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Show us your Martin Keith Basses

#321
So.....I reached out to Martin with a hypothetical fretless inquiry....and now I have a fretless 5 on order. I'm basically leaving it up to him so I don't know all of the details. Will be similar to @77stingray 's chambered 5 string fretless, but 33" scale, narrower string spacing and I believe a BigSplitMan around the P bass location. ...maybe a little closer to the bridge. Either LaBella black nylon strings (most likely) or LTF's. A fretless was the only thing missing for me to use. Unbelievably happy to be getting another masterpiece from Martin. No timeline...when it's finished it's finished. Will be a nice surprise when it comes around. :)
 
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#331
emjazz said:
Ooh...do you have a picture? Would love to see it!
Click to expand...

Keith and Veillette 01.jpg

It's of course the one on the left, which many of you may recognize. Both of my Keith's are pre-owned, though I do hope to have him build me one in the future. I sent this picture to him a while back as he was involved in building the Veillette on the right long ago, so I thought he'd get a kick out of it.

You can see some nicer pics in this old thread: No longer available - Martin Keith Elfin Plus Fretless

One of these days I'm going to either spray the on/off switch black or replace it with a typical volume knob.
 
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#332
Thanks to TalkBass I’ve tried way too many Basses. My Martin Keith fretless is my all time favorite. @gscroggin that one is a beauty I bet is sounds amazing. @emjazz you on a fretless = magic! Can’t wait to hear what you do with your semi hollow! Is it going to have the same body thickness as your first one?
 
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#333
77stingray said:
Thanks to TalkBass I’ve tried way too many Basses. My Martin Keith fretless is my all time favorite. @gscroggin that one is a beauty I bet is sounds amazing. @emjazz you on a fretless = magic! Can’t wait to hear what you do with your semi hollow! Is it going to have the same body thickness as your first one?
Click to expand...
I'm just giving Martin some information and letting him build whatever he feels will work for me. I believe this one will be more like your fretless design, but we'll see! To be honest, I haven't had a fretless in such a long time that he could build me most anything and I'll just run with it and play the heck out of it. The only thing that he's suggested to me to try is a Nordstrand BigSplitman somewhere in the middle. He heard that pickup in another bass and thought it was really cool. I have an inquiry in with Nordstrand about a pickup idea. If that doesn't pan out than BigSplitman it is. Whatever it turns out to be I know that Martin will make something inspiring. :)

And thank you!!
 
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#336
My favorite combo has always been chambered or semi hollow with black nylon strings with piezo in bridge and a citron pickup. I had a veillette with a DTar Eclipse preamp that blended the two really well. My MK has a Knoll blender. I really love the sound of the pickup and piezo blended. Rob Allen uses k & k piezo I think, not sure about other brands.
 
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#337
77stingray said:
My favorite combo has always been chambered or semi hollow with black nylon strings with piezo in bridge and a citron pickup. I had a veillette with a DTar Eclipse preamp that blended the two really well. My MK has a Knoll blender. I really love the sound of the pickup and piezo blended. Rob Allen uses k & k piezo I think, not sure about other brands.
Click to expand...
I'm going for more of an electric hybrid sound...so just a magnetic pickup or pickups, semi hollow and with black nylon strings.
 
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#338
emjazz said:
What pickup/pickups do you like for fretless? I'm pretty inexperienced with fretless. It seems everyone that has a bass from Martin has Citron pickups in their fretless bass.
Click to expand...

I was floored by the high output and dead silent nature of the Citron's in mine, especially for a passive bass. I tend to prefer an aggressive, bitey, mid-focused electric fretless sound, and this bass really delivers. I'm guessing it's the sum of the parts though; the wood, the pickups, the pickup placement, the coil switching options, the ToneStyler that was retrofit, the strings, etc. I also love the sound of my Veillette with tapes and a piezo, or my DB with a piezo, but those are a very different sound for a very different purpose.

Since you're planning on using nylon strings, I think that's going to be one of the most influential things in your overall sound. I've tried a few fretless basses that had different combo's of magnetic and piezo's. None of them wowed me as being super versatile, but to be fair all of them had tapes which obviously greatly influences the sound. Perhaps I would have felt/heard different if they had rounds or flats. Regardless I find electric fretless in general to kind of be like a P bass; it's distinctive and recognizable, you can make it fit if you want/have to, but it's not necessarily the best sounding flavor in all cases. That said the vid you posted on IG with your friend's fretless sounded great IMO. What was the config on that thing?
 
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#339
gscroggin said:
I was floored by the high output and dead silent nature of the Citron's in mine, especially for a passive bass. I tend to prefer an aggressive, bitey, mid-focused electric fretless sound, and this bass really delivers. I'm guessing it's the sum of the parts though; the wood, the pickups, the pickup placement, the coil switching options, the ToneStyler that was retrofit, the strings, etc. I also love the sound of my Veillette with tapes and a piezo, or my DB with a piezo, but those are a very different sound for a very different purpose.

Since you're planning on using nylon strings, I think that's going to be one of the most influential things in your overall sound. I've tried a few fretless basses that had different combo's of magnetic and piezo's. None of them wowed me as being super versatile, but to be fair all of them had tapes which obviously greatly influences the sound. Perhaps I would have felt/heard different if they had rounds or flats. Regardless I find electric fretless in general to kind of be like a P bass; it's distinctive and recognizable, you can make it fit if you want/have to, but it's not necessarily the best sounding flavor in all cases. That said the vid you posted on IG with your friend's fretless sounded great IMO. What was the config on that thing?
Click to expand...

I was just using the magnetic pickup in that video. It sounds good!
 
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#340
gscroggin said:
I tend to prefer an aggressive, bitey, mid-focused electric fretless sound, and this bass really delivers. I'm guessing it's the sum of the parts though; the wood, the pickups, the pickup placement, the coil switching options, the ToneStyler that was retrofit, the strings, etc.
Click to expand...

I have a Tonestyler in one of my passives, it's an amazing device. I don't play fretless, but I'm sure it works especially well for voicing the 'mwah'.
 
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