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I need a new fretless, any thoughts ???

#61
LePL said:
-5-pc neck: is it really worth paying an additional $100-200?
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In my opinion, absolutely. Multi-laminated necks are stronger, and more stable, making them less likely to require seasonal truss rod adjustments. I like my fretless necks about as flat as I can get them, and I'd lose my mind if I had to adjust the truss rod every several weeks to maintain that. Plus, they're less likely to warp, so it's a good piece of mind as well.
LePL said:
-hard as nails fretless finish: I'm quite sure that's what I want given the sound I'm after, but $250 seems a bit much... Do you think a local luthier might do the same kind of thing for cheaper?
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It is a little much, but a local guy would probably still charge at least $150. I'd rather get it sent from the factory, covered with warranty, with a finish that I want than dealing of the hassle of someone else doing it for a little bit cheaper. Also, their finish isn't just an epoxy finish. I believe it's either super glue or gloss poly (like Pedulla's). This is nearly bullet proof... And yes, this is the sound you're after.
LePL said:
-piezo pickup: not too sure about this one, it does sound interesting and adds a brittle top-end attack to the sound that might help the bass cut through the mix... Thoughts on this?
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Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of piezo's on solid body basses. They're much more worthwhile in a semi-hollow/acoustic in my opinion. They do add a brittle top-end attack but I think a decent bridge pickup with the right frequencies EQ'd in would get better results... I think the piezo brightness might be a little too high. A frequency peak in 1kHz is perfect IMO to emphasize mwah/growl. A peak around 3kHz is good for a nice attack. Anything higher than that will likely get lost in the distorted guitars, and to my ears a piezo-pickup can be in that range.
LePL said:
-pickups: I actually don't know how Carvin pickups sound. For those who do, do you think the radiused humbuckers are good for the sound I'm after or would you recommend a different configuration?
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Sorry, I've never played a Carvin so I can 't help you there. Humbuckers are mandatory on a fretless for me so I can solo the bridge pickup without any 60 cycle hum, but I want ones that are bright and somewhat maintain the single coil sound. I'm not sure if these do or not. I also like the idea of radiused pickups as it helps balance the output between all of the strings... But I'd rather have a bright single-coil like sounding humbucker than a radiused pickup.
 
#62
LePL said:
Thanks for all the comments about our band's new album! As BioWeapon pointed out, we are a French band with only French lyrics. I was living in Chicago at the time I joined TB and just forgot to update my location to France when I came back :)
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That might change things for the Carvin. Unless it changed, I had heard that the overseas pricing is not very friendly.

LePL said:
I've tried to build an instrument on their site and here's what I came up with: Icon (or maybe LB, they both look good) with walnut body, 1-piece maple neck, standard radiused humbuckers. There are however a few things I'm not quite sure about:
-5-pc neck: is it really worth paying an additional $100-200?
-hard as nails fretless finish: I'm quite sure that's what I want given the sound I'm after, but $250 seems a bit much... Do you think a local luthier might do the same kind of thing for cheaper?
-piezo pickup: not too sure about this one, it does sound interesting and adds a brittle top-end attack to the sound that might help the bass cut through the mix... Thoughts on this?
-pickups: I actually don't know how Carvin pickups sound. For those who do, do you think the radiused humbuckers are good for the sound I'm after or would you recommend a different configuration?
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5 piece: I live here in SoCal where Carvins are made, and I never got any thing other than a 1 piece neck and have had no problems. But I'm not sure how much the climate varies where you are, so it may factor in more.
Hard as nails: Are you going to use round wounds?
Piezo: I had one of their basses with the piezo, but rarely if ever used it.
Humbuckers: I have the RAD-H humbuckers in my fretless and I like them. But tone is soooooo relative so don't take anything I say as anything other than my opinion.
 
#63


[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
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I found [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] for you, in Japan - all ready to go and in tip top, A grade condition, for approximately 480 euro + shipping etc. Almost the same as the one I posted earlier, #52. Get some good pedals to shape the signal and you're good to go - with the option to go Back to the (Fender) Future in any number of possible directions.

PS: Sunburst basses don't photograph well. They look excellent in reality. Much better.
 
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#64
Tom Bomb said:

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
​
I found [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] for you, in Japan - all ready to go and in tip top, A grade condition, for approximately 480 euro + shipping etc. Almost the same as the one I posted earlier, #52. Get some good pedals to shape the signal and you're good to go - with the option to go Back to the (Fender) Future in any number of possible directions.

PS: Sunburst basses don't photograph well. They look excellent in reality. Much better.
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YIKES!! that's one of the worst paint jobs ive ever seen, crappy fade work and they left out the orange on the lower horn, if the finish quality is any indicator of the rest of the bass that things not worth the firewood it's made of.
 
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#65
gpx1200 said:
YIKES!! that's one of the worst paint jobs ive ever seen, crappy fade work and they left out the orange on the lower horn, if the finish quality is any indicator of the rest of the bass that things not worth the firewood it's made of.
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I think the missing orange on the lower bout is typical of what Fender did a number of years ago. If the pickguard was on it would be covered up. But I do agree, I've never liked that look on basses intended to be played without a pickguard.
 
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#66
GBassNorth said:
I think the missing orange on the lower bout is typical of what Fender did a number of years ago. If the pickguard was on it would be covered up. But I do agree, I've never liked that look on basses intended to be played without a pickguard.
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aahh didn't think of the pick guard, I have a habit of disregarding anything I don't like from the list of posabilitys. they must use a template to do the fades and apparently they don't have one for the lower horn
 
#67
For reference…
jacoenlarge.jpg
 
#69
The newest Carvin pickups and electronics are great. i got the chance to play a fretted Vanquish 5 string the other night. It had the Radiused humbuckers with standard preamp. It sounded killer and played just perfectly.

