Ibanez are going fanned frets right now. Alas, only 5-6 string. Which means that they will surely be available in any shop from now on. So you can test drive if fanned frets are for you or not, without ever having to buy any Ibanez.
Anecdotal from another one trying out my 5er Dingwall at a local jam a couple of years back, when the Combustion just came out:
One of my jamming mates came up after a tune, from the back of the stage, and I just handed over the Combustion to him hanged it over his shoulders in a hurry. He didn't know what it was. It's a 5er. When he did look down, the dots and lines lined up as ususal. Now, a regular blues jam maybe not be the jam that challenges your skills or tricky parts on bass. But he played it while looking down on the neck. A consumate pro who didn't give and f* of what brands or bass he played on.
Now, two long songs later, he left it over to me again, and jumped down from the stage, and sat down at the coffe tables on front of stage, for the first time of the evening watching anything on stage from the audience point of view. When I started to play the next tune, I could see his jaw dropping when he stared at the bass he was just playing on and one could read the "What the f*...!?" expression on his face, and a huge laugh from him. Afterwards he came forth and asked a lots of questions, but the main thing, that he hadn't even tried to adapt. He was in awe. He didn't even notice it was a fanned fret when playing. He never heard of it before.
The only closest thing I can compare to is this:
a) It takes a lot longer to get comfy with a 5er if you've never played a 5er before, than getting used to fan fret. I mean a regular fretted 5er. If you just played 4ers before.
b) The fingering down at the first few frets, is comparable to fretting a fretless bass (regular frets or scaling so to speak). On a fretless you just have to spread the fingers a tiny bit more in order to press down at where the frets are really supposed to be, in order to play octaves, since you can't play "in between" the frets, you have to nail the exact spot. It's aikin to fanned fret fretting. Thus, I can guess that a fanned fret fretless (!?!?) would be something of a chore.
Anecdotal from another one trying out my 5er Dingwall at a local jam a couple of years back, when the Combustion just came out:
One of my jamming mates came up after a tune, from the back of the stage, and I just handed over the Combustion to him hanged it over his shoulders in a hurry. He didn't know what it was. It's a 5er. When he did look down, the dots and lines lined up as ususal. Now, a regular blues jam maybe not be the jam that challenges your skills or tricky parts on bass. But he played it while looking down on the neck. A consumate pro who didn't give and f* of what brands or bass he played on.
Now, two long songs later, he left it over to me again, and jumped down from the stage, and sat down at the coffe tables on front of stage, for the first time of the evening watching anything on stage from the audience point of view. When I started to play the next tune, I could see his jaw dropping when he stared at the bass he was just playing on and one could read the "What the f*...!?" expression on his face, and a huge laugh from him. Afterwards he came forth and asked a lots of questions, but the main thing, that he hadn't even tried to adapt. He was in awe. He didn't even notice it was a fanned fret when playing. He never heard of it before.
The only closest thing I can compare to is this:
a) It takes a lot longer to get comfy with a 5er if you've never played a 5er before, than getting used to fan fret. I mean a regular fretted 5er. If you just played 4ers before.
b) The fingering down at the first few frets, is comparable to fretting a fretless bass (regular frets or scaling so to speak). On a fretless you just have to spread the fingers a tiny bit more in order to press down at where the frets are really supposed to be, in order to play octaves, since you can't play "in between" the frets, you have to nail the exact spot. It's aikin to fanned fret fretting. Thus, I can guess that a fanned fret fretless (!?!?) would be something of a chore.
