Born into a musical family, Franklin first took the stage at age of five. He got his big break in 1984 as bassist in the supergroupthe Firm, withJimmy Page,Paul Rodgers andChris Slade.
While maintaining his music career, from September 2003 through July 2011, Franklin served as Artist Relations Manager forFender andSWR. He returned to music performance full-time in mid-2011, when he joinedKenny Wayne Shepherd's band for the tour supporting the guitarist's 2011 albumHow I Go. Franklin can be heard on Shepherd's album, "Goin' Home", released in the summer of 2014.[3]
Franklin is mostly known for his work on fretless bass. In January 2006 Fender introduced the Tony Franklin FretlessPrecision Bass,[4]a distinctive instrument, with an alder body and modern C-shaped maple neck with an unfinished and unfretted ebony fingerboard with side dot position markers. Other features include vintage tuners, with a Hipshot Bass Xtender drop-D tuner on the E string, a three-way pickup selector switch that controls, an American Series Precision Bass mid pickup, and Franklin's signature Jazz Bass bridge pickup with hex-screw pole pieces and ceramic bar magnets.[4]
Besides his fretless bass, Franklin has also used a fretted Precision Bass on recordings and in concert. From 2008 to 2015, Fender offered a fretted version of Franklin's signature Precision Bass, which otherwise features the same specs as his fretless signature model.
Prior to his work with the Firm, Franklin toured and recorded with English folk/rock singer-songwriter and guitaristRoy Harper, appearing on eight of his albums between 1982 and 2013.[5]
In 1996, Franklin played on long-time friendDonna Lewis's albumNow in a Minute, which spawned the worldwide hit single “I Love You Always Forever".[6] Substantial touring followed the release of the single throughout the U.S., U.K., Japan, Europe and Canada.
In 1997, Franklin toured the world withWhitesnake as part of the Last Hurrah Tour.[7]
In a 2023 interview,Pearl Jam bassistJeff Ament cited Franklin as an influence, specifically on his use of a slideharmonic on the hit song "Even Flow". "I knew at the beginning of Pearl Jam that the wayStone [Gossard] was writing, it was very Jimmy Page – very riffy. And because of Tony Franklin, I knew that fretless would add a really cool voice and texture to rock music. So that harmonic, I'm kind of ripping The Firm's 'Radioactive.' And I figured it out by accident. I was always obsessed with playing harmonics on bass, but at some point I remember accidentally hitting harmonics and sliding on it, so I started experimenting with that part of it. So mistakes, and also having in the back of my head that sound of 'Radioactive.' Hats off Tony Franklin!"[9]
