+1 Steve, that's a really nice looking bass. It looks very much influenced by TB'er Gard, who I know went from Bass Central to Roscoe. I have his old Zon Special that he gave up when he went to Roscoe.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
I thought playing fretless was easy!
- Thread starter Emanuel Apascaritei
- Start date
Good luck! Fretless takes daily practice to keep up on intonation. I use a bit of upright bass crab-claw technique a la Simandl. That hand position and way of shifting makes sense to me and helps with intonation. A bit of chorus helps even out intonation as well, but don't practice with it.
Totally agree, and with others who commented on my post that I USED to play sloppy between frets. It was getting the lined fretless where I figured out that I needed to play right up close to the lines to be in tune, and then I transferred that back to my fretted playing to have them be the same and found that this made my fretted tone cleaner. This was all part of relearning bass from the ground up after already playing (badly) for 35 years. Even if you don't play a fretless with others I found it great just as a learning device. I do drills from "Bass Fitness" with the Petersen Stobe tuner app running and try to keep the lines from moving.
Yeah, this is actually my 2nd 5 string fretless. I sold one almost identical to this a while ago so I have them make me this one to replace it. Two of the finest fretless basses I have played. I know Gard has one similar in spec to this. The "secret" is the mahogany body and the "JB" pickup placement. Not a better fretless out there if you ask me. Plays itself and can go from full on mwah to a nice "fretted like" staccato. My fretted bass - another amazing "custom" built for me Roscoe - doesn't see as much action these days.
I had nothing to do with that bass. Nope. Nothing at all. Nada. Nicht. Nien. Zero. Zip. Zilch.
(....good to know it's still with you, that Zon was a great bass, and definitely influenced my tastes going forward.
)
My bass is similar, but with a swamp ash body, instead of mahogany. The NEXT one will be mahogany....and headless.
Outstanding! Glad we got that straight!I had nothing to do with that bass. Nope. Nothing at all. Nada. Nicht. Nien. Zero. Zip. Zilch.
(....good to know it's still with you, that Zon was a great bass, and definitely influenced my tastes going forward.
I haven't had a fretless in a few years but had one as my main bass for quite sometime.I love 'em.It all comes with practice then it will be like riding a bike.
Absolutely. The problems with intonation really begin when the open strings are in tune, but as you move up the neck the gap increases until you have to finger each string in a different position. What a mess. When you're off a little bit it throws you, when it's really pronounced you're ready to throw it into the wood stove.
You should compare notes with Sting. Doesn't he have the same basic story except it was a Sam Ash? Except he just showed up at a gig with the thing and played.
I *was* thinking about moving out my Carvin Walnut 5 string fretless as I hadn't payed it in a while in favor of a Squier VM Jazz I picked up, but inspired by this thread I was playing it at my lunch time practice session and now I don't think so.
One thing to avoid is playing a fretted bass with one scale length then picking up a fretless with a slightly different one. An example would be 34" and 33 1/4". You get used to the spacing for where the notes are on the fretted bass, but where you think they should be and where they actually are on the fretless are just enough off to really screw you up.
Playing *any* bass well is hard. Fretless is just a bit harder.... or put another way - it's easy to sound *awful* on a fretless. But if you keep at it, you'll get good. It's just a matter of practice.
Right. There are some basses out there that are almost unplayable because the setup is so far off. Easy enough to fix, but still...
When I gravitated to a fretless, I really had no problems whatsoever. First one was a poopy old poplar body Carvin with a lined board. Hated the tone, and perhaps concentrated too much on looking at the lines. Got rid of it. Now I play an old G&L L1000 and G&L SB-2: both fretless, unlined. From looking at the way a lot of upright players play, I've started incorporating more vibrato. Not like a douche, but just enough to find the note. Helps a lot when I'm singing and playing at the same time. "Sour" notes are part of playing a fretless, if you even want to call them sour.
A tool I use to practice intonation without having to look at the fretboard is garage band on any mac/ipad/iphone
set up for either keys or strings to do arpeggios in a particular key (example G) id then just go through the neck and play every G and try to land directly on the note (no sliding into it) do that up and down the neck several times you wont second guess yourself after a while..
side note: im going through something similar currently with my new 6 string. ive only ever been a 4 string guy and now went to ERB. its more about getting the new strings under the fingers and comfortable.
set up for either keys or strings to do arpeggios in a particular key (example G) id then just go through the neck and play every G and try to land directly on the note (no sliding into it
) do that up and down the neck several times you wont second guess yourself after a while..side note: im going through something similar currently with my new 6 string. ive only ever been a 4 string guy and now went to ERB. its more about getting the new strings under the fingers and comfortable.
Yes. I had two Ken Bebensee 6 string fretless basses that were 35.25" scale which were used for gigging when I was younger. Later I got a Status Graphite 6 string fretless and a Jazz 4 string fretless, both 34" scale. Those ended being used more often and I would practice a lot with the KBs to stretch out my fingers and when it came time to gig the shorter 34" scale basses seemed so much easier to play. I sold the two KBs not too long ago and just acquired a Status Graphite 5 string fretless with 32" scale. As jamro217 points out, things get kind of weird with the muscle memory and beyond the 12th fret things get kinda tight. But I am really enjoying the shorter scale and its been a lot easier on my aging hands. I've always like the cleaner look of no lines.
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
Fret lines are handy to ward off any band leader who "doesn't want a fretless". With a little more relief (more akin to a fretted than the usual fretless neck relief) you can get rid of most of the mwah too. I've got mine setup somewhere in between so I can coax out mwah if and when I want it.
Mine is set where I can go either way pretty easily. The mwah comes easy though so I do have to b careful.
- Jul 30, 2006
- 2,315
- 453
- Disclosures
- Endorsing artist:Regenerate Guitar Works Carvin, Micheal Kelly Guitars
Yeah, Sting does a lot of the same things I do. I never saw him play fretless except in pictures. Respect to him. I used to do a lot of bass tracks for a certain producer . One day I showed up with a fretless and he got this screwed up look on his mug. He expressed doubt about my intonation. I told him to let me cut a track and then see if I was in tune. I was. Never heard another word about it.
