Description
Fretless six-strings ask a lot of a pickup system — you need growl for the low end, sing for the harmonics, and enough clarity up top that jazz, rock, and solo work all sound like you, not like a compromise. Steve Bailey ran into that wall constantly, so he worked with Seymour Duncan to build a single set that could cover every situation he faced on stage or in the studio.
The result is this active soapbar neck/bridge pair paired with a 3-band Tone Circuit that Bailey voiced himself. Beyond standard bass and treble, master volume, and blend, there’s a frequency contour switch engaged by pulling up on the volume knob — it dials in a mid-range lift and harmonic emphasis tuned specifically for fretless playing. Two trim pots on the circuit board let you fine-tune exactly where that contour sits, so the harmonic bump matches your bass and your ear instead of a factory guess.
Installation calls for a control cavity with room for three knobs (volume/freq switch, blend, and concentric bass/treble) plus a single 9V battery — or wire two batteries in series if you want extra headroom for hot passages. Everything ships pre-wired: high-quality potentiometers on a harness, battery clip, and black anodized, knurled dome knobs, all hand-built in Santa Barbara. Expect roughly 1,000 hours of battery life per set.
- Neck and bridge active soapbar pickups, ceramic magnets
- 3-band active Tone Circuit: bass, treble, volume, blend, pull-up frequency contour switch with onboard trim pots
- 2-conductor shielded cable
- Pre-wired harness, battery clip, mounting hardware, and knobs included
- Hand-built in Santa Barbara, CA
If your fretless six-string needs one pickup set to handle slap grooves, harmonics, straight rock, and jazz tracking without switching gear, this is the setup Steve Bailey built for exactly that job.
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