Instant fretless bass?

[40Hz]

I don’t want to be guilty of rushing to judgement on this one. A lot of the sound you get would depend on the plastic they’re using and how snug the fit was. My Willcox Saber has a synthetic fingerboard. And it plays and sounds every bit as good as my other fretlesses with ebony and rosewood boards.

My gut tells me I probably wouldn’t like tapewounds with it. But rounds or pressurewounds might be a different story.

Hmm…for $50 I just might be tempted to take a small gamble and get one, just for its weirdness factor if nothing else.

 

[40Hz]

Does it tune up like you would expect? Are the fret lines under the material accurate to the notes?

The fret lines on virtually every fretless bass won’t be accurate over the entire neck anyway. So that’s not going to be an issue for a fretless player. We don’t rely on fret lines for good intonation. Because you can’t.

 

[40Hz]

This type of thing is just cringy to me. Like those guitar contraptions that allow you to press one button and play full chords.

What exactly makes it “cringy” for you? It bears zero resemblance in either form or function to that chording gadget you’re citing. It certainly won’t make you an instant fretless player. Nor does it claim to.

 

[lowfreqgeek]

I taught guitar students in the late 90s and had more than a few who's parents didn't want to make any investment, so they'd buy the cheapest, nastiest, steel string guitar they could find. The guitars were unplayable for 8-10yr old kids. 1/8" at the first fret, crooked nuts, misplaced frets, no truss rod, etc. Even with significant work, they couldn't be made to play comfortably or in tune.

Inevitably, very few of those kids were interested in playing because it was a bad experience. I couldn't do anything to make that physical experience better, and I tried.

If anyone *really* thinks this is going to give them a good taste of what fretless bass is all about for only $50, they'll more likely be run off by the experience. Besides the bridge issues, how do they account for the neck relief and fb radius? Is the plastic milled to account for the neck relief and fb radius, or does it tilt and squish and float as you press the strings against it? Do you swap it in and out between songs in a set, or just doodle with it at home?

I'm not ashamed to find it dumb and useless. There is no honor in pretending it's a useful product for anyone serious about fretless.

If you want to doodle at home and wonder what the big deal with fretless is, go ahead.

 

[40Hz]

So much hatred in this place at times.

Not so much ‘hatred’ (a term that’s so overused as to be virtually meaningless these days) as speculation in the absence of any real experience. A practice that somebody once described as “putting on your cool.”

And yes. you certainly can get a lot of that around here.

 

[bigjames]

You end up with a fretless that has a weirdly wide and thick neck, and to those 2 minutes you have to ad the time to rise the bridge to match the new fretboard and re set the intonation and pickup height acordingly (and do it all again when you want to switch back to fretted). And it won't even cover beyond the 14th fret for no aparent reason?
No wonder there's no love for this thing.

Get a cheap fretless, or defret a cheap bass. It will sound and feel better than this thing. Plus, you get a new bass!

Yeah. I think this would be the biggest issue...the need to completely change your intonation and saddle height to accommodate the accessory.

 

[40Hz]

I'm not ashamed to find it dumb and useless. There is no honor in pretending it's a useful product for anyone serious about fretless.

All that? Wow. I just looked at it, had a chuckle over its sheer zaniness, and thought it might be a fun goof to actually try it out. I must be mellowing big time in my old age.

I also think anyone who’s genuinely serious about taking up fretless bass is going to just go buy a fretless bass and (hopefully) take some lessons for it. With luck they’ll also bring their sense of humor along for the ride. Because you’ll need it for those occasional moments when your fretless simply doesn’t want to cooperate with you. And that can happen regardless of your level of experience on fretless. It just goes with the turf.

 

[jimmydean]

Could be a great idea if it sound good . I have just pulled the frets out of my CV PB and doing it the old fashion way ; taped neck , filled slots with plastic wood . Will sand excess down , remove tape and polish neck .......easy .

 

[KenSmithFan]

So much hatred in this place at times.

If they made one for Stingray 5 strings I’d for sure be picking one up. Even if it was $60, I’d rather spend that and try it than spend another $2000+ for a fretless SR5 that wouldn’t have fret lines.

So much sensitivity in this place.

This is an Internet forum where people post their opinions. Just because you don’t agree with someone, it doesn’t make them a hater.

