wasting time

[dave_bass5]

[quote name='paul_5' timestamp='1401883712' post='2467790']
I keep trying P basses off and on, but always come back to a Jazz.
[/quote]

Tone wise I prefer a Jazz bass, but find a P works better in my band.
whatever i play it has my Squier CV Jazz neck or Lakland JO neck on it. Cant get on with medium jumbo frets or P necks these days.

[Skol303]

Twiddling can be fun, but easily over-done [i][yeah, I'm rapping!].[/i]

If anything, it helps you get used to your system, so that you can find your way to achieving different tones more efficiently. Hence, with practice, you can dial in what's needed for a particular track, or compensate for room acoustics and so on, more quickly.

Just like any form of 'critical listening', it can help if you:

[b]1) Use reference material.[/b] Select some tracks that show off the bass tone you're looking for, and try to match them. It's a much more productive method than trial and error.

[b]2) Take regular breaks and give your ears chance to rest.[/b] Your ears (or specifically, your brain) will begin to get tired after about half an hour of critical listening. Take a ten minute break, listen to some of your reference material at low volume, and come back to it. You'll be amazed at how much of a difference this can make.

[b]3) Read some boring stuff about 'dynamic processing'.[/b] Yeah, I know it's much more fun to just twiddle those knobs [i](ooh, matron!).[/i] But it help a lot if you learn a little about how different twiddles affect the sound in different ways.

...or just buy a P-bass and be done with it

[JTUK]

[quote name='dave_bass5' timestamp='1401364717' post='2462812']
Wonder why so many people have multiple basses if its not worth spending more than a few mins getting a good tone.

Maybe its not worth spending the time, but worth sending them money ;-)
[/quote]

I think you can go up many blind alleys when you don't actually know what you are looking for.
If you hear a Fender type sound, then you need a Fender type bass to deliver it...and then there
are the nuances within that sound template to explore.
It took me a long time to realise I was fighting what I was hearing rather than embracing what I had..
and then at that point, what I had, had to go.
So, for a fender sound, I binned the modern bass take on it which basically means altho
the front pick up has P.Bass tendences, it isn't really it...
So, now for Fender sounds, I have an active Fender clone..which is basically a much better made
Fender Jazz, with an active, but I don't want the active to take over too much of the work..as that is going back to square
one.
Then I run the amp without a lot of bias as that gives me the core tone of the bass and I slightly enhance that.
The amp and cab don't have a great amount to do and just make it it louder.
I don't add masses of bass and I don't wipe off a load of top...

If, after all that, the sound is off... I haven't got the bass to do the job.
I have settled on two sounds.. a classic Marcus Miller Jazz and a vintage RW Fender which is quite
woody and blocky and I have never been happy or had the sound up so easily and quickly.

So, in that sense... I'm there.

[No lust in Jazz]

[color=#222222][quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1401872631' post='2467619']
This is why I made the change way back in my first working band...
Best decision ever........
[/quote][/color]
[color=#222222]It was the opposite for me, having watched Scott Thunes on Zappas 1984 tour; I'd never played a gig without a plectrum until five months ago. The change came as I began working on /rehearsing/using as practice programme some Jeff Berlin & Weather report stuff; as this developed along with the callouses and hardened skin to play a gig I took my finger style ‘live’.[/color]

[color=#222222]I’ve not noticed too many differences with tone – not ‘wow - this is a new epoch in my playing one’s’ anyway – same amp and cab, but my plectrum technique had become quite refined over the years. I've found that some material that I’d had issues with when using a plectrum is a little easier with fingers - playing with a fingers has given me a little more thought time to choose which notes to play and a deftness on touch that try as I might, I can’t replicate with a plectrum.[/color]

[color=#222222]Conversely there’s material that my finger style struggles with.[/color]

[color=#222222]My band haven’t noticed, but the piano player finds that my higher register 3 note chords slaughter his low budget Professor Longhair imitation noodling [/color]

[color=#222222]With reference to wasting time – providing that somehow your knowledge of music, your instrument or gear moves on I can’t see how it is a waste.[/color]

[color=#222222][quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1401872631' post='2467619']
The only pick player I get interested in is Bobby Vega
[/quote][/color]
[color=#222222]+1 but for me there are others of interest.[/color]

Edited June 4, 2014 by No lust in Jazz

[JTUK]

For me, it mostly prompted by the sound I could get at the time.
I was listening to guys like Glover but I couldn't get the fatness I wanted
so I tried fingers and it was instantly better for me...although I suffered
technically for a while. Then slap came in and I was already there.

If I hadn't had the sound limitations that I heard ...then I would probably have swapped
a few years later when Stanley came along..
But the point is...we do these things according to how we hear them...and I think that is the best way
and reason to do it..

[Bassnut62]

[quote name='steve-bbb' timestamp='1401404625' post='2463439']

I do hope guitarists read this
[/quote]

Always found it easy to get bass tone in minutes with trusty Bassman 135 head and assorted cabs.
Now playing guitar and while I basically stick with same approach of a simple Fender-type valve amp, I am finding getting good guitar tone a fair bit harder to do. This may be because of need for different gain settings and need to place sound in different parts of band mix....not sure; but maybe we should cut guitarists some slack re getting right level, tone, gain, etc

[discreet]

[quote name='Bassnut62' timestamp='1401910029' post='2468273']
maybe we should cut guitarists some slack re getting right level, tone, gain, etc
[/quote]

Nah.

[steve-bbb]

[quote name='Bassnut62' timestamp='1401910029' post='2468273']
but maybe we should cut guitarists some slack re getting right level, tone, gain, etc
[/quote]

err ....let me think ..................................... nope

[Bassman Steve]

[quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1401892442' post='2467928']

But the point is...we do these things according to how we hear them...and I think that is the best way
and reason to do it..
[/quote]

This.

[Telebass]

[quote name='dave_bass5' timestamp='1401884476' post='2467803']


Tone wise I prefer a Jazz bass, but find a P works better in my band.
whatever i play it has my Squier CV Jazz neck or Lakland JO neck on it. Cant get on with medium jumbo frets or P necks these days.
[/quote]
All my Ps have J necks. Would like a Precision with a proper Jazz pickup set, because the J shape is less good looking abd heavier.