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The Fretless Club (Part 2!)

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#142
BassBus said:
Interesting bass. What is it and what are all the switches for?
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It is a custom CB bass. The black switches are for the nordstrand dual coil pickups (series/parallel/single coil). The silver switches are for the preamp... Active/Passive switch, Z mode switch, and three way mid frequency selector switch. 3 band eq. All the bells and whistles. It is so nice to have such a great fretless. ;):bassist:
 
#143
Two Precisions, on the left a '78 maple neck fretless, which I've had from new. It's had roundwounds on for most of it's 30 years, but the maple board shows very little wear beneath the strings and it plays like a dream, having the lowest action of any of my basses. I've still got the original black pickguard and PU covers, but liked the idea of a tortoise-shell PG/cream PU cover combination. These cream PU covers were originally white - the matching aged effect came from being left for a week in a cup of strong coffee!

The bass on the left is a '91 Fender Precision A/E [acoustic/electric], made in Japan, though the neck plate has "Fender USA". (I think they were planned for production in the US and the early ones had American-made parts but were assembled in Japan. Several of these early examples only have "Fender" on the headstock without the "Precision A/E"" logo). Unamplified, it's not as loud as a standard acoustic bass guitar, but I'm practicing fretless a lot more now I don't have to plug in.

Fender-Fretless-Basses.jpg
 
#152
CaracasBass said:
Fender-Fretless-Basses.jpg

Lovin´your Precision A/E, never seen one of those before. How does it sounds compared to your "normal" P-bass?
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The main difference would be that the Precision A/E has a wider range of sounds than the maple-necked Precision. It's active, and features both a Lace Sensor split PU in addition to a piezo pickup in the acoustic-style bridge. The three pots are Volume, Tone (cut & boost) and Pan, which blends between the 2 pickups. The Lace Sensor on it's own produces a tone not unlike a classic p-bass, though the new nylon-covered strings make it difficult to do a direct comparison with the maple neck bass, which has an old set of roundwounds on it. The piezo on its own make the bass sound very much like a standard amplified acoustic bass guitar, with plenty of cut. The most useful tones seem to be ones which use the blend knob at various positions. Plucking the string near the end of the fingerboard can produce a reasonable walking double bass sound.

Generally speaking, I'd say the solid p-bass is better for rock, and the A/E better for jazz.
 
#154
yep I have my fretless on order,... for some weird reason the suppliers aren't stocking any Ibanez GWB35's to australia for public sales so had to order it in,... was going to take until september to come in but now said it may come even earlier so I'm happy with that!

AUD 1355,... by comparison my K5 cost me AUD 1450 on special,... not sure what that equates into USD but it seems we always pay ALOT more in comparison to other countries (even with conversion's factored in,... like I can get a 300 AUD pedal for about 220 USD with shipping and a bad conversion rate (I think it was 65cents to the USD)

still, fretless 5 string with tight string spacing and 24 frets etc,... all that I want, and much cheaper than anything if I tried to get a custom job.... I certainly aint complaining at all!
 
#155
I've got a washburn xb120 fretless, which I got to save having to lug the double bass around everywhere with me - but, have now quite taken to the guitar as well, and have two basses!!!!

The question I have been dying to ask people is - why do some fretless basses look like they've got frets on? They seem to have some sort of line or something in photos, and, I've never seen any here to actually find out what they are!

Please forgive my ignorance - I'm sure there's a really simple reason ...

Let me know if I've got a number for Rupert - who's all black, apart from sandalwood colour up the back of the neck and around the head - very goovy.
 
#156
caillean said:
The question I have been dying to ask people is - why do some fretless basses look like they've got frets on? They seem to have some sort of line or something in photos, and, I've never seen any here to actually find out what they are!

Please forgive my ignorance - I'm sure there's a really simple reason ...
Click to expand...

Those are just fretlines. Thin strips of wood or plastic are inlaid into the fingerboard at the same locations as the frets would be- a (usually) more accurate place to put your finger than using just the side dots (side dots are great but don't help as much when playing on the higher strings as they won't line up with where the point of intonation will be- this is more noticeable on extended range basses). They give the player another visual reference to use when playing. There are more lined fretlesses out there than unlined. Neither is better than the other- as with most things, going lined or unlined is just personal preference.
 
#157
Here's my Franken-Fretless: It's an SX jazz body and neck. I put on Schaller tuners, BAII bridge, warmoth plates, 1/4 Pound Pups and wired up the electronics myself.

the thing has a pretty interesting tone... very organic and woody. The paint job is a crap one but I think it adds some character. I've got a black pickguard that I need to file down to get it to fit, but I've been playing it open like that for a while now. She's got a lot of character, I think. And she's fun to play.

Sorry for the terrible pictures!

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That's her on the left there:

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joe
 
#158
Bryan R. Tyler said:
Those are just fretlines. Thin strips of wood or plastic are inlaid into the fingerboard at the same locations as the frets would be- a (usually) more accurate place to put your finger than using just the side dots (side dots are great but don't help as much when playing on the higher strings as they won't line up with where the point of intonation will be- this is more noticeable on extended range basses). They give the player another visual reference to use when playing. There are more lined fretlesses out there than unlined. Neither is better than the other- as with most things, going lined or unlined is just personal preference.
Click to expand...

At last, a balanced, rational opinion about the lined/unlined debate. Well done Bryan. :hyper:
 
#159
I am, indeed, awesome ;) :D
Now for another gratuitous display of my fretless- a lined one with side dots located where side dots would be on an unlined (under the lines):
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#160
...if you're like me, you need those babies!!

As a new fretless (and I use this term very loosely) player, I really rely on those lines to get me through the transition from fretted-only to unlined fretless. I've sampled myself on fretted and fretless over a performance setting on my new B-DEC, and I'm all over the place!

Interestingly my struggle, and continuing on Bryan's point, is that it's much more difficult to sound good on the top end than the bottom. Perhaps only restating the obvious, there is far less room for intonation error the higher up the neck you play. Thus "staying on the lines" is helpful.

I often start a line very low and move my way up the neck. I'm usually "on tone" up to about the 10th "fret" before I begin to hear my tendency to play sharp as I go higher. Hopefully patience and practice will correct that over time.

thankful for my lines...E207
 
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