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The whole fretless thing..

#81
I've had my Lakland 55-01 fretless for about 3 weeks or so now. Not only is it fretless, but it's 35" scale. I got the lined fretboard, because if I got a totally bare fretboard, I'd probably obsess about intonation and it would wind up in the rear bass stand gathering dust.

So it's a very different exercise for me to use my 55-01. When I go back to my Corvette $$ 5 string, it seems way easier to play. The 35" scale on the 55-01 stretches out my hand and the fretless intonation attention makes me more accurate in finger placement.

Add the mwah sound (which I really dig) and the slide-ability of the fretless, I just kinda like playing it and I'm using it for everything, so I'm learning how to manage its more unusual sounds with my hands. As I get better at managing the 55-01, I can use it in more situations. I'm looking forward to gigging with it.
 
#82
Interesting to come across this thread right now! I have been playing fretted bass on and off for about 30 years. A few months back, a bud at work gave me an old Ibanez EX 404 FL bass. It sat in the garage for a few months, 2 weeks ago I decided to fix it up. Stripped it, stained it, sanded the neck, put new pick ups and pots, new nut, pretty much everything.Put on a new set of light gage flats.

Never played a fretless before, untill about 2 hours ago...


I love it!! Different for sure. But I can see me playing this one more than any other bass I have. So cool!!



MUAHH!!!!!!
 
#83
I play in several situations with several styles. I don't use a fretless to play with my "main" band, kind of a country-rock-blues band, except to practice when I don't want to haul an upright to practice for the songs on which I play upright. (About 1/3 of them; the other 2/3 a fretted Jazz.) That fretless is a '78 P. It's a great vintage bass and I'd like to use it more, and am working on that.

But I do gig with my fretless EBMM Sterling 4 about once a month. It's a jazz gig at a restaurant where you can't fit an upright - but honestly, the fretless is musically better for that gig as well given the style being played. So I'll say that one of my fretlesses gets regular gigs - and I love playing it and get a lot of compliments about that bass.
 
#84
I have 2 fretless basses and an upright. I play the upright way more than the fretless, which means I use it for about 1/3 of my gigs. Why? Band leaders like the look of the upright. They have little or no clue about real upright tone.

That said, I used to play fretless exclusively—for a total of about 5 years. I just needed fretted instruments for the different attack, and also needed a fretted 5er...gas marches on!

Having a background with double bass (upright) makes fretless pretty much a breeze, IME.
 
#86
Fretless adds another dimension to your playing! I've been playing bass for about 40 years,...25 of those years on fretless.What I've learned is that,you don't "play"fretless,as much as you"sing" fretless.
Because of the absence of frets,you now have a wide open pallette of pure tone,that you can manipulate in any manner you so desire.
Your vibrato becomes more controllable,and pronounced.

You can slide into,or out of phrases.

By using your instruments volume control(or a volume pedal),you can create a "bowing"effect.

Using a stereo chorus,or a digital delay,really gives the instrument,yet another dimension.

Just like other untempered instruments such as violin,viola,cello,upright bass,etc.,
fretless brings a real "vocal quality" to your playing.
Keep exploring it,...you'll find that it was well worth the time,down the road!
 
#91
I like fretless.
One benefit is that older strings seem to sound better for longer and so fretless is cheaper than fretted( at least for me it is). even flats can work ( which I found to sound really disasterously bad on all but P basses where I really like them too... ).
On the whole it's all down to practicing though and to enjoying it
 
#92
I love fretless and have owned several. But it just never seems to fit with whatever band I am in at the moment. punk metal with a fretless? Thrash with a fretless? Doom with a fretless? It's teh kind of thing that works very well in certain genres, and feels like fighting uphill in others.
I regretfully sold my stingray 5 fretless a few months ago to fund another cabinet and fretted bass purchase.
 
#93
I played fretless exclusively for years in a Tower of Power/Earth Wind & Fire/Stevie Wonder type of horn/funk band... what was I thinking! :eek: ... Oh yeah! It was a blast ripping through Sir Duke on fretless... very expressive. Sold the bass in the 80's got another in the early 90's... too heavy (almost 13 lbs!) for gigging, but it got some use at church and enough practice at home to stay in shape on fretless.

Fast forward... I'm having one built - the fraternal twin of this one (owned and built by TB'er Joinercape). Mine is a combined effort of Jeff (Body & Neck) Ben Lindsey (some bodywork neck work cool fret markers and an outrageous Orange paint job - I'll be posting a thread about this one!) and I'll do the electronics and setup.

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Here's Jeffrey on a gig with it...
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His is Mahogany body, (gorgeous flamed) maple neck, unlined Ebony board, Fralins and Hipshot hardware. Mine is Basswood, similar neck, but (barely lined) Rosewood board, Hipshot hardware and (probably) Sadowsky single coils. It will be light and I'll gig the heck out of it. I got to play Jeff's on a couple of gigs and at a 7 hour jazz jam session... I'm ready to get back in the saddle!

Fretless is a different animal than fretted and takes some time and effort to be able to do it justice. I think it's definitely worth the effort!

Sadowsky Flats on both of them too! (I think they're the BEST!)
 
#95
Considering my only basses are fretless, I'd say that they don't gather much dust. I can get a good fretted tone out of it with rounds, though it makes the fingerboard look like train tracks after awhile. :eek:

Yeah, like everyone says, fretless opens up a whole new world of expressiveness and lets you show you "voice". However, that voice may sound pretty confused for a bit. :D
Just practice, practice, and practice some more until you're comfortable with your intonation.
 
#99
I had a beautiful, beautiful fretless, and I loved to play it. The problem was no one wanted to play with me when I was playing it due to my questionable intonation :) When I played by myself with my little Alesis drum machine, I really was in heaven with it. But in the end, I got tired of being asked to 'just put it down already please' and we needed money for something I don't even remember and I sold it. I regret it so much...

I'll definitely get another unlined fretless in the future, hopefully in the near (12 months?) future.
 
#100
Fretless bass guitar is fun to play, I love how it sounds, but for the kinds of gigs I do, it isn't always appropriate. I love playing the DB also, probably more than electric bass, but it is not always appropriate either. It's great to have a fretless in the arsenal but IMHO/E it's more important to provide the appropriate sound/feel for the music at hand. But I am an eternal sideman, and happy to be there. I cannot speak for "artists".
 

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