Tried flats on my last fretless. Awful. Switched to rounds and the bass came alive
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Flats on a fretless?
- Thread starter red7flag
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I had flats on a fretless for years but something was just not working for me with the sound: not enough high end. I now use stainless steel half-rounds on my fretless and it's much closer to the sound I want to hear. YMMV.
I only use TI flats on my fretless basses (and fretted, for that matter...) Tone and feel heaven!
I prefer tapewound on fretless. All of mine wear them. For me, they deliver a nice warm, woody, organic sound. Dial in some more mids and they will deliver a nice punch if you want to be more aggressive.
Added moments later: I've used RotoSound, LaBella, and D'Addario. I prefer the LaBella on acoustic and Rob Allen style basses and D'Addario on solid body basses.
Hope this helps.
Koog
Added moments later: I've used RotoSound, LaBella, and D'Addario. I prefer the LaBella on acoustic and Rob Allen style basses and D'Addario on solid body basses.
Hope this helps.
Koog
Depends on the fretless bass and what you want.
On my Roscoe it's rounds. Mwah baby.
On something like a Rob Allen, flats for sure.
I'm all nickel rounds (D'Addario) on my Roscoe 5 fretted and fretless.
The Roscoe Classic P (fretted) get TI flats.
On my Roscoe it's rounds. Mwah baby.
On something like a Rob Allen, flats for sure.
I'm all nickel rounds (D'Addario) on my Roscoe 5 fretted and fretless.
The Roscoe Classic P (fretted) get TI flats.
My Tony Franklin bass has only worn flats. Currently wearing three year old chromes, I’ve been contemplating putting on Labellas lately.
I played nothing but fretless for years when I was younger and I felt that a fretless really comes alive with (dead) rounds. With flats, a fretless sounds like a bad impersonation of an upright sound without the thump and the resonance. Nylon Tapewounds are a bit more interesting but still. To me the ultimate fretless tone (sorry Jaco) will always be Pino Palladino's '79 Musicman.
Just choose flats or roundwounds.......the tone. Roundwounds will make bigger touch on your fretbourd in a bad way.
The signature tone of a fretless is "mwah." Chromes don't do it. They go zing-thump. If you put flats on a fretless, I would suggest Fender 9050L, 45-60-80-100. They have an inherent mid growl that helps a fretless tone, not detract from it. Not far behind them in tone are Ernie Ball standard flats (not cobalt), similar tone, but less pronounced growl. When I gigged with flats, I used an Ernie Ball 105 E string to replace the Fender E string when it went finally died so I didn't have to change the entire set that was just getting well seated.
The signature bass for a fretless is a Jazz bass with vintage-wind pickups. They also have good definition to help the fretless tone, not detract from it, as does a Precision pickup which, being more round in tone, will do.
Setup is critical. It needs to be just a millimeter higher than an electric fretted, so when you stop the note (what it is called when there are no frets, you are "stopping the string at pitch" rather than fretting it) it is clean and the intonation does not wobble. And as you may surmise, unless the fingerboard (instead of calling it a fretboard) has been carefully epoxied, flats or nylon wounds are preferred to rounds, which even conventional nickel plated wounds will eventually dig into the fingerboard.
Technique is critical. I recommend everybody going fretless take a few double bass lessons to learn proper technique, positions, and approach to the instrument, which when you go fretless is more like a double bass, again, to bring out proper articulation and that "mwah" tone.
That is what I recommend in 45+ years of playing electric bass. That is also what Jaco used, who defined electric fretless.
The signature bass for a fretless is a Jazz bass with vintage-wind pickups. They also have good definition to help the fretless tone, not detract from it, as does a Precision pickup which, being more round in tone, will do.
Setup is critical. It needs to be just a millimeter higher than an electric fretted, so when you stop the note (what it is called when there are no frets, you are "stopping the string at pitch" rather than fretting it) it is clean and the intonation does not wobble. And as you may surmise, unless the fingerboard (instead of calling it a fretboard) has been carefully epoxied, flats or nylon wounds are preferred to rounds, which even conventional nickel plated wounds will eventually dig into the fingerboard.
Technique is critical. I recommend everybody going fretless take a few double bass lessons to learn proper technique, positions, and approach to the instrument, which when you go fretless is more like a double bass, again, to bring out proper articulation and that "mwah" tone.
That is what I recommend in 45+ years of playing electric bass. That is also what Jaco used, who defined electric fretless.
Flats are the standard on a fretless bass, and they were even at the height of the roundwound era. If not for the concurrent popularity of fretless basses, flats might have gone extinct.
skyline_01
Endorsing artist: Nordstrand Audio, Tsunami Cables
Yep - Chromes on it now. Getting ready to try half rounds for the first time but keeping these around in case I want to go back.
Also my experience - struggled with rounds on my fretless Stingray - never found *that* tone. Two weeks ago - a desparate try with LaBella Low Tension flats and .... voila(!), here we are. A bit of an unusual constellation, I guess - Stingray5 with a Status fretless replacement graphite neck and flats.
But even my bandmates (notabene!!!) praised this new combination - normally they're deaf concerning my string experiments
Tom
I don't care for flats. I also learned quickly to NOT use stainless steel on my fretless...only nickel. The sounds was horrible with steel.
Altitude
An ounce of perception, a pound of obscure.
I prefer roundwounds on a fretless because of the longer sustain they provide. But I'm here because I'm struggling to figure out what word you meant that your phone or computer corrected into "rice."
skyline_01
Endorsing artist: Nordstrand Audio, Tsunami Cables
Also my experience - struggled with rounds on my fretless Stingray - never found *that* tone. Two weeks ago - a desparate try with LaBella Low Tension flats and .... voila(!), here we are. A bit of an unusual constellation, I guess - Stingray5 with a Status fretless replacement graphite neck and flats.
But even my bandmates (notabene!!!) praised this new combination - normally they're deaf concerning my string experiments
Tom
Tremendous! I've always heard good things about the LaBella flats. I'm glad you found your sound!
Great point, all fretlesses are not the same tonally, and we are not all going for the same sound.