Any Bassists out there?

[Toasty Virus]

Yo! So I picked up bass about a year ago, I've been sorta practising on and off but recently I've started getting serious and learning.

I usually play with a pick, but recently branched out into trying plucking, I'm really struggling with it.

So I pose to you two questions, Do you have any tips for someone trying plucking? and for further discussion, What is setup/playing style?

 

[EscapeGoat_v1legacy]

Uh, ok, some plucking tips, from my own experience:

- If you're used to playing with a pick, it'll feel really weird and take a while to get used to. Don't be disheartened and keep playing.
- Play with your pads for a softer sound and nails for a sharper sound, but try not to rely on your nails overmuch.
- Plant your thumb somewhere and learn to move your fingers down and up your strings with the minimum of effort. Don't waste energy.
- Follow through on playing strings so your fingers come to rest on the string below.
- Find a style of plucking that's best for you, whether that be using one (yes, it happens), two, three or four fingers.
- If it's speed you're after, practice, but remember to take a break if you start aching and build up stamina slowly.
- If you have a favourite particular bassist (or bassists), try learning how they play, or what techniques they use. For example, Steve Harris (of Iron Maiden) is known for a three-finger playing style where he plucks the strings down with enough force that they produce a "slap" and a sharper sound, helping to give him his signature tone.

As for bass and setup, I use an Aria MAB-series in metallic blue running through a Marshall MB Bass amp. I also use a couple of effects pedals, mostly a wah-wah for some more interesting sounds.

 

[Toasty Virus]

Some pretty good snip'd advice

I bite my nails, so I don't think i'm going to be relying on them much

but yeah, going from pick to trying to pluck is really weird. I can't seem to get a good rhythm with two fingers and one doesn't seem speedy enough for my liking.

Thanks for the advice though!

 

[Toasty Virus]

Yo! So I picked up bass about a year ago, I've been sorta practising on and off but recently I've started getting serious and learning.

I usually play with a pick, but recently branched out into trying plucking, I'm really struggling with it.

So I pose to you two questions, Do you have any tips for someone trying plucking? and for further discussion, What is setup/playing style?

Also, has anyone had any experience singing while playing bass? Is it mega hard to do?

Edit: Doh! meant this as an edit not an extra post!

 

[EscapeGoat_v1legacy]

Some pretty good snip'd advice

I bite my nails, so I don't think i'm going to be relying on them much

but yeah, going from pick to trying to pluck is really weird. I can't seem to get a good rhythm with two fingers and one doesn't seem speedy enough for my liking.

Thanks for the advice though!

Hey, no problem. I went from guitar to bass after an accident with an amp (it, uhh, fell on me, doh!) and getting used to plucking was pretty difficult. As with anything, persevere and it'll get easier.

Getting the rhythm with two fingers seems a daunting challenge at first. Try picking out some slower songs that you'd like to play (not sure what you listen to, but I'm sure you'll have an idea for songs to play) and try to play that alternating your fingers. Slowly start playing faster songs; also pick out specific bass riffs to follow and play them at different tempos, always alternating fingers. As with a pick, after enough time playing it, your speed picks up. This is also a great way to get used to switching strings.

An example I'd suggest is something akin to the bass riffs from songs like: Powerslave (Iron Maiden) [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyOhBn-Pk2s], The Four Horsemen (Metallica) [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TDeT4DBn7k] or Laid to Rest (Lamb of God) [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqgJc7DaDU4]. Now these may not be your kind of songs, but I picked them as examples of great bass riffs and lines that require alternate fingers and string switching - these types of songs are great for learning riffs slowly and then building up to the tempo required by the song.

 

[Toasty Virus]

Further Snipage

I'm not a massive metal fan to be honest, but I did try out playing some of those songs. I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. I just need to build up more stamina in my fingers, they get tired quite quickly!

 

[Klumpfot]

I'm sort of a bassist! I have a six-string Woodo bass on the way. I currently play two Yamaha five-string basses through a wah wah, a compressor pedal and a multi-effect pedal into a 4*10"+1*15" Trace Elliot stack. I've been playing for six years or so.

As for advice, if you're going for playing with your fingers, dexterity is important, as well as versatility. Learning to use more than one fingers (I use three) for plucking is not a bad idea at all. You may also want to learn to use your thumb for plucking. Look up the double thumb technique. Slapping is fun. Also, practice. A lot.

 

[Burst6]

-Always lean the bass on you at an angle. Never lean on it yourself, that's how it breaks.
-adjust the endpin so the first tuning key is at level with your ears.
-hold the neck of the bass in a way that only the tip of your thumb supports it
-always keep your left hand perfectly horizontal so you can change positions better
-Work on relying on your wrist to move the bow, not your shoulders


Wait.. you're talking about electric bass arent you? You aren't a real musician unless the instrument is bigger than you are.

kids these days *monocle*

 

[Xanthious]

The best advice I can give to someone thinking of becoming a serious bass player is to make sure you get the pizza there on time. People will tip better typically the quicker the pizza makes it to their house. I kid I kid! I remember growing up and telling my dad I wanted to be a bass player. He said "son you can't have it both ways". Bass jokes, you'd think there is a lot of them but really there's just one, the rest are all true.

