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Are there any negatives on starting with a five string?
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Dec 8, 2020 19:09
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Uhhh, it's slightly harder because the fretboard is a little wider and muting strings is a little different wrt hand placement. But not really any major differences.
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Dec 8, 2020 19:15
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All the courses I researched are geared toward four string basses but other than resting your thumb on the low B rather than pickup there's probably not much difference at all. Just mentally adjust when/if they talk about the lowest string if they don't call out E specifically. Just know that you won't be making use of it if you do a prepackaged tutorial course, but if you want to futureproof yourself and think you'll play enough material with lower notes then probably nothing bad about that.
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Dec 8, 2020 19:16
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However I do think a 5 string is totally worth it.
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Dec 8, 2020 19:18
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Agreed, if you only have access to a fiver or you feel that you will want that extra string, it will be absolutely fine for a first instrument. Muting is a little harder because there's an extra string to keep from ringing, but that's fine. I still think a four string is good for learning as it helps to promote horizontal shifting (can't just grab the low G on the B string, you gotta shift instead etc) but that's certainly not a big enough justification to ignore a five string as a beginner.
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Dec 8, 2020 20:06
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I'm a five string guy, and what everyone else have said is true. It's a bit harder, but not much, and you get more low notes. However, if you just want the low end, you might want to consider a 4 string tuned BEAD. Honestly, if I didn't have a great 5 string, I might have gone that way.
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Dec 8, 2020 20:27
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BonHair posted:I'm a five string guy, and what everyone else have said is true. It's a bit harder, but not much, and you get more low notes. However, if you just want the low end, you might want to consider a 4 string tuned BEAD. Honestly, if I didn't have a great 5 string, I might have gone that way. I used to do this a long time ago and much prefer a five string now because I can still play stuff in standard tuning with it. And having a tiny bit extra range for death metal stuff is cool sometimes.
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Dec 8, 2020 20:42
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Shageletic posted:This reminds me, I have this new project (plenty of time to do that with no gigs existing anymore, thanks American politics) with a guy I think is really talented, and likes the same music I do. Only problem is that he's incredibly self taught and doesn't know the first thing about music theory and simple stuff like keys or matching with the same chord, he just does things instinctively. Its frustrating because I see the mistakes he's doing and ways he can get better, but I'm hesitant to bring anything up, because if I've learned anything playing music for the past 6 years, being in a band has more to do with people management than anything else. The dude's good tho, really interesting, its just a longer road to communicate than it has to be Speaking for myself as a person who knows zero about music theory, I would love it if another musical peer would help walk me through some of these musical concepts. Just kindly explain how learning some of these concepts have benefited yourself and ask if they would be interested in learning some of these things. Start off slow and don’t try to shove a year of learning down his throat in one evening. Be ready to send him some learning aids and encourage him to ask questions. Chances are they will be open to learning if you’re a decent teacher and approach the topic from a positive place. If they aren’t then they might not be right for your group long term anyway. Part of being a good creative musician is being open minded.
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Dec 8, 2020 22:56
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Krustic posted:Speaking for myself as a person who knows zero about music theory, I would love it if another musical peer would help walk me through some of these musical concepts. Just kindly explain how learning some of these concepts have benefited yourself and ask if they would be interested in learning some of these things. Start off slow and don’t try to shove a year of learning down his throat in one evening. Be ready to send him some learning aids and encourage him to ask questions. Chances are they will be open to learning if you’re a decent teacher and approach the topic from a positive place. If they aren’t then they might not be right for your group long term anyway. Part of being a good creative musician is being open minded. Hmm I'll give this a shot, let's see how it goes! For jamming and the like, saying we should play in an A minor key or something just makes things flow so much better, and generally my go to move when jamming with strangers on a blues riff or something, I'm not too experienced a player myself mind you, but if there's anything you're having trouble with or questioning don't be hesitant about approaching the thread btw When I first starting playing with my cover band three years ago, my keyboard player used to just yell poo poo at me while playing, C minor 7th this and F sharp minor that, it was loving bewildering and unhelpful (3 5 1....of what exactly lol), but working on that stuff by myself really paid off, still a dickish and unhelpful thing to do tho Spanish Manlove posted:However I do think a 5 string is totally worth it. I love my 5 string but constantly got to break out of the habit of ignoring the lowest string, its there for a reason
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Dec 8, 2020 23:50
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Shageletic posted:I love my 5 string but constantly got to break out of the habit of ignoring the lowest string, its there for a reason One trick I love to do is sort of do double octave downs on riffs. For a "follow the root" example, if the guitar is going F#, C#, D, A power chords (so root on E string, then 2 on A string then back to E) then on bass you do the F# on the E string but do a C# and D on the low B string then go back to the E string for the A. It'll make those two chords sound even bigger and is super badass. Stuff like that.
