# NBD: '90 Ibanez SR 800 LE Fretless



## JaeSwift (Mar 23, 2013)

I really do think fret-less is more
































Specs:

34'' scale, 3pc Maple neck
24...oh wait, no frets 
Alder body
J/P Setup; Bass/Treble EQ and a volume and blend knob
Gotoh hardware
Don't know what they call the grey finish but it looks REALLY nice

Picked this up for a mere 125 euro's. It was in really good state with practically new roundwound strings. The owner definitely loved it and you can see some superficial marring from the strings on the fretboard. The setup was decent, he definitely didn't set the bass up to the radius of the fretboard though. Intonation was absolutely horrible but at least the neck had the perfect amount of relief for a fretless bass. 

J/P Setup with active pickups and EQ; really impressed by the sound to be honest. It growls like no other when you turn the treble all the way up; especially on a 80% P 20% J EQ. This bass is pretty exceptional value for the money, as are all Ibanez's from that era (IMO). It just plays absolutely wonderfully but the sound is what suprised me the most.

Also never ever expected a fretless to be so suitable for metal. I will try to get some recordings up soon. Really like playing fretless too; took me less than an hour to adapt to which I did not expect at all. Reading stories on teh webz I thought the learning curve would be MUCH higher but either my hearing is better than I thought it was or I'm just used to playing notes the way they are supposed to sound  

The hardware is what surprised me the most though, especially the bridge. It is amazingly sturdy and definitely a testament to Ibanez having much better quality hardware back in the day than they do now. This thing has a LOT of mass, is built like a tank and is super intuitive to operate coupled with the fact that it comes with a screw that locks the saddle down into position after you've intonated it correctly. Definitely a winner  It's also my first grey (bass)guitar ever and I really like it thus far.

I'm going to build it a 34'-35' scale fretted neck. Before I played this I intended to just fret the neck but I like playing fretless a lot; I just really want a 35' conversion neck for it so that I can tune B E A D in order to use it for most of my recordings, which was the purpose of buying it. 

Hope you guys enjoyed it!


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