TheLowDown

It will pass. It sounds like it's not the basses you're dissatisfied with but something closer to home. Sometimes if I'm whizzed off with life or people or whatever, I find I will 'transfer' it onto something else and then blame the stinky poo out of it. "The garden looks like crap", "the tone on my basses really don't do it for me anymore", "family are doing my head in", blah.

I bought an amp head from Thomann recently and they supplied a UK plug in addition to a 2 pronged plug.

I'm one of those who suggested that, but you would be barking up the wrong tree if you believe that it was in any way a "defensive reaction". The purpose of the post, given the OP and subsequent comments, was to remind that there is a lot more to music than perfect chops, and people should not feel so defeated. At the end of the day, it's not about how good you are, but about how much you enjoy making music. It's not a competition.

I recall seeing a film one time about 2 competing pianists. One of the pianists was "brilliant" and technically perfect, but his playing lacked feeling (the film was almost like a metaphor for the technically proficient but sometimes robotic classicist vs the improvising jazzer). While the other pianist often made mistakes and always felt inferior to the technically perfect one. The latter was the one that was always preferred because he had something to say, whereas the former was more like a robot. It just goes to show that it's rarely about being perfect, but about having something to say in your playing. Music is expression. If you'e got nothing musically to say, it doesn't matter how good your chops are.

Each day I practise one finger per fret involving shifts on the fretted so that I have the muscle memory of where the fret is, and I always always fret almost on the fret on a fretted. Practice scales up and down the neck every day on the fretted for ear training. An exercise to do is to put the drone(ideally, a bass, cello, or sine wave) on C or whatever scale you want to us at the correct octave, switch off the lights and feel around for where you think the C is. With muscles memory, you'll have a good idea of where it is anyway so you will be able to make an approximate stab at it on the fingerboard. If you can't find it, then cheat and put the light on for a bit. Then slowly slide up the fingerboard on that string, plucking the string to hear the note every few seconds to hear where you are, always listening to the 'beats/pulses' that you hear. The slower the beats the nearer you are to a note (even if it's not in the scale), the faster the beats the further you are in no-man's land. After a while you'll hear that some notes/intervals(well, it's 2 notes that you're hearing in harmony) sound sweeter. The unison, octave, and 5th and to a lesser extent, the 4th will tend to sound slightly sweeter sounding(that's when you'll be thinking that there's got to be a note somewhere around there). Do that until you've reached the octave further up the fingerboard. I like to play in the dark because most of the time I'm trying to see with my ears. The ultimate goal should be to rely on your hearing much more than what you see on the fingerboard, but even the best will have to look at the fingerboard occasionally. Regarding strings, choose either roundwounds or flatwounds depending on which sound and feel you prefer, either brighter/rougher or duller/smoother. Some people advise against roundwounds "because they'll eat into your fretboard, man!", but it's silly advice, like being advised not to leave the house in case you get run over by a bus. I prefer SS roundwounds because it makes it easier to grip the strings to do a vibrato each time I mess up, and I prefer the tactile feel of them anyway on both fretted and fretless. Maybe in a few decades the fingerboard will start to show some wear that makes any difference whatsoever. But by that time, the bass will have long been sold or forgotten about, but I will have enjoyed playing the bass much more along the way than if I have have heeded the advice. Play with your finger tips rather than finger pads.

To begin with, play and sing each note up each string in sharps and down each string in flats. Do for each string. You need to associate the position of each note with the sound that you will eventually expect to hear before you play it. Then put on a drum track or metronome and then play every C note on the fretboard before the 13th fret, going from one to the other for about 30 seconds to the drum track or metronome. Then do the same with G, D, A, E, B, F#, F, Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, G#. A#, D#, C# (the last 4 are the same as Ab, Bb, Eb, and Db, respectively). Do the above every day until it becomes second nature.

Theory is the easiest part - you learn it once and it's done. It's not an evolving, continuous or subtle process. The hard part for me is with ear training, consistently recognising intervals and notes on fretless..

I buy my gear based on whatever gives me the best value for money. Where it's made is irrelevant in my decision, but I doubt any will be British. I would have to look. I notice that there is no Eastern made gear listed there, which is odd given the overwhelming prevalence in modern day times. Any reason why?

The damage is being done when the fingers are moving quickly, forcefully, repetitively while the wrist is bent at an uncomfortable angle. Light pressure and less finger movement will be less damaging than fast and furious finger movement with a bent wrist. A bent wrist with no finger movement does not cause any damage. I would hazard a guess that punk, metal, and rock players would be far more susceptible to carpel tunnel syndrome than country or jazz musicians, for instance. Those fast and repetitive 16th note rhythms, while trying to look cool with their low strung bass, is a ticking timebomb that will inevitably take its toll.