Distain for an idea doesn’t even come close to hate. ;-)

 

[PennyroyalWe]

The bass with a jazz width neck that I own is already fretless, shucks

 

[Dincrest]

Seems like a trendy "wow cool!" thing, until you dig a little deeper.

1) setting it up takes time, especially to get the contraption under the strings at the nut, get the saddles on the bridge right... you'd pretty much have to do a full setup before using the thing.

2) portability. This isn't an easily collapsible thing you can take to a gig or session.

It's a highly inconvenient "solution" to a "problem" that creates more problems in the long run.

If you want a fretless, bite the bullet and invest the money in a decent fretless bass. Sometimes it's a better value to do things right than use cheap duct tape solutions.

 

[lowfreqgeek]

All that? Wow. I just looked at it, had a chuckle over its sheer zaniness, and thought it might be a fun goof to actually try it out. I must be mellowing big time in my old age.

I also think anyone who’s genuinely serious about taking up fretless bass is going to just go buy a fretless bass and (hopefully) take some lessons for it. With luck they’ll also bring their sense of humor along for the ride. Because you’ll need it for those occasional moments when your fretless simply doesn’t want to cooperate with you. And that can happen regardless of your level of experience on fretless. It just goes with the turf.

I might've overstated my ambivalence to the concept a bit just because of the pure silliness of equating "distaste" with "hatred". If thinking something is dumb is "hatred", well, I'll just be a "hater" cause I think a lot of things are dumb. Pretending every idea is valid is dumb.

It's zany, for sure. I wouldn't begrudge anyone who thought it was a fun novelty, but I wouldn't want anyone to think they were actually doing themselves a favor by substituting this contraption for a real fretless.

That's just my personal take.

 

[RVRSCO]

What exactly makes it “cringy” for you? It bears zero resemblance in either form or function to that chording gadget you’re citing. It certainly won’t make you an instant fretless player. Nor does it claim to.

It’s what I consider a gadget. In my own opinion. It looks cheap and allows you to do something difficult by spending less money. It just looks cheesy on an instrument. That’s just my opinion.

 

[jdjk7]

It’s what I consider a gadget. In my own opinion. It looks cheap and allows you to do something difficult by spending less money. It just looks cheesy on an instrument. That’s just my opinion.

If we wanted the experience of playing to be as difficult and manly as possible, we wouldn't have frets or amplifiers or light-gauge strings or bolt-on necks. There is no place to draw that line that is constructive and consistent, so I don't think it's a good reason.

 

[TrevorR]

I recall back in the early 80s a popular science TV show featured an inventor who had invented a way of swapping from fretted to fretless by turning a little key… for some reason, the inventor (or bass playing stooge - who can say?) energed from a shed in a cloud of dry ice, dressed like a pirate.

And, yes, I reckon that prototype is based on a Wal Bass!!!

 

[primussucks9126]

I bought the guitar one for my brother as a goofy gift so he can experiment with new sounds. I helped him set it up. It's definitely not just a drop in and play kinda thing.

It's not bad. For someone that has too many instruments and wants to try fretless I think it could be worth it.

 

[jd56hawk]

You know, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it might be good for someone who has two Jazz basses and wants to see what it'd be like to put this on one of them, maybe the one with the high action that he hasn't gotten around to addressing. I don't think it will be a matter of putting it on and taking it off, and putting it on and taking it off every day like a wristwatch.

 

[Five or Six]

I watched a demo on one of these a while back. I get the concept but, not a fan. Kinda like pockets on underwear.

 

[OldShark]

Isn't the real question whether it fits on an already fretless bass — in order to prevent further wear on the fingerboard?

 

[Thunderthumbs73]

So much hatred in this place at times.

If they made one for Stingray 5 strings I’d for sure be picking one up. Even if it was $60, I’d rather spend that and try it than spend another $2000+ for a fretless SR5 that wouldn’t have fret lines.

Yes.

And... I too would LOVE to hear how a fretless Stingray 5 could sound in my hands, through my own amp, through my normal fretless stylings because I can't find a fretless Stingray 5 anywhere to put my hands on and try before buying. If such a device for $60 could settle this long held quandary of should I or should I not do all the things I'm going to have to do to acquire a $2000-$3000 fretless Stingray 5 basically without otherwise ever being able to put my hands on one, then it seems $60 is a very reasonable price to pay.