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Dec 9, 2020 00:03
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Elissimpark posted:Have a look at Wedgie rubber picks. I have a 5mm hard one (ehhehheh) that sounds like playing with your thumb (not slap) but with a sharper attack. Got that pick today, absolutely sold on it. Will try to pick up  some more if I can. I do notice that it can lose volume with fast cross-picking so you do need to maintain some force with it but in tests with my SB-2 (flatwounds) and cv70's jazz (roundwounds) I was really pleased with the results. With palm-muting, you can get some pretty old-school tone happening. Not often I find something that cool, thanks heaps for pointing me at it!edit: oh, nearly forgot the best thing, they have a nice comfortable thumb-scoop in them, I don't get tired using them. ewe2 fucked around with this message at 06:14 on Dec 9, 2020 |
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Dec 9, 2020 06:12
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Martytoof posted:I am way more excited to get good at walking bass lines than I probably should be. Good luck. I can just barely do a walking line, and I have to write them out ahead of time or learn them by rote if I want to play a song that has walking in it. No jazz band at my school, so I learned to play bass classically, and then I moved to metal and stuff. They don't have a class or a book for people who know how to play bass but don't know anything about jazz or walking bass lines; at least, not that I know of. I have one book for walking bass lines, but it starts at such a low, basic level that I can't really engage with the material. We're talking "this is a string" type stuff.
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Dec 9, 2020 07:02
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Walking bass is as much about ear training as it is theory knowledge and applying it over some simple backing tracks (tons available on youtube) will get you moving a lot quicker. The best advice I have is just learning basic jazz chord theory and playing along to a lot of common progressions. Start with the 1s and 5s of each chord, play half notes, etc. Work up to building your lines around pentatonics and arpeggios, then connecting and leading from chord to chord will come naturally from there. Learning where the spicy notes are for a given chord will help you add in some tension and release to the song as a whole.
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Dec 9, 2020 07:18
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Shageletic posted:Hmm I'll give this a shot, let's see how it goes! For jamming and the like, saying we should play in an A minor key or something just makes things flow so much better, and generally my go to move when jamming with strangers on a blues riff or something, I'm not too experienced a player myself mind you, but if there's anything you're having trouble with or questioning don't be hesitant about approaching the thread btw I tried to learn some musical theory stuff about 8 years ago when I hired some teacher with a degree. I told him I wanted him to help me put together a daily practice routine, learn some music theory so I wouldn’t be clueless, and not rely on 100% ear and all. The dude was an arrogant butthole and insisted I learn Clapton songs and other artists songs that I didn’t give a poo poo about instead after I told him my focus was original music. Also told me I sucked, had bad technique, bad vibrato, and should stick to bass over guitar because I had more potential there (the one musical skill I possess is good ears so I know I suck and don’t really need some prick I’m paying 45 dollars an hour to tell me so.) I learned no music theory or a daily practice routine after 4 lessons, just bullshit songs I could have learned by ear easily. I told him I’m content to be mediocre and don’t want lessons and then all of a sudden he’s interested in teaching me what I want to learn. Too little too late rear end in a top hat. The entire experience soured me on the idea of even trying to better myself as a musician and I haven’t really tried since. This guy came highly recommended. That’s my why I’m mediocre origin story.
