bass_dinger

YMCA. To get the gallop rhythm in the chorus, I have had to learn a completely different approach to playing bass - using my thumb and two fingers, and not just two fingers. I am struggling with the octave chromatic runs too. I don't yet have the dexterity to fit them all in where they should be. And look - 6 flats! So, this is a challenging piece for me, but terrific fun.

https://reverb.com/uk/item/53221267-unknown-maker-unknown-5-string-bass It's on Reverb.com. It has stripes. It makes me sad. For my own education, could the luthier have used a commercially available body-mounted tuner?

Same for me - I don't feel that I play enough to justify an additional bass. I also tend to use something until it breaks (cars especially, and, it seems, basses too). However, I have plans for a second bass, and will start searching seriously later this year! That's more to give me a backup instrument, and less about having a collection.

For me, I have two basses. The acoustic 5 string bass never gets used. It was bought when I played in an acoustic ukulele band. However, the five string electric bass is played on stage pretty much each week. As a result, it is need of a setup (rattling truss rod), and I need to wait for a break in my playing schedule before I can have the work done. So, one bass effectively, but two basses numerically.

Did you find anything suitable? When my daughter was learning, it seemed to me that the teacher was for ever correcting bad habits, preempting bad technique, and sharing good habits that carried her easily to Grade 8. Conversely, another family friend had taught herself on the recorder. She was very good indeed, but had somehow managed to get her hands the wrong way round. By the time a teacher told her that, it was too late to change years of ingrained habit.

Could I just point out that a flat battery makes a huge difference to my sound. It's a lot easier to listen to, for a start! It did feel like a small thing to fail over, at less than the cost of a pack of bass strings. And it is not in the signal chain (or, arguably, is fundamental to the signal chain). Had I purchased an outboard battery checker, I would not even have mentioned it. However, a thing in the bass, and a light and a switch outside of it, feels like a bass purchase. Let's see what the basschat legal team say.

I tried, but I couldn't get my tongue into the battery cavity....

It's fear, not necessity, that compels me to buy them. I had one run down while I was warming up, after less than a year's usage. From then on, I changed them every month. That's now changed to every quarter year. I play weekly (and, indeed, weakly...). I also play a few times in the week for perhaps an hour. The bass is always unplugged when not in use. I know that the batteries still have life in them. However I don't know how much life they have, and it is easier to buy a battery from Poundland, and replace it. The battery tester therefore felt like a better solution.

It looks like I am out. I purchased a battery status checker, from zvirus. It is designed to fit into the bass, and illuminate an LED when the battery voltage drops below a predetermined level (7.5v for mine). I also need to pay my luthier to fit the item - holes drilled, switches and LEDs installed. I was getting fed up with buying batteries every month, on the off-chance that they were about to expire. On the plus side, I can finally use up the six old batteries that I have in my kit case.... Thanks, all. The Gear Abstinence thread has been a great discipline!

If one immerses oneself in church worship bands, it is a great training ground, for the reasons that LukeFRC shared. However, not everyone embraces the opportunity, and it seems to me that some musicians become better, while others simply stagnate. So, I have learnt to play in all the keys, because the YouTube video is in one key, the chord charts are in another, and, on the day, the singers find that the chart key is too low, and they want it higher. So, one song in three keys - sometimes in the space of 5 minutes. Add to that a drummer who plays differently to the drummer that played last week, and a new guitarist who does not follow the charts ("Just play by ear, Rob!") and I get the opportunity to become more versatile. However, I do feel that the whole gig is made less enjoyable when people make no effort to improve.

No theology, but lots of truth in that tattoo. I like it.

That's a useful reminder of what makes something musical, rather than simply music. Certainly, it felt to me that this bassist had mastered the piece, and was able to introduce expression, feeling and emotion into his playing.

"Where's the amplifier, boys and girls?" "It's left behind you!!" "Oh no! It isn't.....!?" Oh yes it was.....

It perhaps won't help you, but in my band, I don't have keys in my stage mix. That way, I am not distracted by what they are doing. The house mix is different of course - the Sound Engineer can decide how best to weave keys and bass together. For all I know, he may have switched me off in the room! hahah I also play in a way that a keyboard player can't - so, driving bass riffs, hammer-ons, slides, melodic riffs, and plucking different parts of the string for different tones. An active bass and steel roundwounds help to cut through the mix.

It's not an effects pedal - it's the natural acoustic reverb in the 300 foot tall vaulted ceiling . . . .

So many talented musicians lost to us at an early age 1970 - Robert Johnson appears on the Old Grey Whistle Test 1980 - the Mama Cass Workout video is released. 1990 - Buddy Holly reunites with the Crickets, and plays at Wembley stadium. 2000 - Jimi Hendrix composes a piece for orchestra, to great acclaim. 2010 - Brian Jones leaves the Rolling Stones, citing ill health. Has a regular slot on Radio 2 ("Sounds of the 60s").

"Hey Joe - where you going with that airgun in your hand?"

Nick Drake would have a YouTube masterclass channel, in which he and Rick Beato shows everyone the tricky tunings used in his first five albums....

I would be tempted to add in some musical quotes from Avicii's Wake Me Up. To my untrained ear, it sounds like the same chord sequence, and the Euro-pop-synth motif evokes the Avicii riff. “The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.”

Spot on - they don't need a home-grown version of the song. They need the right, and familiar, version. As for learning a dance to a song, is this the 2022 equivalent of learning hand-actions to a song? For me, one of the reasons I started playing guitar in church was to exempt me from songs with actions . . .

Now gone, to a good home

You don't need a new bass. A multiscale Dingwall would require special strings, and you can't therefore swap out strings from your other bass. You may find that you need a different case to what you currently have. The technique of playing a multiscale Dingwall may not easily transfer to a standard instrument. If you play fretless, then there does not appear to be a fretless Dingwall. All the same arguments that I formulated, when I had the same desire for a Dingwall. "Step away from the Search Engine, sir. Put down your mouse, and back away from the open tabs."

That's a warning to me. I saw a through-neck Washburn, buyer collection from Alloa, £350. Barely affordable, and I have never tried one before. I have now decided not to try to get it. Instead, I will use the Wanted ads to go for the instrument that I really want.

So, I have previously been overwhelmed by the choice at Camden's Bass Gallery (5 different acoustic five-stringers when I was looking for my own instrument!). Perhaps a bass meet-up is also a good opportunity to try other instruments.