lowdowner

Excellent! It's great to be fortunate to absorb someone else's experience like that and make it your own... I had a bass lesson today and now feel even more enthused about my playing than ever... Are you going to keep it up?

[quote name='chaypup' timestamp='1346968213' post='1795602'] Here's a quick clip of my band ¡Super Chango! at Saturday's gig - I always look like I'm frowning but I was feeling massively happy the whole gig! [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iggoyq0B3f4[/media] [/quote] I absolutely love this - great groove going on and I could listen all night - no wonder you were happy

[quote name='merlin' timestamp='1346959441' post='1795427'] love it,great stuff,nice bass tone... [/quote] hey - that's so cool to hear - thanks long way to go yet, but given that most people who hear me play (like family and most friends) don't really 'get' the bass, hearing that from a bassist is really encouraging!

Hey - thanks for the comments. My teacher suggested filming my playing and looking at it - there's a lot I don't like here, but some of it is ok. The mix is because if I turn down the bass it seems to (very quickly) be lost to the cheapo microphone. I'll take a look at that right hand - I come from a classical guitar playing background so I had to 'unlearn' quite a lot (and am still doing that)... thanks again

Ok, inspired by other newbies on here - and the useful feedback they received - here is the first video of me playing my loverly thumb... this is Radiohead 'Iron Lung' (well, a shortened version). I'm not sure if I'm brave or foolish posting this, but genuine comments welcome: we all have to start somewhere and 8 months in, any constructive advice is welcome. Please be nice or I will cry! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0hmzSEVdv4

When you guy are talking about 'learning a song' though - what exactly do you usually mean? if you have the chord chart for a song then you can (usually) play a pretty simple pattern around that - maybe with a pentatonic minor/major variation of notes here and there and some chromatic runs, and it tends to work. Or do you mean the *actual* accurate riffs/patterns in the song from the original? If someone asked me to quickly 'learn' a new song for a gig in a few days, I'd work from the chord chart and make my own (simple) one to add the harmony and rhythm... so now I'm worried that I'm not 'doing it right'!

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1346932932' post='1794948'] you weren't tempted by the one in the forsale section? [/quote] no - i'm not sure about the broad neck version!

about once every two weeks, recently once a week for a short while, but fortnightly seems to work well. I guess it's all about how much time you have to practice, how much you have to work on and how happy you are to work 'alone' in between. When I started I had them every week because I wanted to stop some of the bad habits forming and that takes a lot of hands on help - now it's a bit different and maybe more subtle issues - including theory - which takes longer to practice and get right.

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1346865273' post='1794236'] Who else wished they had this bass, a tuner, a box of tools and a set of new strings in front of them right now? [/quote] yes, absolutely, it's *screaming* for a bit of fettling

Looks like the action is quite high (from the photos) so you might be in need to some work on the setup anyway - playing with a very high action is a real pain

Good looking bass - how does it play? Welcome to the forums

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1346793325' post='1793443'] Really? I thought you were just describing playing a short repeated phrase that was well within your comfort zone so you just relax a bit more than normal. [/quote] Ah yes, that's it... I knew there was a better way of describing it (obviously sobriety helps)

Brilliant - absolutely brilliant! Almost as good as their new 'rusty' finish

me too - doomed, utterly doomed

But the music exists as some kind of Platonic perfection and the moment you 'connect' (although the term 'moment' could be quite a long time period) you're just channelling the essence of the music ... just for a brief time. What you're doing is not a result of your deliberate action, it's just because you've some how connected to the music

put 50 to 110's on my bass which has 45 to 105's on before and the neck definitely needed a truss rod adjustment, the additional bow was visible. but no hassle, a very small turn and all was back to great action... definitely worth learning to do

Killing me Softly - Roberta Flack http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1eOsMc2Fgg listen out for the killer bass groove at 0.30s

too late.. too late... I'm doomed to drag my weak and starving body through the streets of england begging for pennies to pay for my GAS caused debts I'm too weak to resist

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1346790191' post='1793382'] Should be OK shouldn't it that Spector? I can see you are a man of similar Warwick taste lowdowner! [/quote] Mark - at bassdirect - told me that once I got bored or Warwick and was looking for a 'real' bass I should go back to him and try a spector (or a roscoe funnily enough). I still think the bass brand is - largely - immaterial - compared to ability

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1346790240' post='1793384'] I think really that 'being at one' with music is being thrilled by what you hear in your head. 'Being at one' with your instrument means you can play what you hear in your head without having to interpret it, you just articulate it without having to think. I don't personally know many players who can do this, except Jake Newman. [/quote] there's a strange zen-like thing going on though isn't there? being 'thrilled' and being 'connected' aren't the same. I'm thinking about that moment when you've been playing a short groove over and over and all of a sudden your timing seems loose, but perfect, and you can feel the pulse completely... I wish I was better at describing this feeling, written posts are sh*t at this kind of thing

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1346789776' post='1793370'] I never had Spectors down as cheap? trade it for a Squier Jazz bass on here and be done with ya! [/quote] the man was speaking poetry and you've reduced it to 'stuff'

I don't really know the answer to this, but my gut feeling is that the 'groove' can live in an elastic band, let alone a many-thousand-pound wonder-bass... Seriously, I've been moved to dance to someone slapping a shoebox with feeling. The 'problems' (such as they may be) are probably lack of practice/groove and not much to do with the instrument... Keep playing, the groove can be released by someone bashing the table top with a biro....

[quote name='Doddy' timestamp='1346783770' post='1793232'] I think that it's easy to feel 'at one' with the bass-it's just a matter of spending time and knowing your way around a particular instrument. Being 'at one' with the [i]music [/i]is a totally different thing. It's a great feeling when you are playing with other musicians and everything is working,and everyone is listening and reacting to each other. Or when you are soloing and you play some hip lines and it feels/sounds great. It's the culmination of all the years of study and practise,when you realise that you know it so well that it has become subconscious and naturally comes out in your playing. [/quote] this is 'deep' but I completely understand this - being at one with the music is independent of the instrument in some way (as long as your limitations with the instrument doesn't get in the way)... but it's rare to be one with the music to that extent

Leonard's a star! Suzanne is one of my favorite tracks...

[quote name='warwickhunt' timestamp='1346785491' post='1793276'] It is played in B... and I did! [/quote] yars, yars, just on a different string to me... you're almost certainly more experienced - I play with the B on the A string either way - sounds nice...