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Dec 9, 2020 07:36
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ewe2 posted:Got that pick today, absolutely sold on it. Will try to pick up The ebay store I bought from last year no longer has them, but Harrison Music (https://harrisonmusic.com.au/shop/product/wedgie-rubber-pick-3pack-5-0-hard/) seem to have them in stock. They have the soft ones too, but I read somewhere that they tend to disintegrate. Yeah, the thumb scoop is great. For a 5mm pick, they're pretty easy to keep a grip on. (Out of curiosity, I used to live in your area in the late '90's/early 2000's - did you happen to play in any bands around that time?)
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Dec 9, 2020 12:37
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As far as walking bass lines goes, if you can read music there are books with transcriptions of Paul Chambers, Percy Heath, Doug Watkins, etc. If you can't read music, then learn them by ear. Maybe start with jazz trio albums, where the bass is easier to hear.
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Dec 9, 2020 14:26
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I'm still too early in my bass studies to tackle it, but Truefire does have a walking bass line class: https://truefire.com/essentials-guitar-lessons/walking-bass-lines/c762?aid=townsendsmith
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Dec 9, 2020 15:09
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I'm no expert, but this is just what I'm practicing on walking bass. I started with this video on walking within a single chord, in this case Dm. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsTne59KDYc He gives these little patterns in batches of 4. Here's the first one (keeping in mind this is scale degrees, not fingerings, so 1 = the root).  The only "theory" necessary here is knowing the notes on your lowest two strings, knowing your scale pattern through the 5th, and knowing where the 3rd is in major and minor chords. You can bop those four patterns endlessly, hit your changes, and nobody would kick you out of the band. Then there is the idea of chromatic leading. All that means is, the last beat before you make a chord change, play the note either directly above or below your next root (eg, if you're in A and moving to D, the last note you play in your A section should be either C# (leading up into D) or D# (leading down into the D). The NEXT NEXT level is finding which of those patterns lead most interestingly into one of those chromatic shifts. So in our A to D example, the 1232 pattern sounds real good leading back to the A, but sounds kind of lovely when you're trying to chromatic your way to D (try it! it's awful!). BUT, that 1235 just walks very naturally into your next root, particularly if you do something like make eighth notes of the walk down. So you take JUST those four patterns above and apply them to a 12-bar minor blues. Am Am Am Am Dm Dm Am Am Em Dm Am E Go real slow, learn to swing a metronome. Where it gets fun is, when you add in the REST of the patterns he introduces in the video:  And that ought to be enough to keep you busy for several months (it has me, for sure).
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Dec 9, 2020 16:30
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Does anyone have any ear training apps to recommend for Android? I'm not sure what would constitute a good app vs a bad app aside from the obvious stuff.
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Dec 9, 2020 21:48
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Elissimpark posted:The ebay store I bought from last year no longer has them, but Harrison Music (https://harrisonmusic.com.au/shop/product/wedgie-rubber-pick-3pack-5-0-hard/) seem to have them in stock. They have the soft ones too, but I read somewhere that they tend to disintegrate. Amazon also sell them directly from Wedgie fairly cheaply I just discovered, but not as cheap as that! I will get a pack for sure. The last bands I played with were in the earlier '90's, 91-93ish, the Caplights and the Great Curve, the former an original band, the latter a covers band. Apart from one attempt at a covers band that never made it beyond a few rehearsals in Castlemaine, and a couple of reunion gigs of the Great Curve, I've not gigged since then.
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Dec 9, 2020 22:51
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Man I’m certain I’m holding everything right but my fretting hand still cramps a ton after like, five or ten minutes. I’ll try to stand up the GoPro and take some snaps tomorrow maybe just to run my posture and hand position past you guys. I’ve been doing this for a month and change now and I’d hoped that I’d develop a little more muscle comfort by now but maybe that was optimistic. Of course if I’m holding the neck wrong then RIP me anyway.