Don't shoot the messenger. I'm just quoting what someone else said earlier in the thread. It was meant to be 4-5, not 4-6 fwiw. Whatever the number happens to be, then that's the only accuracy that's needed.

If the human ear is only accurate to 4-6 cents then that's all that's needed. I tune every day before playing, first by ear and then by tuner to within +/- 3. I generally fuss about far more important things.

Took me a long time to warm to rap/hip-hop because of all the mentions of Ns and Hs and Bs, which I didn't want to hear in music especially. It wasn't until I started playing the bass that I tuned out the lyrics and focused on the beat. I prefer the independent non-commercial hip hop.

Wow! Nice bass. If I didn't already have a 5 string fretted I would have bought the blue version in a heartbeat, assuming it's relatively lightweight.

That's interesting! A theory about tinnitus is that the frequencies that we hear are the brain's way of compensating for those frequencies that we hear the least well We typically hear higher pitched frequencies in our tinnitus because they're usually the first ones to not be heard so well. But if yours are lower pitched, then perhaps that may have some impact on you as a bassist.

Every day for the last year and a bit during my warm up exercises, I've been practising permutations to the metronome at a current 200bpm, keeping each finger as close to the fingerboard as is possible while applying the absolute minimum pressure before fret buzz occurs. I think a lot of the technique for this transfers into other areas of the bass. As rightly stated by DiMarco, it really helps to make the flying finger disappear (within 6-12 months it will). The less the fingers have to travel, the less fatigue over time. It trains the fingers to develop equal strength (there is a tendency for people to concentrate on their strengths rather than developing their weaknesses, so often this means that people will avoid doing things that use their little finger, preferring to use the simandl technique instead)

Mine is like background noise so I'm unaware of it most of the time. Like breathing, as one person has said. It may or may not be directly as a result of diet, but diet affects stress levels and mood, of which definitely has an effect on the intensity of the ringing. High stress, loud ringing. So best to stay from sugary things and to reduce caffeine intake. Jaw issues can also make it worse.

I'm using them now, and not found any reason not to recommend them. Price is reasonable when they're on sale. I don't know what they're like for slap because I've no intention of ever finding out

My heaviest is a 6 string HB at 9.9lb. The HB 4 strings were somewhere between 7 and 8lb. Not sure about the 5 string. Being lightweight is important, but balance is importanter.

Nah don't worry. I would only have been offended if you'd said they were Fenders.

They're all Harley Bentons from the progressive range. Cheap Inexpensive and cheerful but they do me. The one on the left is this.

The white one. If I gave up bass but later decided to return, I would be less likely to want to pick up a fretless, a 5 string or a 6 string.

I would keep the precision and sell all of the jazzes given that's your favourite. What can the jazz do that the precision can't that you absolutely need? Probably nothing, so there's your answer. Doing a Marie Kondo with basses is always empowering because you'll be down to what you need rather than having lots of baggage around the house which could be sold and spent on something genuinely more useful. Before I sell something I always have a twinge of "What if I regret it later?", "But it's so attractive looking though", "What if it will comes in useful later on?", "What if....?", but experience has told me that I never miss anything I sell, and once it's out the door it's forgotten. Life goes on and the world keeps turning. I've mentioned elsewhere in a similar thread, I always ask myself "if this bass was the only one I had, would I be contented?" If the answer is not "yes", then it gets sold. It's often an illusion to believe that we really need something, and it's often the case that we keep things because we just want to own them. In my case, every one of my 5 basses is functional for my uses at this time - 4 string fretted, 4 string fretless, 5 string fretted, 6 string fretted and fretless. If I gave up bass, then all but one would be sold. They're good enough and each serves a specific purpose, and that's fine with me.

The difference in actual quality between inexpensive and expensive is usually minimal nowadays because of the costs of labour and high level of machining, so you really don't have to spend much to get a decent quality bass on a budget. What you could do if you're undecided between fretted and fretless is get 2 basses identical to each other, but one is fretted and one is fretless. Both of these are quite lightweight around 8lb or under.

Just listening to it now and really quite like it. The track 'No other feeling' reminds slightly of Rainy Milo. Thanks for the recommendation.

Just sell what you don't need. Lots of people get GAS and end up with about 200 basses, most being bought because they liked the colour that day or they had a crap day at the office and wanted something to cheer them up. I find it's refreshing to have a clear out, but beforehand I always have the feeling that I will miss them for one reason or another, but I never do. It's an illusion. And once they're sold I never give them a second thought. For each bass you should ask yourself if this was the only bass you had, would you be content? If the answer is NO, get rid. For the OP. I would put it to one side for a while.