Question for Mr. Steve on fretless technique

[Ethanbowen666]

Few questions for you on your technique and approach to playing your fretless bass.


1. I noticed you have the "Steve Harris" attack style on the fretless where each time a string is plucked it "clicks" against the frets (in this case wood). Doesn't that give you some serious wear on your fingerboard? Or do yo have some sort of coating to protect it that allows you to use this technique. I just got my new custom fretless with a real ebony fingerboard that is not finished (bare wood). I've always had that aggressive plucking style on my fretted basses and on my old fretless (with an ebonol finger board that's indestructible). I love the sound of my new bass with just the bare wood and I would hate to compromise that sound with a coating. Should I change my technique to save my fingerboard? What do you do?

2. That being said, what kind of action do you generally have on your fretlesses that goes well with your playing style?

3. Finally, when playing live do you have the sound engineer boost any certain frequencies to make your bass cut through the monitor mix so you can hear your self to play all the notes in tune? Also would that be the same frequencies you would want boosted in the house mix?

If you see this post I would just like to say thank you for having an open forum and communicating with your fans! this is really cool!
I'll spare you all of the "your my hero, thank you for being born, inspiring me ext...." I know you get that a lot. So I'll just go with "All of the above" thanks again!!

Ethan

 

[Son of Magni]

Ebony fingerboards last 100's of years with flatwounds, 10's of years with rounds. I think SDG's right hand technique is like mine, bash the string down and let it flip off the end of my finger (rather than pluck it), so my finger ends up leaning against the next lower string. This really doesn't bother the fingerboard at all, even when you bash it down hard against the fingerboard.

Now I can tell you that I set up Steve's basses exactly like my own. Nice low action for fast left hand, but not super low. Medium low I'd call it. He hasn't complained But it is super low at the nut, between 5 and 10 thousandths of an inch.

My guess is he always tells the sound engineer to boost all frequencies! Seriously though, he uses a modeler so I'd guess he wants it flat, or certainly not scooped.
SoM

Edit: Also if you abuse your fingerboard so much that it has enough wear to effect your sound, resurfacing is easy and quick. And you could resurface a fingerboard many times before you would have to replace it.

 

[Ethanbowen666]

I think SDG's right hand technique is like mine, bash the string down and let it flip off the end of my finger (rather than pluck it), so my finger ends up leaning against the next lower string. This really doesn't bother the fingerboard at all, even when you bash it down hard against the fingerboard.

Now I can tell you that I set up Steve's basses exactly like my own. Nice low action for fast left hand, but not super low. Medium low I'd call it. He hasn't complained But it is super low at the nut, between 5 and 10 thousandths of an inch.

So you are Steve's bass tech? Thats cool.
Thanks for the info.
That's cool. Do you know if he has a coating on his fingerboard? or how often he resurfaces it?

 

[Son of Magni]

No no, not his tech
I just build basses

Oh yeah, and no coating on the Thor and they've never been resurfaced. How much wear there is Steve would have to tell us...