Fretlessness

[3V17C]

i've been getting into ye olde fretless quite a bit lately both playing wise and listening wise - soooooo..... howzabout recommending me some new listening material for inspiration. i'm well aware of all the usual suspects; Jaco, Mick Karn, Michael Manring, Tony Franklin, Gary Willis etc but would be interested in hearing some recommendations of other fretless players/albums etc. Not so interested in jazzy stuff (I like some, but not a big Jaco fan for instance) and would also be interested in hearing some fretless in a rock scenario (aside from Blue Murder/The Firm/Pearl Jam).

Any pointers?



cheers

c

[Bilbo]

Your preferences are already stated so don't get too hung up on these but you should have a listen to people like, even if its only the once:

Percy Jones - Brand X - jazz-rock/fusion but some interesting ways of using a fretless bass. Some ideas may be transferable to your own thing so worth checking out.

John Giblin - also played with Brand X but also did some Simple Minds and other more mainstream stuff.

Mo Foster - English session player who has his own thing - great tone.

Dill Katz - another Britsh fusioneer

Steve Bailey - 6-string fretless

Jack Bruce (post Cream) uses a fretless Warwick bass guitar.

Sean Malone played a fretless bass on the technical death metal band Cynic's sole album "Focus."

Rick Danko (of The Band) used a fretless bass in early recordings

Steve DiGiorgio (one of the few fretless bassists in the metal scene) usually plays a five string fretless bass.

Mick Karn (former bassist of Japan and avantgarde musician) used fretless bass guitar since the late 1970s. Very interesting but very stylised

Tony Levin - bass player with Peter Gabriel and King Crimson

Alain Caron - UZEB - great technique but a bit soulless

Pino Palladino, a session bassist, has developed a fretless bass method.

Jeroen Paul Thesseling, fretless bassist, plays microtonal world music using six-string fretless Warwick basses.

John Myung, (bassist for Dream Theater).

Garry Gary Beers, (bassist for INXS).

Josh Ansley, (former bassist of Catch 22) is well known for his innovative fretless bass styles.

Colin Edwin, (bassist for Porcupine Tree).

Bunny Brunel used a fretless bass on a PBS special concert with Chick Corea, Gary Burton, Al Jarreau

Victor Wooten uses a custom five-string fretless bass on several of his own songs as well as several Bela Fleck and the Flecktones songs.

Paul Simonon from The Clash used a fretless Fender Precision Bass in 1981, during the period of their Sandinista! album.

and, of course, Bakithi Kumalo, who has performed and recorded with Paul Simon (Graceland CD) and others.

Oh - and me.

[lowdown]

Boz Burrell....
Did the Bass duties in Bad Company & King Crimson.
Good Fretless Rock vibe going on there.
+1 for all the above as well.

Garry

[wateroftyne]

Freebo (Bonnie Raitt)
Rod Clements (Lindisfarne) - 'Magic in the Air' is a live CD from the late 70s. The fretless tone on there is to die for..

[3V17C]

ok nice one bilbo - lots of names in there i'm aware of, some i've heard, some i haven't and some i'd just completely forgotten about!! I'm very open minded musically so will listen to all kinds of different stuff - Next stop youtube!

cheers

c

[Jase]

+1 for bilbo suggesting Percy Jones, well worth checking out his approach and applying it to the rock side of things, the other chap that's also worth checking out is Mick Stevens.

[queenofthedepths]

Or if you like a bit of death metal [url="http://youtube.com/watch?v=W5ciJcksiEU&feature=related"]http://youtube.com/watch?v=W5ciJcksiEU&feature=related[/url]

[SJA]

Paul Webb with Talk talk eg. "Today"
Derek Forbes with simple minds eg. sweat in bullet, today I died again

[Doc B]

Check out Bauhaus, David C is the bassist I think. She's In Parties is a great bass line.

Norwood Fisher of Fishbone plays fretless in a few songs but the only one I can recall off the top of my head is 'They All Have Abandoned Their Hopes' from the album Give a Monkey a Brain and He'll Swear He's the Centre of the Universe. He also plays fretless on a track on Jerry Cantrell's first solo album.

[cetera]

John Giblin on some of the old Kate Bush stuff...

[lowdown]

[quote name='cetera' post='171510' date='Apr 7 2008, 03:06 PM']John Giblin on some of the old Kate Bush stuff...[/quote]

+1...
And a top player at that!

Garry

[Rich]

Anything as long as it's not Les "look at me, I'm being wacky!" Claypool...

[Rodders]

Speaking of Percy Jones his instructional/clinic DVD is on YouTube.

"The Bass Exploration of Percy Jones"

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwcPon5FzPg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwcPon5FzPg[/url]

Its in several parts but I found it very interesting.

Rodders

[3V17C]

haha.. yeah just watched all of the Percy Jones DVD on youtube (not much work done this morning then!) - he's pretty good - thinking about it, i did have some Brand X stuff on tape years ago.

+1 for Giblin on the Kate Bush stuff and also the guy from Talk Talk - who were a very good band

as for Claypool - went through my Primus phase many moons ago! i do like a bit of quirkiness and Primus, Sauage, Oysterhead, Frog Brigade, BOBB etc all still get listened to from time to time. in fact i may have to revisit some with my fretless head on aunt sally.

peace

c

[Jase]

More Percy with Dann Glenn....nice heavy parts

[url="http://www.bangtower.com/media.html"]http://www.bangtower.com/media.html[/url]

[Tait]

[quote name='bilbo230763' post='171222' date='Apr 7 2008, 10:45 AM']Paul Simonon from The Clash used a fretless Fender Precision Bass in 1981, during the period of their Sandinista! album.[/quote]

thanks for that! this thread interested me because im getting into fretless bass, too. paul simonon's one of my fvaourite bass players, ill definatly give that album a listen.

