My first time playing a fretless Ric

[ilan]

Today I visited Gil (gibsonlp) who lives 20 min drive from me, and have enjoyed his great collection of vintage and new Rics, including his near-mint Shadow, '71 4001 MG, and fretless BBR, through his vintage SVT.

I have always loved fretless basses (my first good bass was a fretless P) but never played a fretless Ric before. Gil's is strung with Roto tapewounds. My first instinct was to solo the treble pickup, but I found that I prefer the neck pickup solo'ed with the tone rolled off about halfway.

Gil had to suffer through my pathetic rendition of Vivaldi's cello sonata in A minor (RV43)... had to do something fretless-y and I'm way past my Jaco days

Sorry for the low quality cell phone pic... the bass is actually a lot prettier. It's a very dark application of Blueburst, and not purplish like in the pic.

[rickenbrother]

It looks nice on my monitor. What did you think of it?

[T28]

nice wall of amps and a great shot of the Ric.

Amazing the quality that cell phones can put out now days....

and like Joey asked, What did you think of it?

[JakeK]

With the right lighting situation, a cell phone pic can be very good.

And like Joey and Stephen asked, "What did you think of it?"

[rickenbottom]

That bass looks fantastic and very interested as well of what you thought about playing it.

[coolingitdown]

Very cool!

And like Joey, Stephen, Jake, and Scott asked, "what did you think of it?"

[jps]

Very cool!

And like Joey, Stephen, Jake, Scott and Jonathan asked, "what did you think of it?

Better yet, what did Gil think of your Vivaldi?

[ilan]

I liked it a lot. With Gil's permission I lowered the action quite a bit to get more "mwah". I especially liked that it did not sound like a fretless J or boutique bass - it has a very "acoustic" kind of tone that is great for jazz. And BBR, that I never liked in photos, is much nicer in person.

Better yet, what did Gil think of your Vivaldi?

He was brave and polite.

But seriously, on an upright it's easier to get good intonation, and I didn't have the sheet music and played from memory... I haven't played that piece in a long time.

Here it is played on two basses

[jps]

When I had my 4003FL I found it had it's own unique tone with the mwah not being what most think, to me, anyway. I used it on a Rare Blend recording to good effect.