thisnameistaken

I have three bass guitars and a double bass, and yeah I do actually play them all. All the guitars are 4 strings and fretted, one is my Warwick which is just all Warwicky and ace so of course I play it, next up I've got a Squier Jazz which I keep strung with flats so that has a reason for existing, I also have a Fender Jazz with a '70s Allparts neck on it which I have been using for recording recently and it's a fun bass to play because it feels so different to the Warwick, but to be honest I'm thinking about shifting that bass to help fund a second double bass.

Yeah you really need a pedal that can ape a synth with a short envelope on it. The cheapest solution is the BMS, which to be fair is a great pedal. Actually there aren't many other pedals that can do this at all.

[quote name='mentalextra' timestamp='1316371017' post='1377094'] Yep, dont think he used a pick Will I have to stop using my beloved roundwound strings too! [/quote] I always used roundwounds on my fretless basses. All but one had rosewood fingerboards and I never had to get the boards looked at, I probably did 100+ gigs on one rosewood-boarded Jazz that I had without any issues, and I was using Rotosounds the whole time which everybody says chew frets up. Go figure. There are definitely some nice cheap fretless basses to be had. Look at used Squiers or the '80s Yamaha BB models, something like that.

Do they have the same sort of surface as the Silver Slaps? Because I find those to be quite coarse-feeling too. It's a weird thing to get used to after steel strings - feels like playing rope.

Weird. If I rename Jake's file as .pdf it's fine, wonder why the extension is being substituted? Perhaps a 'Site Issue' Anyway thanks Jake I've got the document, I'll give it some attention tonight.

Cheers Jake - is that attachment a pdf file? It's got an odd extension that I can't open.

[quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1316370892' post='1377091'] If someone says play a G, you must know the notes within that chord that will work, so that is why if you know the scale shape, even if you don't or can't work out the individual notes quickly, you are still on safe ground. Am I missing something..??[/quote] It's more about knowing what I'm doing. I would feel a lot more confident and I'm fairly sure I would play more fluently and with less mistakes if I didn't rely on what little knowledge I have right now. It would also make it easier to communicate ideas with other musicians especially non-guitarists, and it would make songwriting easier too, and also working out harmony parts and stuff. Generally I think it would be beneficial to everything I do. [quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1316371515' post='1377107']If people can't keep this shape as they can't use 4 fingers all the time, this falls apart a tad, but you should be using 4 fingers as a matter of course. [/quote] I think fingering is something that is best decided by the instrumentalist according to their own physical ability. You are also assuming I am talking about bass guitar. I play double bass too, and all the accepted wisdom states that I [i]shouldn't[/i] be using 4 fingers as a matter of course.

[quote name='hairyhaw' timestamp='1316209897' post='1376039'] Funny, I've only ever associated Rays with Steve Querault from Ride... [/quote] For me it was William Potter from Cud. In recent years he's been playing Jazzes though. I think Flea sounds like Flea whatever he's playing.

Nah I know all that stuff, it's the actual names of the notes I don't know, which means when I'm busking a tune I don't know I have to be very conservative about what I play because I can't be trusted to find a given interval for a given chord without first thinking of where the root note is and spotting the interval in relation to that.

Could be a Zeller but it's impossible to know without a label, as you've already heard. Probably the best thing to do would be to put it on eBay, list all the important dimensions (body length, width, overall length, length from bridge to nut [this one is v. important], along with what note is under your second finger on the A string when your thumb is against the heel joint [could be D, Eb, few are E]) list it as local pickup only and see what you get. The more info you can provide the better. With the pickup you will should get your £400 back, maybe a little bit more, assuming there's no other damage and you provide lots of good photos to demonstrate that. If you find that the bass has any body parts that aren't laminate you will get more money for it. If it is indeed a Zeller they tend to go for quite low figures IME but again with the pickup I don't think £400 would be unreasonable. Edit: Also try to identify the strings. If they're decent strings and don't need replacing then that will improve the value of the bass by £50 or so.

[quote name='ZMech' post='1375873' date='Sep 16 2011, 07:29 PM']not sure why you've picked trombone as the instrument, piano would seem like the logical choice to me, partly as it's more visual.[/quote] Presumably because I bought a trombone from him earlier this year. I have two of them, I'm just not very good.

