/No Maybe, more information needed. It would be a strike against it.

5) Please describe your view on this subject? - No strong moral convictions on the subject. I just like the way unlined looks better, and I find the lines more distracting than helpful. But that's me.
 
#46
1. Playing fretless about 40% of the time, and poised to ramp it up higher as my bandmates are accepting fretless in may main project.

2. Bass has lines and dots on the upper edge - dots are positioned where a "fret" would be.

3. Pretty happy with this arrangement, but also could live with lines

4. It depends - for me the clincher always be whether an axe makes me feel like playing.

5. I could live with lines, but be it dots or lines, at the end of the day intonation is where your ears take you, and I particularly find that in the upper register (north of the 12th fret) true pitch seems to lie behind where a fret line would be. One thing I can't deal with is dots in the middle of a fretted area, like you would find on a defretted bass.
 
#47
1- No, not yet, but in a few weeks I will have my liuther remove frets on one of my basses.
2- this means I will have a lined and dotted fretless.
3-4-5 my favorite fretless at the moment is an Ibanez sr705 I tried in a store and it was unlined and I didn't lesser difficult than I thought but I was playing alone so I could be sure of my intonation with other instruments. My goal is to learn on a lined instruments and buy an unlined later
 
#50
How abot LED lined frets? ;)

Just kidding.
1. Yes, I do. Not exclusively.
2. My fretless are lined, across the fretboard.
3. I'll play both. Really doesn't matter if push comes to shove.
4. See point 3.
5. I don't think it matters with me. There are some benefits for the beginner with lines. I do play graphite fretless headless, where I can easily change from flats to roundwounds at the drop of a hat. They just hangs in the cupboard, and bring them out whatever is appropriate. Double ball ends. The roundwounds doesn't chew into a Moses graphite fretboard, so some people gets a little irked, when live, I am doing some bright slaps and pops and all of a sudden slides them up too... but that one hasn't got anything to do if they're lined or not though.
 
#52
I used to have an unlined, and now I have a lined... and I actually prefer unlined. The lines are actually not always spot on with intonation, so they can be a distraction from your ear, because it's weird to try to get the intonation right by going off the line. Easier, IMO, to just approximate the intonation by ear and develop your ear's pitch recognition instead of relying on the lines.

I should mention that I am a very amateur fretless player, and I have not developed my ear enough to have consistently accurate intonation on fretless, lines or no lines... but I still prefer unlined.
 
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#54
1) are you a regular fretless electric bassist? - Occasional

2) does the fingerboard or top edge of your favored fretless bass have lines, or is it fully unlined? - Favorite: unlined. Practical: lined.

3) all other things equal, if you bought your next fretless bass from a brand that offered the choice of either a Lined or Unlined fretless neck, which would you purchase? - Im torn but if I am buying for practical reason, I am gonna go for lined. Will need that precision since I am not that good of a fretless player.

4) if you only had the one choice (as with Godin) of your less favored fingerboard preference, from your favored fretless bass brand, would you buy one? - Yes/No

5) Please describe your view on this subject? What this poll is for again?
 
#56
bassmanford said:
...

Ted
Click to expand...

1) are you a regular fretless electric bassist? - YES - 90%

2) does the fingerboard or top edge of your favored fretless bass have lines, or is it fully unlined? - UNLINED

3) all other things equal, if you bought your next fretless bass from a brand that offered the choice of either a Lined or Unlined fretless neck, which would you purchase? - UNLINED

4) if you only had the one choice (as with Godin) of your less favored fingerboard preference, from your favored fretless bass brand, would you buy one? - Possibly. It would depend on the rest of the package but need not be a deal-breaker.

5) Please describe your view on this subject? -

I've had both in the past and I much prefer unlined. My first fretless was unlined FrankenJazz, then I had a WAL Probass 1e with lines. Since 1988 I've been unlined. From a playing perspective, whilst the lines themselves don't really affect me, I prefer the side markers to be 'in position', which mostly means unlined boards. I don't dismiss lines as a crutch and I trust my ears over my eyes when it comes to intonation.
From an aesthetics perspective I prefer the uncluttered look of a plain board, and the darker the better. YMMV
 
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#57
1) Yes, more than half the time

2) Unlined

3) Unlined

4) Absolutely not

5) Think about this for a second, except for open strings an unlined bass is never really out of tune. All you need are side markers, lots of practice and ear training. For me lines are a crutch and a very poor one at that. I'd never own another lined fretless.
 
#59
bassmanford said:
Lined fretless basses are virtually unplayable for me, it's like looking at the LA freeway system..
Click to expand...
me too!

1 - yes: fretless only
2 - no: fully unlined
3 - i only play unlined: period!
4 - i would not purchase or attempt to play a lined fretless (i purchased a used lined FB once --- by the previous owner's defretting --- and tried to make it unlined: tinted epoxy)
5 - lined is unplayable for me: as in your own experience
 

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