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Dec 10, 2020 04:26
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bees everywhere posted:Does anyone have any ear training apps to recommend for Android? I'm not sure what would constitute a good app vs a bad app aside from the obvious stuff. Functional Ear Trainer. Stick with it and I guarantee you it’ll blow your mind when it starts coming together for you after some time. It uses a very good method and the app itself is well made (at least on iOS) with a responsive developer if you have any issues.
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Dec 10, 2020 04:43
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Martytoof posted:Man I’m certain I’m holding everything right but my fretting hand still cramps a ton after like, five or ten minutes. I’ll try to stand up the GoPro and take some snaps tomorrow maybe just to run my posture and hand position past you guys. I’ve been doing this for a month and change now and I’d hoped that I’d develop a little more muscle comfort by now but maybe that was optimistic. you're probably too tense and exerting too much force. your body is massive compared to even a bass string, you only need to use a little bit of kinetic energy to get things going. focus on being loose and touching the strings slightly. and make sure your wrist angle is as straight as possible while not tensed.
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Dec 10, 2020 08:43
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Kilometers Davis posted:Functional Ear Trainer. Stick with it and I guarantee you it’ll blow your mind when it starts coming together for you after some time. It uses a very good method and the app itself is well made (at least on iOS) with a responsive developer if you have any issues. Here's that app for Android peeps: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kaizen9.fet.android Haven't tried it myself but it looks good!
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Dec 10, 2020 09:08
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Solumin posted:Here's that app for Android peeps: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kaizen9.fet.android This is very good. It's on iOS too. Free with no IAP.
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Dec 10, 2020 09:11
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ewe2 posted:Amazon also sell them directly from Wedgie fairly cheaply I just discovered, but not as cheap as that! I will get a pack for sure. Yeah, I was there from '95, so a bit before my time there. I was secretly hoping you'd say Grover or Ruttiger or something amusing (to like, 2 people). Or that you'd played with Skip. Is he still around?
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Dec 10, 2020 12:57
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Kilometers Davis posted:Functional Ear Trainer. Stick with it and I guarantee you it’ll blow your mind when it starts coming together for you after some time. It uses a very good method and the app itself is well made (at least on iOS) with a responsive developer if you have any issues. I downloaded this and I’m enjoying it. It gets fairly challenging when you start mixing in the random and many octaves functions.
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Dec 10, 2020 20:53
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creamcorn posted:you're probably too tense and exerting too much force. your body is massive compared to even a bass string, you only need to use a little bit of kinetic energy to get things going. focus on being loose and touching the strings slightly. and make sure your wrist angle is as straight as possible while not tensed. That and trying to cover too many frets as a beginner without shifting absolutely hosed up my tendons in my left hand, playing light, right, and laid back is key
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Dec 11, 2020 04:13
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Yeah, I think you nailed it on the head — I forgot to charge my GoPro so no footage, but after five minutes I started to cramp up again and it made me think of that post and immediately I realized I was crushing the neck. Finding it hard to square my unclean fret buzzing with my action height and how loosely I’m supposed to hold the neck. I think this is just an inexperience thing and something I really really wish I could book one or two in-person bass lessons just to get some technique advice face to face, if only that were possible right now. By the numbers my action height isn’t too far off from good (but still somewhat high, I’m seeing) so I’m loathe to blame that when the simplest explanation is that I’m still just holding/fretting wrong. I still think I will do a quick recording so maybe you guys can pick me apart. The GoPro is charging so I’ll try to find some way to get good fret shots this weekend maybe. Don’t mean to sound all sad-sack though. I played along with a bit of Talk Talk’s It’s My Life which was one of the songs that really made me want to get into this, and it was hella fun even if I was buzzy and sloppy.
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Dec 11, 2020 05:13
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Turn up your volume and don't hit the strings as hard and see if that helps clean up the fret buzz.
