Linus27 Posted February 16, 2019 Posted February 16, 2019 (edited) Does anyone know anything about Bireli Lagrene's Fender fretless Jazz basses? One of them is sunburst but has blocks and binding and the other has dots. Neither basses have lines and it doesn't look like they are fretted basses that have been de-fretted. Custom necks perhaps or mega rare. I love the one with blocks and binding in the video. Edited February 16, 2019 by Linus27 Quote
Grahambythesea Posted February 16, 2019 Posted February 16, 2019 Never heard of him playing bass before, known as a gypsy jazz guitarist more recently he has been playing Gibson electrics. No mention of using a bass on his website as far as I can tell. I reckon they are defretted and treated like Jaco’s as the fingerboards shine. Quote
fleabag Posted February 16, 2019 Posted February 16, 2019 I'd say the same as the OP. No old fretlines, so they weren't defretted. There's no epoxy coating either. The shine is just down to years of playing which ended up putting a vague shine on the board. Stage lights will make it look shinier than it is Quote
Hellzero Posted February 16, 2019 Posted February 16, 2019 I posted this video a long time ago, and nobody even cared; Is this the Brexit effect ? Biréli Lagrène played lots of concerts in Germany and Italy in the 80's with a guy named Jaco Pastorius and they used to exchanged their instruments... Yes he is a great fretless bass player and he played fretless bass on some records too, like the first French Kiss album. Quote
tauzero Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 The video quality is too poor to tell. In the still photo, I'm not sure if there are artefacts because it's not great quality, but it looks like there are faint lines from a defret where the filler material was the same colour as the fretboard. Most noticeable above the 12th fret between the E and A strings. Quote
Hellzero Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 Last year, for the 30th year death anniversary of Jaco Pastorius, Biréli Lagrène played a concert in Paris with the Multiquarium Big Band as an hommage. He played the major tunes of Jaco on the fretless bass as a he is also a (fretless) bass virtuoso and is well known for that over here in Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, France, Switzerland and Italy where he toured with Jaco in 1986. His relic Jazz Bass is a 1971~72 defretted à la Jaco, but it has dark fills, and has been his main bass for years. The other one is "newer" one. Check the announcement of last year concert : https://m.facebook.com/events/162103677813785?refid=52&__tn__=*s-R 1 Quote
fleabag Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 Although poor quality, i still see no fretlines, and with the best will in the world, it's hard to make old fretlines disappear , after been ripped out Quote
bigsmokebass Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 (edited) On the neck with the blocks, Is it just me who thinks they reflect more than usual? Possible fretboard stickers? Edited February 18, 2019 by bigsmokebass Quote
Hellzero Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 7 hours ago, fleabag said: Although poor quality, i still see no fretlines, and with the best will in the world, it's hard to make old fretlines disappear , after been ripped out Never seen this one before, but the one I was mentioning is the the sunburst one. This one looks to have an ebony fingrboard and looks like a luthier bass. Biréli Lagrène will sound exactly the same even with the worst bass on earth. Seen him a lot and he's always impressive being it on guitar or (fretless) bass. 1 Quote
fleabag Posted February 17, 2019 Posted February 17, 2019 Absolutely. He's a fabulous player no matter what he plays on. 1 Quote
Linus27 Posted February 17, 2019 Author Posted February 17, 2019 Yep, he's one of those super naturally gifted musicians no matter what he plays. An amazing talent. Quote
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