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='1375740' date='Sep 16 2011, 05:05 PM']Tricky one for me, As Rick states in the OP there is a line in the sand for pre EB at 84' which I can't think of for any other main stream brand?[/quote] Pre-CBS Fenders, Warwicks pre-'92 before they changed to more automation and factory processes, some guys even say the '80s G&Ls are considerably better than newer examples. I find Ernie Ball sales in these forums to be amongst the most amusing for sellers justifying inflated asking prices. Despite being one of the most common bass guitars in the world it seems every one that comes up for sale is either vintage or rare; Only 5,000 were made in Puke Green Sparkle!

[quote name='Bilbo' post='1375450' date='Sep 16 2011, 01:13 PM']Its called a third for a reason. If you know the scale, you know the reason why a 3rd is a 3rd and a 5th id a 5th etc. and it all makes more sense. I can't see why you would want to do it the other way around. Whilst I can't argue with the importance of chord tones, I do think that their usage is dependant on the notes in between them and there aren't many hip lines that rely soley on chord tones. No, I say learn the scales first.[/quote] I suppose I just thought learning the most common tones first would be a good 'in'. Maybe not. As Doddy points out it could mean I'm calling notes by the wrong names in some contexts if I'm not careful. And while that wouldn't be a massive deal for me in the situations I play in, I wouldn't want to get into a bad habit like that. So is there no better method for learning this stuff than practising scales and voicing the note names at the same time? That just sounds like the kind of exercise that would get very boring very quickly. [quote name='silddx' post='1375391' date='Sep 16 2011, 12:26 PM']TNiT, what led you to identify this need?[/quote] Mostly from playing bass. Busking, especially tunes I haven't rehearsed much / at all. Trying to learn to improvise walking style bass lines. Working on original songs with a band and trying to communicate with brass players, etc. Lots of situations, but it's particularly come to the fore because I'm now playing types of music I hadn't played much before, since I started playing double bass.

Bilbo do you mean learn the notes (names) of each scale rather than concentrating on learning the names of notes in triads first? I guess knowing all the intervals would be more useful but it also seems like a much more challenging thing to do, which is why I was going to start with 1-3-5s.

I played one of those in G4M's showroom and the metal tailpiece really put me off. I did think it could be a decent bass but I thought it would cost a fortune to improve it and I thought it was a bit of a gamble. It was the only bass they had on the floor that was any good though. The rest were worse than school instruments - most looked like they'd had the strings and bridge thrown at them as an afterthought.

I'm fine with anticipating intervals my ear is pretty good, I can follow common changes like turnarounds and stuff just by ear but more often than not I don't know the names of the notes I'm playing. Also I'm a terrible trombonist and the instrument itself would be a big distraction I think. Although my girlfriend is planning to take up the trumpet so maybe that will give me more opportunity to practice.

[quote name='Clarky' post='1375100' date='Sep 16 2011, 06:54 AM']For no logical reason whatsoever, I have always thought of 1980 as the cutoff. hence '70s Fenders, Stingrays, Ricks etc are vintage in my view. But like said earlier, it's all in the eye of the beholder[/quote] It's 1980 for me too, but I wonder if that's an indication of our age. I would imagine older players might draw the line at 1970, and younger players might see 1990 as the fairly close to the beginning of time, when only dinosaurs and Dinosaur Jr roamed the earth.

Yeah really embarrassing, but there are massive holes in my knowledge and I'm looking for the best ways to fill them. Starting with this! I'm alright finding the root of a chord anywhere on the neck, although I could get better, but my main problem is I don't know what the intervals in each chord are. As in, I don't know that Eb is the 3rd in Bmaj. Or if I do, I can't think of it very quickly. Any tips for practising towards this knowledge?

Every time that reliced yellow Sandberg PM5 comes up for sale (I think I've watched it change hands 3 times on here) it makes me think I could put up with a 5 string and/or a P-bass neck.

I'm gig-less at the moment, my last front man (who I really rate as it happens) was a bath-dodging bin-diver.

Hey Clarky how is the tension compared to Silver Slaps? Also have you slapped them? Do they sound mellow enough for that sort of thing?