More New Areas to Explore on the New CD

"The Vectorman Goes Fretless"

I have seven songs "in the can" for the still-untitled new CD and I've already delved into so many different, new sonic areas. Presenting this rather ambitious material live is already going to be a challenge, so what did I go and do? Why, I decided to take up a "new" instrument and make it even more difficult, LOL!

I've been a fan of fretless bass players Patrick O'Hearn and Tony Franklin for years and have always wanted to delve into fretless. The other day, I got the itch again and figured, what the hell, why not go for it now? I've also been very intrigued by the new Steinberger Synapse basses, so I decided to satisfy both curiosities at once and get a Synapse 5-string fretless (see photo). I've only had a few days with it, but my initial impression is that it's a very slick design and very comfortable to play. I just used it for some overdubbed parts on a new song I finished up yesterday, and it sounds great in the track - its sound has a lot of definition and personality.

Playing fretless isn't easy, mind you...a certain amount of nuance/inaccuracy in pitch is part of the fretless "sound," but keeping everything in-tune enough to sound good without the aid of frets takes some practice. I have a long way to go to master this thing, but the rewards in terms of the added expressiveness will be worth it. I just hope I can get it sufficiently under control not to suck too badly when I go to play it live at gigs, hehehe. :-)

I'm still really fond of my Carvin 4-string, of course - it's a fine bass and Carvin make beautiful instruments. Given how different the Carvin and the Steinberger feel, though, I don't know that I'll be wanting to switch back and forth during gigs, so I'll likely just play everything on the Steinberger fretless. (I wonder if I can get an endorsement out of this...? LOL)

Meanwhile, I'm starting on song #8 for the new album. Might actually get this sucker done before the end of the summer after all...