WATCH: Derek Frank Debuts “The Basses Behind the Gig,” a New Video Series for No Treble

Introducing The Basses Behind the Gig with Derek Frank

Every bass has a story and Derek Frank has plenty of them.

No Treble is excited to debut The Basses Behind the Gig, a new monthly video series with Derek that takes a closer look at the instruments in his collection and more importantly, the stories behind them.

Each episode will focus on a different bass, why Derek bought it, what makes it special, and the tours, sessions, and gigs where it earned its place in the rotation. The videos will appear on Derek’s YouTube channel with each installment featured on No Treble.

If you have followed No Treble for a while, Derek probably needs little introduction. The Pittsburgh born bassist has been a fixture on the Los Angeles music scene for years, building a career that has taken him around the world with some huge artists. His credits include Shania Twain, Gwen Stefani, Shakira, Kelly Clarkson, Air Supply, Melissa Etheridge, Don Felder, Mindi Abair, and Brian Auger’s Oblivion Express, among many others.

He has also appeared on some of the biggest stages and television shows in the business, including Dancing with the Stars, Ellen, and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. In 2025, Derek joined Yungblud, Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, and Nuno Bettencourt for the Ozzy Osbourne tribute at the MTV Video Music Awards.

Derek has also continued making his own music, including his 2024 album Origin Story, which brings together funk, jazz, blues, and the sounds of the 1970s television and film music that have long influenced him.  That kind of career makes Derek the perfect person for a series like this. These are not basses that simply sit in a collection. They are working instruments with stories attached to them.

For the debut episode, Derek digs into one of the newest additions to his collection, a custom Bacci Marleo five string built by Bruno Bacci in Tuscany.

The story started at the 2025 NAMM Show, where mutual friend Dave Marotta introduced Derek to Bacci. Derek had been going back and forth on five strings when Marotta suggested he check out Bacci’s 32 inch medium scale Marleo. Derek immediately connected with the shorter scale and the way it fit his hands, while still being impressed by the strength and focus of the low B string.

That meeting quickly turned into a custom build.

Bacci suggested making Derek his own Marleo with some personal touches. The visual inspiration came partly from a flyer for Derek’s own band, whose artwork draws from 1970s cartoons, superhero shows, stars, stripes, and other imagery from that era. Bruno took those ideas and began working them into the design of the bass.

Derek later suggested matching the stripe colors to a tattoo on his arm that becomes visible while he is playing. The finished bass has a palladium gray satin finish, blue star fingerboard inlays, glowing Luminlay side dots, and stripes that continue across the body and headstock. The transparent pickguard was painted from the back to continue the pattern, and Derek says Bacci went through seven attempts just to get the stripes to line up correctly.

The electronics were equally personal. Derek went with a reverse P style pickup position paired with a Music Man style bridge pickup, using Nordstrand pickups and electronics. The controls give him plenty of flexibility and in the video he walks through the individual pickups, active and passive settings, and some of the sounds he gets from the bass.

More importantly, the Marleo has already gone from custom build to working bass.

Derek describes it as comfortable, versatile, and equally at home with fingerstyle, muted playing, and slap. It has also become one of the instruments he regularly reaches for on gigs.

That gets right to the heart of The Basses Behind the Gig.

Over the coming months, Derek will open up more of his collection and tell the stories behind the instruments, the people connected to them, and the gigs that made them memorable.

For episode one, check out Derek Frank and his custom Bacci Marleo five string.