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Fretwraps: Cheating?

#26
I view it the same way I view everything else... If a bassist were to come up to me after a show and say I was 'cheating' using a fret wrap, I would kindly remind him/her that he's talking (stuff) sitting in the audience while I'm on stage. We should always strive to better ourselves as players in every way, but none of us has anything to prove to anyone. Use what works for you.
 
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#27
Yes.

Fretwraps are great for stuff like tapping, and also for stuff like needing to play a capo'd drone bass note and also a high-range passage. You might think, who'd ever do that? ...but maybe the person who invented fretwraps wanted to. For a while, I was doing that on a 7-string bass with a small group, and it was kinda awesome. (the bass is really heavy though)

IMHO, when you get into 6+ string basses and/or get into unconventional technique, having a fretwrap on hand can make practical some passages that would otherwise just be frustrating or even impossible. It's a wonderful tool for creative musicmaking.
 
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#29
Some folks were asking for pics, so here are some. Unfortunately they've all I've got left of the bass now since @phillipkregg shopped me to the BPEA and they came round and confiscated it.

Next to my old EDC:
ng3-3-20.jpg

Me, freaked our by the awesomeness right after unpacking it:
ng3-matt-40.jpg


Seriously: thanks for the advice. As a newcomer to this forum (and bassery in general) I've found it welcoming and helpful. I'm a bit of an anal-retentive learn-by-the-book kind of guy (~30 years in the martial arts, what can I say?) so I have a tendency to overthink the technical aspects. Going to get the wrap, as I'll hopefully be good enough to record some stuff soon and I think it will help especially with the crazy harmonics I'm getting in the middle of the fretboard. Main goal will still be to ace my muting technique.
 
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#32
In my experience, when I came across any musical problem, the long term best way is to deal with it the hard way. If you help yourself with wrap, you will learn the muting techniques much slower, because you will not be forced to. Better basses are more demanding fingerwise, because they can play more sound colors. But when you learn to deal with it, you will have many more colors at your disposal.

So I'd say, use the wraps if you will for gigs, but at home, practise the hard way.

Also, with a new bass, there always are issues due to the fact that you don't know the character of the bass. Give it some weeks before you buy the wraps.

All above, of course, doesn't apply if you use the wraps for what they are intended for - two hand tapping etc.
 
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#33
jj.833 said:
In my experience, when I came across any musical problem, the long term best way is to deal with it the hard way. If you help yourself with wrap, you will learn the muting techniques much slower, because you will not be forced to. Better basses are more demanding fingerwise, because they can play more sound colors. But when you learn to deal with it, you will have many more colors at your disposal.

So I'd say, use the wraps if you will for gigs, but at home, practise the hard way.

Also, with a new bass, there always are issues due to the fact that you don't know the character of the bass. Give it some weeks before you buy the wraps.

All above, of course, doesn't apply if you use the wraps for what they are intended for - two hand tapping etc.
Click to expand...
QFT.
 
#36
Anatosuchus said:
Just got my new Dingwall six on Tuesday and as expected I'm going to need to work hard on my muting technique. Not as expected, this bass is way more prone to ringing than my Ibanez five string - far beyond the fact that there's an extra C on there, it just seems to be way more "alive" or finely balanced and picks up a stack more sympathetic noise from pretty much everything I do.

Obviously the final goal is for me to be so great at muting that it doesn't matter, but short term I find myself eyeing up those neat Fretwrap things. My worry is that this will make me lazy and I'll come to rely on using one instead of sorting myself out.

So, what are your opinions or experience of wraps? Should I suck up more noise in the short term and make sure I work to avoid it or is wrapping not such a crime?
Click to expand...
If the bass has an active/passive switch is there a big difference in volume between the two? If so, does it ring out as much in passive mode? If the bass has an internal trim pot, lower that and see if the results are the same. Aside from that, the bass may produce more harmonics which will require an improved muting technique. You can try an LPF or turn down your tone knob and see if that helps.
 
#37
Wraps are best incorporated when you are not using open strings. On a 5 I move the anchor, I use the thumb to mute the resting string and the top/side surface to mute the string above. I'm not fond of floating thumb without an anchor, it sounds a bit too light.
 
#38
Fret wraps are k, just another tool. Might be better to learn muting from either hand as I do. You’ll be rewarded with many tonal and amount of mutingS applied. Fret wrap give one option.
 

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