www.FretlessBass.com

We thought it would be nice to start a thread on who are your favorite fretless bass players and why? Where can we check them out on the web? Let the community know!

One increadible player that doesn't seem to get a lot of attention is Dan K. Brown from The Fixx. His playing on albums like Phantoms, Walkabout, Calm Animals, and Inc is absolutely amazing, and it doesn't seem like many people know of him.

I'll have to check out Dan K. Brown.

My favorites are some of the usual suspects. Jack Bruce, first off. Watching the Cream reunion DVD made me go down to the music store and order my Spectorcore 5, which is now my primary bass.

Pino Palladino has always impressed me with his fretless work, most notably with Don Henley and especially on Pete Townshends "White City" album. The line he plays on "Give Blood" is genius!

You can probably tell by my choices that I am one of the older cats on here...
Monk Montgomery (Wes Montgomery's brother) he put the smooth in Jazz long before they started calling it Smooth Jazz!
Alphonso Johnson Awsome and some of his stuff is actually playable by us mere mortals!
Jaco What else can I say?
Jauqo III-X I have sat down with and watched this cat and still can't believe it!
Andre Bundridge RIP The cat who inspired me as a kid to even try fretless over 30 years ago.
And the list goes on and on...

There's too many to name but of course Jaco Pastorius, as you all know he pretty much developed a whole new language for the electric bass. I'm a big fan of all his music but what I've always really loved about Jaco's playing was the feeling he would put into playing a beautiful melody like his own "Continuum" or Zawinul's "A remark you made".

I also love the bass playing of the Yellowjackets Jimmy Haslip. Wether he's playing fretted or fretless bass he always has a great sound and puts plenty of heart and soul in his playing. He's got his own thing happening. If you were to mix Jaco's spirit with Ron Carter's tone..., that's the way I feel about Jimmy's playing. I know he doesn't really sound like either of those cats but if someone were to ask me how to describe his sound that would be my answer.

Alain Caron - Absolutely amazing #un (one)
Brian Bromberg - Monster Chops
Steve Bailey - Technique Ace
Marcus Miller - Not known for fretless but has a beautiful touch and musicality.

I have a personal favorite - a fella used to play Bass in our band back in the 80's. Mike O'Brien - "OB" was my introduction to a real, live fretless bassist. You couldn't learn much - it seemed to be a hand position thing, sounded oh so sweet, and he always did the right thing musically. Fit the groove so well, it went under the radar most of the time. No hot solos, no posing. Just doing what a bass should do, hold down the pocket, and there was certainly fire in the hole. Big ol fatbottom sound, and I'd been playing for a decade when I met him. For a local guy, his playing is comparable to the "superstars" - seriously. Hey - when yer in South Dakota - there ain't much else to do. This guy studied and played for a loooooong time. Thanks!

The guy I've been getting into lately is Percy Jones, Incredible tones that guy gets

Maybe my favorite above all is Alain Caron, I love his great feel, his amazing sound and, last but not least, his great technique!
That said there is a lot of players I listen to and I really admire, like Gary Willis, Jaco Pastorius, Pino Palladino, Tony Levin, Jimmy Johnson, Alphonso Johnson, Steve Bailey,Michael Manring , Marcus Miller( great slapper but also great fretless player!), Mark Egan, Percy Jones and many others...in this period I'm really into Jimmy Haslip and Bunny Brunel: Jimmy's feel is wonderful!
A player who's really underrated, in my opinion, is Fernando Saunders, does anybody listen to him? He played with Lou Reed, Jan Hammer, Special EFX...

I forgot to mention Richard Bona and Brian Bromberg, both terrific!
May I suggest you some italian players, if you don't know them?
Massimo Moriconi, Ares Tavolazzi (former Area member), Patrick Djivas (PFM), Faso, Paolo Costa, Dino D'Autorio ,Cesare Chiodo...if you see these names on any record playing quality is guaranteed!
Massimo Moriconi years ago played also with Billy Cobham...

