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Help me make my fretless sing PLEASE!!!

W

warwick89

Oct 6, 2009
86
3
#1
i guess this involves setup so i posted here. I got a fretless jazz with rosewood board. i put some new dunlop stainless rounds on it cuz i want it to sing/mwah.
like this
I understand how to play fretless vibrato etc.
even when i slide up to notes its not really mwahing. its kinda a thud.

My really question is, is this dude getting his mwahing because of his epoxy?
Im debating wheather or not to epoxy. So will epoxy and low setup give me that sound? im thinking maybe my soft rosewood is not giving me the sound i want.....

note: Im trying everthing. solo bridge pup, roll off a lil tone. reverb lil chorus. vibrato, rounds. (how low is low enough on my setup?)

Thanks. any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
#2
My recipe: Rounds(I prefer SS but saying so will likely derail this into a *SS rounds will destroy your fingerboard/no they won't* debate- sorry), favor the rear PU, pluck as horizontally as possible near the end of the neck(occasionally over the end)& bump the lows & low mids(more low-mids). That all said, a friend had a Yamaha TRBI-5IIf that would NOT mwah- we suspected the preamp, but IMO some basses do it better than others, and there may be a few that require a MASTER to get anything nice out of them. On that note- IMO, technique is a LARGE part of the equation.
 
#5
you don't need epoxy. rounds are ideal, and then you need the neck to be almost dead straight (as opposed to bowed forward) so that a nice long chunk of the string can vibrate slightly against the neck without buzzing.
 
#7
i dont need epoxy. ok. well i will try lowering the strings. i was thinking the were kinda high.

and as for rounds messing with boards; i played my bass with rounds for 10 songs at church sunday( 5 practice, 5 not-practice) and there are marks all over the board. just little scratches i guess. not large grooves from vibrato up and down.... so i may epoxy it anyway since i have some mirror coat.
 
#8
Here's my recipe:

- plane the neck dead straight while on a neck jig or something similar to simlulate string tension on the neck
- cut the nut down almost to the board
- keep the truss rod tight enough to make the neck almost perfectly straight
- lower the action at the bridge as low as possible

Rawk!
 
#9
i think you need to have it low enough where you'd normally get a decent amount of fretbuzz incase of a fretted bass, on a fretless when the string buzzes against the board you get that sound. but way way too low action wouldnt let the notes really ring out enough so you know when to back off
 
#10
theoretically having a straight unbowed neck makes a lot of sense- never thought of it that way. perhaps my luthier should adjust it differently than he would for my fretted basses.
i agree with the action being low, but not too low; you still need revolution for sustain, but low enuf that you get the mwah from the strings grazing the fretboard.
and of course- lotsa vibrato!
i have used rounds on my fretless for years and i have a wicked vibrato and there isn't much wear. it is a pau ferro board and i figure that to get my sound, i don't mind the cost of redoing the neck down the road.
 
#11
ok. i tighened the truss rod, it was really loose and lowered the string till it was too low then raised them just enough and it still doesnt seem like much. i even had to shim the neck up because i couldnt even get the string to bottom out with the saddles all the way down. EVery now and then a mwah will pop out. but thats like 1 out of a hundred slides.
I still cant believe it.

I doesnt really MWAH, even with playing over the neck butt and bridge pup soloed and tone rolled back a little.

im trying vibrato and such....

Other basses just mwah away, so i dont think its me.....

I still wanna know how much a difference an epoxy would make.

I want the sound of a Pedulla pentabuzz, based on youtube videos.

I dont know.
i dont think its my amp, cuz im playing through guitar rig 3 software and have trying all the jaco tricks, chorus verb, ect.
nota.

:scowl::atoz:
 
#12
Hey folks, I found this thread when I was about to defret by bass. So great timing!

For me if I solo EITHER or neither pickup I get very little mwah. I only get good mwah if I turn just a little toward the bridge side. We're talking just back of center. I'm even using flats (Cromes) and it's very acceptable to me. I didn't get a lot of help from the tone knobs, for me it was all about the pickups (it does help to play just onto the neck too). I love it because this means that I can sort of turn the mwah on and off, even mid-song.

PS My board is also unfinished rosewood and almost perfectly staight.
 

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