EDIT: by the way, I've been playing a lot of red hot chilis stuff. i know flea dont play fretless, but songs like under the bridge, soul to squeeze and give it away sound good. scar tissue also sounds good but the really high bit's hard to get right.

Edited April 7, 2008 by lwtait

[3V17C]

[quote name='Jase' post='171568' date='Apr 7 2008, 04:28 PM']More Percy with Dann Glenn....nice heavy parts

[url="http://www.bangtower.com/media.html"]http://www.bangtower.com/media.html[/url][/quote]

yeah i likee that!

cheers

c

[Rodders]

Percy also did stuff with Tony Senatore a 12 string bassist

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQGcNv_ee38"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQGcNv_ee38[/url]

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6b7f287KSUM&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6b7f287KSUM...feature=related[/url]

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJNupSdCVqw&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJNupSdCVqw...feature=related[/url]

[Jono]

[quote name='bilbo230763' post='171222' date='Apr 7 2008, 10:45 AM']Your preferences are already stated so don't get too hung up on these but you should have a listen to people like, even if its only the once:

Percy Jones - Brand X - jazz-rock/fusion but some interesting ways of using a fretless bass. Some ideas may be transferable to your own thing so worth checking out.

John Giblin - also played with Brand X but also did some Simple Minds and other more mainstream stuff.

Mo Foster - English session player who has his own thing - great tone.

Dill Katz - another Britsh fusioneer

Steve Bailey - 6-string fretless

Jack Bruce (post Cream) uses a fretless Warwick bass guitar.

Sean Malone played a fretless bass on the technical death metal band Cynic's sole album "Focus."

Rick Danko (of The Band) used a fretless bass in early recordings

Steve DiGiorgio (one of the few fretless bassists in the metal scene) usually plays a five string fretless bass.

Mick Karn (former bassist of Japan and avantgarde musician) used fretless bass guitar since the late 1970s. Very interesting but very stylised

Tony Levin - bass player with Peter Gabriel and King Crimson

Alain Caron - UZEB - great technique but a bit soulless

Pino Palladino, a session bassist, has developed a fretless bass method.

Jeroen Paul Thesseling, fretless bassist, plays microtonal world music using six-string fretless Warwick basses.

John Myung, (bassist for Dream Theater).

Garry Gary Beers, (bassist for INXS).

Josh Ansley, (former bassist of Catch 22) is well known for his innovative fretless bass styles.

Colin Edwin, (bassist for Porcupine Tree).

Bunny Brunel used a fretless bass on a PBS special concert with Chick Corea, Gary Burton, Al Jarreau

Victor Wooten uses a custom five-string fretless bass on several of his own songs as well as several Bela Fleck and the Flecktones songs.

Paul Simonon from The Clash used a fretless Fender Precision Bass in 1981, during the period of their Sandinista! album.

and, of course, Bakithi Kumalo, who has performed and recorded with Paul Simon (Graceland CD) and others.

Oh - and me.[/quote]

Garry Gary Beers - which album/songs?

[Jase]

[quote name='3V17C' post='171591' date='Apr 7 2008, 04:55 PM']yeah i likee that!

cheers

c[/quote]

Yeah, Percy's the business

Are you thinking of using fretless with Live n Loud Clive?

[3V17C]

[quote name='Jase' post='171958' date='Apr 8 2008, 12:20 AM']Yeah, Percy's the business

Are you thinking of using fretless with Live n Loud Clive?[/quote]

no, not sure how well it'd work with maiden etc!! its more for home recording and just experimenting with at the mo.

cheers

c

[urb]

+1 to all the other suggestions - here's a couple more...

One of my absolute faves is my good friend [b]Franc O'Shea[/b] - he's based in Brighton and is one of the best fretless players around:

[url="http://www.myspace.com/francosheamusic"]http://www.myspace.com/francosheamusic[/url]


[b]Laurence Cottle[/b] made pretty spectacular fretless recordings in the late 1980s - you can download a load of his tunes for FREE from his website - really inspiring stuff:

[url="http://laurencecottle.com/listen/"]http://laurencecottle.com/listen/[/url]


Gary Willis is my absolute favourite fretless player at the moment - I've been known to dabble a (lot) with fretless too - see the ole Myspace line below.


Cheers

Mike

[cetera]

Guy Pratt on the classic 'Toy Matinee' album

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Doc B' post='171508' date='Apr 7 2008, 03:01 PM']Norwood Fisher of Fishbone plays fretless in a few songs but the only one I can recall off the top of my head is 'They All Have Abandoned Their Hopes' from the album Give a Monkey a Brain and He'll Swear He's the Centre of the Universe.[/quote]

Sunless Saturday (Reality of My Surroundings)

I really like the sound Allan Dias got on PIL's "Rise". Great tune.

[urb]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='173290' date='Apr 9 2008, 04:47 PM']Sunless Saturday (Reality of My Surroundings)[/quote]

+1000 - this is still one of the most incredible funk-rock anthems ever - Norwood's playing on this tune is immense - it's of my fave songs from the 90s - turn you speakers up and check this:



M