Fretless outnumbering fretted

Callum

Callum

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So yesterday i played in a school even that my school hosts every year for the new sixth form students in a marquee out on the school field, normally some older students are invited back to play which is always cool as well as current ones..it always rains but its a nice atmosphere. Among some great musicians most notably Kid iD and Aliceband, both containing ex-students from the school. But something that surprised me was that the majority of bass players from the other acts were all playing fretless basses.I has loads of people oogling my $$ in the sound checks as well, hopefully converted a few to Warwicks in the process. In previous events i was the only fretless player, so having more than one fretless player was quite a thing is this just a rare thing or is fretless bass becoming more popular?




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The festival I was at a few weeks ago (just before the "Great Flood" started) I was the only fretless player out of 14 local bands. I wonder if the fretless thing depends a lot on the type of music? (not in my case, but that's another story... I just picked one up and liked it!)
 
I think that might have been a rare little coincidence... Here I've never met anyone that plays fretless, and most of the stores here only stock fretted...
 
yeh i was thinking that was a nice one though :D
 
Fretless will always be more difficult to play than a fretted bass, so I think fretted basses will always be more popular. Maybe the fretless bass will gain more popularity at some point, but I can't imagine it will outnumber fretted basses. But anything is possible................ :wink:
 
Outnumbering - no, but growing in popularity - I say yes. Fretless is more difficult to play, but it seems that bass guitar is gaining converts and these converts are growing and starting to branch out and expand their experience. Fretless is so expressive and a great way to challenge and increase skills. Also, I think more new bass players are becoming increasingly aware of fretless players new and old and becoming curiously drawn to the sound and feel.

I've been playing bass for a couple of years now, and I was first drawn to the slap and pop funk of fretted, but it wasn't long before I added a Dean Edge fretless. Then one day back at the end of March, I received a small fortune and got the bug for a Warwick fretless. I don't even know why, but I remember I couldn't sleep the night before and the next day I dropped into a GC store and they had two Corvette Stds. fretlesses to choose from. I picked the '03 and that was my first Warwick. A week-and-a-half later, I bought a 5-string $$ fretted and figured I would stay with those two until I could add a CS Thumb. But as fate would have it, 3 weeks ago I was at another GC and ran across a beauty of a Corvette Std. with a highly figured fretless fingerboard that I could not take my eyes off, much less, pass up.

So to make a long story short, in my Warwick collection, fretless outnumbers fretted 2 to 1! I still love slappin' and poppin' on the $$, but slippin' and sliddin' on 2 the fretless Warwicks is so SWEET! 8)
 
i'm just getting into the slap and pop stuff, i kinda went to other way....was was after a fretless bass for a few years before i got my first one and i love it more every day as you said they are so sweet to play :D and with warwick they sound sweet and look so sweet as well 8)
 
Since I converted to fretless over a year ago I don't see myself switching back to fretted. I love the sound and the way my fingers glide over the fingerboard. It wasn't hard making the switch and I'm glad I did.

Dedicated Member of the Unofficial fretless Warwick club. :twisted:
 
I have had 2 fretless basses, and they both ended up sacrifices to a Warwick purchase. I will have another in the future. absolutely.
 
I would argue that fretless is actually easier to play... in the physical sense. Once you've got the intonation sorted (the difficult bit), the glidin' and slidin' is actually easier on the fingers... especially if you've got gnarly arthriticky fingers like mine. Used to get pain in my left hand fingers with my previous fretted basses (they weren't Warwicks though)
 
ive just got back from doing the americana festival (10 hours sleep over three nights...ouch) and out of about 60 bands i'd say about 45+ were playing fretless... although they were actually double basses so im not sure if that counts :wink:
 
Stroud said:
ive just got back from doing the americana festival (10 hours sleep over three nights...ouch) and out of about 60 bands i'd say about 45+ were playing fretless... although they were actually double basses so im not sure if that counts :wink:
Click to expand...

hehe
 
I know it's subjective, but I will be getting a third vette for Db tuning. Can I play Trivium to System of a Down on a fretless and have it sound good?...
 
I guess it would depend on how you play it, what strings you use and what EQ-setting you use...
 
Everything can be played on a fretless, but not everything can be played on a fretted bass. i Think some System of a Down would sound awesome on a fretless, get some nice smooth low end on it :D
 
EvilSmile said:
Everything can be played on a fretless :D
Click to expand...

I'm biased, but I totally agree. It would be easier to demonstrate how I play rather than describe it, but I sort of "clip" a lot of the notes to keep them rocky and punchy, but then slide around between different parts of the board. Quite into a slidey-double-stoppy type of thing at the moment... but I'll probably end up overdoing it and getting told off!
 
saxonbass said:
EvilSmile said:
Everything can be played on a fretless :D
Click to expand...

I'm biased, but I totally agree. It would be easier to demonstrate how I play rather than describe it, but I sort of "clip" a lot of the notes to keep them rocky and punchy, but then slide around between different parts of the board. Quite into a slidey-double-stoppy type of thing at the moment... but I'll probably end up overdoing it and getting told off!
Click to expand...

I'm playing way too many sliding harmonics atm. And i love slidy double stops, Playing jaco's version of blackbird like that is really cool.
 
Chords on fretless is awesome! But nothing beats playing a note on the E string whilst playing the either 9th or 10th on the G on a double bass! There's just something about that sound...
 
oh yeh double bass has the best tone ever....its on my GAS list....right after a phil jones suitcase amp....
 
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