 

[Jonluw]

*raises hand*
We have a user group, you know. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/chat/Bassists-of-the-Escapist]

Plucking tips? Practice using your two first fingers (and alternatively your third) alternately.
Try playing one note steadily over and over and accentuate every third hit of the note.
It is also crucial that you learn to move between strings smoothly. It's one of the things that can pose some problems on the more fast-paced songs.

And remember to try to keep the wrist on your left (fret) hand somewhat straight and relaxed.
I ruined my wrist playing the wrong way.

A few songs I recommend for practice:
You are the universe (Brand new heavies)
Money (Pink floyd)
The distance (Cake)
I wish (Stevie Wonder)

I can provide tabs for those if you want.

I play a Fender Jazz bass on a Eden Nemesis N12 with an EBS octabass pedal thrown in if I feel like it.
I'm still trying to convert my old bass to a fretless, but I can't find any bloody stuff to fill the fret slots with.

I can't get myself to play with a pick. I bought one once and resolved to learn how to use it, but I don't like how it handles, and I don't like the sound of it, so I'll stick to fingering and slapping. That's what the girls like in any case, harr harr.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

I remember when I first started I tended to hook my fingers, it made a bit of a slapping sound and slowed me right down. try and keep your fingers fairly straight. I can't really say much else, these days I don't really think about what my right hand is doing.

 

[getoffmycloud]

Yo! So I picked up bass about a year ago, I've been sorta practising on and off but recently I've started getting serious and learning.

I usually play with a pick, but recently branched out into trying plucking, I'm really struggling with it.

So I pose to you two questions, Do you have any tips for someone trying plucking? and for further discussion, What is setup/playing style?

Also, has anyone had any experience singing while playing bass? Is it mega hard to do?

Best to avoid singing and playing until you get really comfortable playing a bit more advanced stuff and then go back to basics trying to sing and play.

As for playing without a pick just start playing slowly until you get a clean sound and then start gradually speeding things up using a metronome would help lots with this

 

[Jonluw]

Also, has anyone had any experience singing while playing bass? Is it mega hard to do?

As for singing:
It's generally really hard to sing while playing the bass, or that is at least the impression I get.
The difficulty varies wildly between songs though.
If the song has a groove, like You are the universe (that I mentioned above), I find singing is practically impossible.

If you want to sing while playing, I recommend looking for songs where the bass takes on a very steady rythmic role where you can just stay on one or two notes per chord.

Spoiler: Related: Richard Bona.

 

[ICantBelieveItGoesBoom]

For plucking it's a good idea to start trying it with songs that don't have notes playing together too much. By that I mean don't try and play songs that are just the roots notes of chords played continuously.

Play more riffy songs with spaced out notes. Lots of Arctic Monkeys songs are like this.



As for my playing style and set-up. I don't really have a style since I mostly just play covers of other songs (got a 161 song long iTunes playlist of songs I can play). I have 2 basses, a fretless Squire Jazz bass which I adore and a 6-string from some Korean company that doesn't sound great but I only really use for playing around with. I got both for around £200.

 

[PotluckBrigand]

It makes you look like a chump, but I found keeping the bass higher up (like almost to my chest) was easier for a while until I got the muscles in my wrists built up a bit. If you're playing anything really quickly you'll usually get tired a lot quicker than you might with a guitar since the strings are so much heavier.

Check out what this guy is doing at about 0:38 -


Stuff like that. Learn some patterns that move quick and you'll get stronger. You need callouses on your plucking hand just like the ones on your fret hand

I love the bass. Guitar is great for some things, but there's just nothing as fucking FUNKY as a good bass lick.

 

[Zipa]

I can play bass (by virture of being able to play guitar ) though I don't do so often nowadays I always found that using whatever the original artist did to play is a good route to go down.

I would never try to play another one bites the dust wit a pick for example or under pressure without (two of my favorite bass lines )

 

[Joseph Harrison]

I'm assuming that you mean the bass guitar as opposed to the stand-up.
And yeah I've been playing the bass for 2 and a half maybe three years, so I'm far from an expert. But some tips for how to pluck I would say just practice. It may seem obvious but the more you pluck the bass the easier it will be.

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

You could always try doing this:

 

[EscapeGoat_v1legacy]

Further Snipage

I'm not a massive metal fan to be honest, but I did try out playing some of those songs. I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. I just need to build up more stamina in my fingers, they get tired quite quickly!

Yeah, that's cool, not everyone is. I only gave them as examples of more interesting riffs that get you working to try and hit them, as opposed to falling into the trap of just hitting the root notes in boring 8-beats-per-bar patterns that are, unfortunately, quite common and can put you off playing quite quickly (in my experience). You know what genres you like and want to play, so look around for songs in your preferred genres that do a similar thing. Blues, funk and jazz have some cracking bass lines, for example, and sound way more interesting than most metal or rock songs, and that's coming from a metal lover!