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Dec 11, 2020 05:30
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Probably a dumb question, but what technique do you guys use for quickly muting notes while playing disco octaves? It's as simple as playing octaves (music from TrueFire class attached below), but I can't mute and play at a decent speed. Of course, I've only been playing for a month, so I'm sure I'll eventually get up to speed
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Dec 12, 2020 01:08
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In that exercise, I'd use the finger playing the octave to mute. The little dot above the upper octave notes (you may or may not be aware) mean you play them staccato (so short and pronounced). After plucking the note, raise your finger enough to cut the note short but not enough to leave the string. Similarly, you would do the same for the lower note too, if you wanted that staccato as well. If you're using a pick or some kind of thumb/finger/finger style (like Sting) you could use your palm, but your finger is right there.
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Dec 12, 2020 01:36
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Yeah when playing staccato you release the fret and just keep the finger on the string.
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Dec 12, 2020 05:20
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Is there a pick recommendation for an absolute pick on bass beginner? I've just been playing everything with my fingers, but there are some metal songs I want to learn and my fingers are just too slow to come close at full speed.
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Dec 12, 2020 06:11
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FatCow posted:Is there a pick recommendation for an absolute pick on bass beginner? I've just been playing everything with my fingers, but there are some metal songs I want to learn and my fingers are just too slow to come close at full speed. Honestly, get a variety pack and see what you like. Dunlop picks are pretty much the gold standard for bass and regular guitar. Get both sets here in the link after this paragraph, get both the light/medium and the medium/heavy set to try out multiple thicknesses, materials, and finishes. My personal favorite is the green 0.88mm tortex but that's just what I've latched on to. You should likely find something different that suites your playstyle that gets the sound that you want. The sets linked have a good variety but there are thicker options too if none of them feel sturdy enough for you. Picks are cheap enough that even if you're unsure on the green tortex 0.88mm or the Nylon 1.14mm or the Gator Grip 0.60mm or whatever in the pack caught your eye, you can get a pack of each for pretty cheap then eventually figure out what suits you for what you want to play. Picks last pretty long, unless you're clumsy and lose them, but they're pretty cheap as even a 72 pack of my favorite bass picks costs $13 so try a bunch but dont feel beholden to a certain type too because of this. Hell, you may like one type of pick for a while then eventually feel that some other type fits you better then you switch to it. It happens. So check out a bunch of things and see what you like. Here's that link: https://www.amazon.com/Dunlop-PVP102-Variety-Assorted-Players/dp/B0055VBYWC?th=1 Also if you really like the sound and feel of a certain pick but it somehow keeps slipping out of your fingers: score it with a knife to get some texture via cross hatching. I personally do this to a lot of picks and it makes a huge difference. Spanish Manlove fucked around with this message at 07:05 on Dec 12, 2020 |
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Dec 12, 2020 06:54
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Also be prepared to work on your muting, a lot. Fingerstyle purists like to pretend pick bass is EZ mode but playing clean with a pick is harder than it looks. The muting methods you use on guitar don't work very well due to all the extra inertia of those big ol' strings so you have get a bit more aggressive. The good news is by varying picking location and angle/slant/etc. you can get just as wide a variety of sounds with a pick as you can with your fingers. BDA fucked around with this message at 10:18 on Dec 12, 2020 |
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Dec 12, 2020 10:14
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FatCow posted:Is there a pick recommendation for an absolute pick on bass beginner? I've just been playing everything with my fingers, but there are some metal songs I want to learn and my fingers are just too slow to come close at full speed. Spanish Manlove posted:... Fair too many words to say green tortex... Get the ones with three points.
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Dec 12, 2020 12:53
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How is the Squier Contemporary?
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Dec 12, 2020 14:51
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Personally I wasn't a huge fan of the pickups they put in the Contemporary I messed with, but they were okay and I'm a picky rear end in a top hat. Build quality and general impressions were quite good for the price, I liked it overall.
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Dec 12, 2020 15:46
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| # ? May 27, 2024 16:59 |
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The Science Goy posted:Personally I wasn't a huge fan of the pickups they put in the Contemporary I messed with, but they were okay and I'm a picky rear end in a top hat. Was it active or passive you played?
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Dec 12, 2020 16:14
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