P-T-P

A high number of the basses for sale which feature a statement along the lines of, "Only gigged once or twice," frequently include a line such as, "Only came with a gigbag so bought a flightcase for it..." Can't help but wonder if the latter is partly the reason for the former. Don't get me wrong, I understand the desire to protect your bass, just seems excessive. I once played in a band where the guitarist used two full flightcased Fender Twin reverb amps that never once travelled further than about 40 miles in a Citroen 2Cv.

Certainly a 5 string is more than simply 5 additional low notes for you to use. Reworking existing basslines wouldn't be my preferred method of incorporating the new possibilities open to you, but there's nothing wrong about it either. I would look for some 5 string scale/mode/arpeggio exercises - mainly just to get used to the way the extra string feels in your hands - then, as you learn new lines or refine older ones, using the extra string will be a more natural step.

For me, when playing standing up, my bass can end up in any number of positions - to the side, at a cocked angle, pulled in close to my (ample) belly - because that's part of performing for me, and alos because I don't like to be that rigid. Playing seated, it's very easy to keep the bass in one fixed place for consistent playing which can enable you to nail some difficult techniques consistently, which is great for recording but not so great if you hope to be jumping around the stage! The more you play, the more you'll find a kinda sweet spot of comfort for your bass. The best advice I can give is to practice as close to how you intend to perform as possible so if you're going to be playing mostly standing, you either need to practice while standing or find a sitting position (on a stool perhaps, on the edge of the seat) which replicates the position of the bass on you when in a standing position. Play around with the lenght of your strap too as this may make a huge difference to finding the right way for you to play. Just be careful not to settle on a playing position where your arms/wrists are too extremely bent as this may lead to long-term injury.

I think it was James Jamerson used an analogy of thinking about the beat as being like the butt cheeks of an well protportioned lady as she walks down the street. In essence, her feet might set the precise points of the beat but her cheeks bounce along to a far more interesting rhythm. The other analogy I've heard is to think of the beat as a horse jumping a fence. It happens very quickly, but broken down there's three major points - as his back legs leave the ground (ahead of the beat); as he's halfway over (on the beat) and as he touches down on the other side (behind the beat). For what it's worth, neither of these helped me understand the concept anything like as much as just listening a lot and knowing the song you're playing as intimately as is possible so that when you play, you aren't playing the bass notes, or the rhythm or the feel or the groove so much as just playing the song.If you're having to think a lot about the mechanics of the playing as you're doing it, it will be a barrier to interpreting the feel.

Interesting how much the sound seems to have varied. I was at the back of 102, which was the lower tier of seats Alex's side, about half way along the arena. Sound was great except there was no definition on Geddy's bass at all. Fine when he was playing solo but as soon as the band cut in, there was just bottom end of the bass as an unintelligible rumble and then guitars, synths, drums and vocals as clear as you could wish for. Knew what was coming with the set before I went and although happy to hear many of those songs, felt the first set in particular was crying out for a couple of rabble-rousing numbers.

My 2p worth of experience/advice. I play in a 4 piece covers band - weddings, clubs, parties, weekend warrior kinda thing. We started out using wedges but it's not really practical to carry all that gear so some of us have adopted IEMs. I agree with the idea that the biggest contributor to the sound quality is going to be the buds, but I disagree that you need custom fit, triple driver system to get a consistently usable solution. First, the IEM systems... The t-bones are great for the price. Our singer uses one of these and I've used them too in the past and they're fine. They are a little shy on bottom end bass response however - not catastrophically so, but depending on your preference, maybe not acceptable either. The Shure PSM-400 and Sennheiser G2 systems I have used both provide a much richer low end and given the choice between these or t-bone I would try to stretch for a second hand set of either ahead of the t-bone but I'd weight my budget towards the phones moreso than the system. The monitors/phones/buds... If you can afford the custom fit jobs, absolutely go for it. If not, I've quite happily used a set of Shure E3c and when they got nicked a set of Shure SCL3s. I wear them with the yellow foam tops which provide a decent seal in your ear canal, which is one of the secrets to good low end reproduction with IEM use. These (and I believe most of the Shure phones) are intended to be worn with the the cable running over the ear to help them stay in place and maintain that seal. These foam tips also cut outside noise by about 40dB so provide excellent hearing protection. That being said, I have a set of iBeats which I use on my phone and I tried them on my IEM system once and the difference was astonishing. The bass response was massive. Unfortunately they don't stay in place very well so not ideal for stage use, but if they could, I'd be wearing them. It'd be interesting to know how much the difference in bass response is down to the specific design of the iBeats and how much is simply a product of the advances in technology since the Shures were designed (6+ years ago).