Dan K. Brown's work on The Fixx Walkabout album was phenomenal. Stand out songs from that album for fretless work would be the title track, 'Read Between the Lines', and 'Camphor'. That album is no longer in print. If you want to hear these songs, send me contact info and I'll hook you up. There's a vid of 'Camphor' on youtube if you want to check it out.

Guy Pratt- loved his stuff on Icehouse's Measure for Measure, particularly his fretless work on 'Paradise'.

Mark Heyward-Chaplin did some great stuff on Thomas Dolby's Golden Age of Wireless. Standout song- 'Airwaves'

Whoever played on Icehouse album Colours. Standout song 'The Kingdom'

Ditto for the Naked Eyes song 'Me I See in You' off the Fuel for the Fire album.

Eberhard Weber on Kate Bush's Hounds of Love and Aerial albums.

I grew up a metalhead so the fretless players I loved were Steve Digiorgio (Death/Sadus), Sean Malone (Cynic/Gordian Knot), and Jeroen Thesseling (Pestilence/Ensemble Salazhar/Obscura). On the complete opposite side of the spectrum, I was always a fan of Patrick O'Hearn's fretless playing on his solo/new-age albums.

But as I began playing bass, I sought out Jaco as I remember the bass player I played in bands in high school/college with played me his first album. That changed everything for me. Jaco is or has the biggest influence in my playing... good or bad I don't know LOL. I have a problem adding lots of dead notes/muting in my bass lines, adding funk to a rock/metal group. Darn you Jaco!

There are so many players out there that I've just scratched the surface of and multitudes more I've never heard of. But currently the 4 I've mentioned so far are my favorites and my biggest influences.

Boz Burrell on the early Bad Company recordings.
Stanley Sheldon with Peter Frampton in the same era.

Nowadays it's Brian Bromberg, Tal Wilkenfield, Roscoe Beck, and anyone who doesn't piddly diddly slappety whack through every last song they do.

Jaco Pastorius, Tony Franklin, Pino Palladino, Tony Levin, Stanley Clarke [upright]

When I first heard the Firm album I went nuts. I t wasn't until I head Blue Murder that I had to get one of those. That was 1989.

I got mine in 1990. I began playing it out live 4 weeks later. I've played all over the Philadelphia/New York/Atlantic City region. I've been hired to play on many demos and recordings.

It made me go back to basics and really be conscious of my approach to the song. I also wanted to increase the amount of sounds I could get. Mission accomplished.

fretless bass is a wonderful instrument. I'm glad I went with less.

first off there's musicans who inspire me like mingus, watt, coltrane and jamerson who don't really play the fretless...

i saw les claypool twice in high school but what he did was beyond anything that made me think 'i can learn to do that'.

then i saw the who, entwistle solo on 5:15, with the headstock mounted camera putting his bass up on the big screen...so i ran out and got a bass.

my friend's dad played guitar and showed me some blues riffs. he insisted 'if you're gonna play bass, you got to listen to jaco' so he gave me jaco's bio and i ran out and got the 'this is jazz' jaco cd. i liked slang and jaco's runs...but i remember sitting in a hotel lobby and reading how jaco had to cancel a tour because he broke his leg jumping off a balcony and missing the pool. that's when weather report started playing in the hotel lobby...and i thought 'what an asshole, so much talent and he made elevator music.' honestly i proably would have tried fretless years ago if it wasn't for jaco.

anyways, then i got into mingus, chambers and garrison--so i got an upright. somebody stole that. but somebody else gave me a second electric and i figured i don't need two fretted basses. so i'm kind of learning about fretless players from this site.

i really like the michael manring song here and looked at some of his stuff on youtube...'the enormous room' where he keeps changing his tuning is just awsome.

mike mills and jeff ament are a couple of great bass players who bring out the fretless for a couple songs...now that i think about it watching REM on austin city limits and seeing mills play the simplest frettless part was proably the last little push i needed to go frettless.