Fretless Metal

[456Spectwick]

I have yet to see anyone mention this band or style of music. Sooooooo Opinions?

 

[Hamlet7768]

Not a huge fan of technical death metal (actually, not a fan at all), but right up until the growler started growling I was sold. Don't think I've ever seen techdeath involving tapping on a fretless bass. Rather impressive, and a good sound.

 

[bassmeknik]

really?

Sort of cool seeing a fretless used this way... The singing (if it can be called that) turns me off. Good playing though.

 

[456Spectwick]

Yeah I'm not really a fan of the looooong drawn out shred fest or the monotone death vocals but I found the playing interesting enough to hear the whole song.

 

[The Hobo of Oz]

I really don't like the growling, but the bass parts are really cool! Fade by Aghora is also a song with some fretless bass, I preffer that one because noone growls in it, haha!

 

[Zanzibar Delgado]

I've heard:

Sean Malone
Jeroen Thesseling
Joe Lester
Robin Zielhorst
Steve DiGiorgio
Forest LaPointe
The guys in Opeth (sometimes)
The dude in Porcupine Tree (sometimes)
Lars Norberg

Anybody know of any other predominantly fretless players in metal? Particularly interested in black and doom metal.

 

[MethodsofDance]

Of course, you can't have a thread on this subject without posting *the* defining moment of fretless bass in metal :



I'm also a big fan of Sean Malone's playing on Cynic's "Focus"

 

[Clef_de_fa]

Yeah Beyond Creation is something and a band from my City.

This is the bass player :

 

[edpal]

I thought the fretless tones were cool within that genre but generally felt the tapping and much of the bass player's other hand movements were strictly for show and the camera. Within that type of a heavy overall sonic wave tapping on a fretless with the inherently faster note decay seems a little pointless. To me. Tapping solos are kind of cool. I like tapping where I get to pull off something that would otherwise require 3 arms.

 

[Kragnorak]

I love playing fretless in metal. I just posted a track from the late 90s where I used my 6-string Aria Pro II Avante. I'm debating whether to resurrect this bass currently. The pickups and pre-amp in it are inferior so I stopped using it.

This is nothing like Forest LaPointe, but the solo section is really fun!

 

[BrBss]

Surprised that Linus Klausenitzer from Obscura hasn't been mentioned.

 

[Huge]

That was good. Would listen again.

 

[eyvindwa]

Great player, but the music is a little too 'polished' or 'pretty' for my tastes when it comes to death metal. To me, the ultimate fretless death metal bass playing has to be this:

 

[beebassdude]

Death had the big time fretless player. i personally think it sounds awful and silly and detracts from the music, but the guy can play. had he played that stuff on a fretted it would have been awesome, instead all his lines are honked all over the place with goofy slides haha.

 

[jon36992002]

Flavius Misarăș from Dor De Duh is pretty frequent fretless player

 

[jon36992002]

Also, Forest is awesome and has been a major inspiration in my fretless playing. His tone in that video is straight Jaco IMO.

 

[Thomas Kievit]

I've seen that video a couple of times, nice stuff they've got.

I think they are (heavily) influenced by Obscura. Their ex-bassist, Jeroen Paul Thesseling, is a pioneer of the fretless metal bass players.

 

[Kragnorak]

Death had the big time fretless player. i personally think it sounds awful and silly and detracts from the music, but the guy can play. had he played that stuff on a fretted it would have been awesome, instead all his lines are honked all over the place with goofy slides haha.

I couldn't disagree more! I love Steve's playing, and I think Individual Thought Patterns sounds superior to Human in large part because the bass is mixed higher...

 

[Clef_de_fa]

Death had the big time fretless player. i personally think it sounds awful and silly and detracts from the music, but the guy can play. had he played that stuff on a fretted it would have been awesome, instead all his lines are honked all over the place with goofy slides haha.

Funny I'm your opposite. Fretted bass has a tendency to disapear because they put to much overdirve/distortion and copy the guitar line. At least this guy can be heard and quite well and he also do some arrangement which add a lot to the music instead of two lines or just a wall where eveyrone play the same thing like Cannibalcorpse

 

[Zanzibar Delgado]

Flavius Misarăș from Dor De Duh is pretty frequent fretless player

Thank you for this! I love Negura Bunget and totally forgot that this project existed.