The more I think about it the more I think a Carvin might be the bass for you. I'd take a look at the models and do a little research.
 
#70
Basically Bob said:
View attachment 621416
I supplied the hardware (Hipshot) & pups (Nordstrand). A local luthier carved the neck to my specs and put it together for me. Total cost was just over $1,500. Cured my gas.
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Is that a Big Single or a Big Split at the bridge? How's it play with the P? How's the balance between the pups? I've considered that configuration before.
 
#72
Mystic Michael said:
While I freely admit my personal bias in instruments here, I'd say what you're describing is a Carvin...with the one exception that you won't have to pay $2,500 to get one - a very, very nice one - and very likely won't have to pay even as much as $2,000. For as nice as Carvin's fretted basses usually are, I'd say that they're fretless basses are even a bit better. Given the close tolerances in which a good fretless set-up must perform, Carvin's precision CNC construction really gives them the edge there.

As for the other items on your wish list, they're all either stock features on Carvin instruments, or readily available as an option - including some desirable things that you haven't even mentioned: neck-through construction, dual passive humbucker or single-coil pickups (with the front pickup not too close to the fingerboard), active electronics, ebony fingerboard, epoxy fingerboard finish, piezoelectric system, etc. etc.

I own three (3) fretless Carvin basses thus far, and I can tell you: they're nice. :cool:

MM
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Mystic Michael said:
While I freely admit my personal bias in instruments here, I'd say what you're describing is a Carvin...with the one exception that you won't have to pay $2,500 to get one - a very, very nice one - and very likely won't have to pay even as much as $2,000. For as nice as Carvin's fretted basses usually are, I'd say that they're fretless basses are even a bit better. Given the close tolerances in which a good fretless set-up must perform, Carvin's precision CNC construction really gives them the edge there.

As for the other items on your wish list, they're all either stock features on Carvin instruments, or readily available as an option - including some desirable things that you haven't even mentioned: neck-through construction, dual passive humbucker or single-coil pickups (with the front pickup not too close to the fingerboard), active electronics, ebony fingerboard, epoxy fingerboard finish, piezoelectric system, etc. etc.

I own three (3) fretless Carvin basses thus far, and I can tell you: they're nice. :cool:

MM
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#75
Sorry your bass got stolen man. I still remember how bad I felt when our rehearsal space got broken into and cleaned out in '91, and I lost a guitar my dad (who passed in '90) had bought me and it gutted me. Hope you somehow get that Peavey back.
 
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#76
That might change things for the Carvin. Unless it changed, I had heard that the overseas pricing is not very friendly.
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Yeah, that's actually a very good point... I don't know what I was thinking but I forgot to take import taxes to France into consideration when I looked at their prices. It would still be a pretty good deal, I could get the kind of bass I want out of them for around $1300 but with shipping and taxes that would amount to 1600 €, which is not bad but not as great as I had thought at first. That also means I probably won't pick the fretless finish option if I decide to go for Carvin because that would bump up the price by around 300€ and I'm pretty sure a local luthier could do it for way less.

So I'll first look into used instruments I can find in my vicinity. There aren't that many unfortunately but I'll get to try a Roscoe bass I talked about in my previous post this weekend and it might be a very good deal. Here's a link once again: Invalid Link Removed

The post doesn't say too much but I called the guy who told me that it is an LG, with the standard bartolini pickups and electronics. Price is 1200€ which would make it significantly less expensive than a new Carvin. What I don't like about it though, is that at the moment it is strung with flatwounds and I prefer the sound of rounds on fretless. Do you think it's a big deal and that I should ask the guy to try it out with roundwounds?

If that bass doesn't do it, the whole discussion about epoxy finishes got me into thinking that if I could find a local guy who could do it for me for relatively cheap, maybe I should just get an Ibanez Portamento, which I know I could get from a European store for around 900€, instead of a Carvin, and have the fingerboard coated. I'm not sure but I assume that the difference between a rosewood and an ebony fingerboard would not really matter once the fingerboard is coated, and assuming that I could get that kind of finish for about 100€, that would still make the Ibanez quite a lot cheaper than the Carvin.

Well anyway, thanks for all the recommendations. I'll let you know what I go for in the end but unless I buy the used Roscoe this weekend it might take a while because I absolutely want to play on a five-string fretless before buying one new. I'm actually going to borrow a five-string Ibanez Gary Willis signature fretless from a friend for a while and I'm pretty sure that will help me decide what I want.

P.S.: I'm actually not that interested in Jazz basses for two reasons: 1- I think it's close to the tone I want but that it's not quite there, I really mean to get a bass with a bridge humbucker, and 2- I already own a fretted JB, so I'd like my fretless to have a somewhat different tone, and if I ever want to get a fretless JB, I'll probably just have mine defretted.
 
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#78
LePL said:
The post doesn't say too much but I called the guy who told me that it is an LG, with the standard bartolini pickups and electronics. Price is 1200€ which would make it significantly less expensive than a new Carvin. What I don't like about it though, is that at the moment it is strung with flatwounds and I prefer the sound of rounds on fretless. Do you think it's a big deal and that I should ask the guy to try it out with roundwounds?
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When I got my Roscoe it had MTD flats on it - nice strings but not what I wanted. I switched to roundwounds and am MUCH happier with them.

When I switched, I had to do a setup on the bass, so asking the guy to change strings if you are just checking out the bass might not be a good idea.

Dan
 
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