lownote

Incidentally if any clever person on here is also on the course and can explain to me Scott's fingering using economy plucking on broken thirds (as in lessons 4 and 8 I'd be super grateful. I thought I understood economy plucking but seems not Edit: now sorted, tnx to Alexis

Dunno, not in the Academia so i can't say. But when I was in I never saw anything like the accelerator. After 8 weeks we've just covered holding the bass, how to hold your fingering hand and how to pluck with two fingers. Yet that tiny detail stuff is transforming my bass playing.

+1. Somewhat to my surprise, my playing is morphing to the good - and this is with a 6 string! I don't think you'll ever stop Scott waffling. I think we should cut some slack to a guy who's so on the detail that he has spent years watching videos of bassists just to see whether they're holding their fingers like this, or like that. And that's on top of all the other things he has achieved/taught himself. And TBF he does stop now and again to summarise.

The former... but maybe that's why no one wants me in a band

No one's raised Kate Bush's contribution to the genre: "washing machine.... washing MACHEEEEENNNN"

Let me come at this from another perspective, one that dials out EQ and a bunch of other factors. An instrument that is just it and you. Sax... SAX, I said. My first sax was a respectable Trevor James alto with a Yamaha mouthpiece. It was a beginner combo, but not cheap, nasty or penny pinching - universal respectable beginner fare. Then I had a bit of a PPI windfall and after asking various grownups I bought an intermediate/pro level Yamaha sax with a pro level mouthpiece, both of which will see out my few remaining years. In bass terms it was like moving from a Squier Affinity to a good Fender P bass. Instantly things that had been hard before became much easier. And yes, I'm getting better but the pro kit has moved me on further than the slow growth in experience would allow - linear v exponential, you know. So kit matters, I would suggest... and indeed have bored with this viewpoint before.

After 3 months in my first proper band I timidly asked the drummer if he was all right with my playing. "Fine m8.... never listen to you so I can't exactly say." was the answer. Which I now realise may have been bandta. Not slow or naive or anything.

bahaha. this

At the recent of being flamed I have to say I think gear makes a huge difference to the sound. It depends on the music , obviously. But my choice of bass, strings, cab and head has a much bigger influence on what I sound like than how I twang the strings - and the EQ too. But then I like to play higher up , where the sound is more clearly defined than playing below fret 5 all the time. I have gone through 35+ basses and 10+ rigs to find 'my sound' and now I know exactly what will give me what sound. I am totally accepting if I was Jaco Devine or any of 100 members on here I could probably do it with my fingers. But I'm a kaka player so I lean on my kit to do as much for me as possible.

round

Aren't they sposed to be Dadario XL170s? Although seemed suspiciously cheap and jangly to me.

Thank you

I had rather hoped my comment wouldn't be taken as sexist or gross, but as it is worded... I doubt very much any woman has ever had a hand in the design of a bass, which may in certain cases make them less than ideal ergonomically. Too much to ask, clearly.

Mrs Lownote is always going on about how you can tell men have designed cars because the accelerator pedal isn't sized for a small foot, and the safety belts catch painfully on their mammaries. I wonder how many women would redesign basses to make them more user friendly if they could. I am minded of shots of Tal Wilkenfeld playing basses that looked three sizes too big for her and with a boob awkwardly hanging over the top.

In an extraordinarily idle moment I found myself browsing through the job ads on DPD's website. I was somewhat WTF-ed to discover that to be a graduate trainee at DPD (from recent experience I guess they need to understand ballistics as well as logistics) you need a 2:1 degree MINIMUM. I cannot say that one of the inducements to apply for uni offered me 45 years ago was that achieving a first would guarantee me a job in a courier company.

+1 The pleasure of the chase, and acquisition [rpt]. A couple of times I have bought The One, only to sell and buy again, because I can't bear the thought of the chase ending.

Still there, week 3. One of those things I probably won't have an informed opinion on until it finishes / I pass the Rubicon point.

I have only been able to afford a couple of basses at a time. But I have serially gone through 35+ in 7 years. I now seem to have found out what I want. I have a P bass bitza (92 Squier neck on Affinity body, Tonerider pup, KiOgon loom) for blues jams, and a 6 string Hohner B Bass VI for everything else. Remarkably I have been free from GAS for a while. But that could be because I now keep buying and then selling saxophones.

well, it's a great piece for a lazy bassist. you could forget the bass line and just duet / converse with the guitarist. that's what i used to do and never got told off.

Awesomeness to date. My heart sank when I learned we were to spend the first week on just holding the bass. And the second lesson just working on the plucking hand's middle two fingers. But in fact it's been great and already improved my playing no end - speed, volume control, accuracy, sense of rhythm n so forth. Mind you, as the postman said through my shed window the other day 'look on it this way, you can only get better'. Cheeky blighter. Can't imagine how he's going to fill the other 24 lessons but enjoying it so far.

A girl can always change his mind

+ 1

I seem to remember Scott Devine devotes a lesson to this. It's not simple - sometimes you lock with the kick drum, sometimes with the high hat. Sometimes the drummer does the detail and the bass takes a back seat, then the drummer lays back and you provide the detail. Then you can lean on the beat and other times you lean back on the beat. I swear you musos make it up half the time.

Just to upset everyone: I bought Vanderkleys and Barefaced cabs at the same time by accident so I had the chance for a back to back comparison. Despite wanting the Vanderkleys to be better I much preferred the BFs. Then I tried Markbass and the BF went out the door. My ears, my gear MHO>