Jackroadkill

I may be on the right track, then. The new strap will be here in a few days, so I should know by next practise.

Grrr, I'm still having trouble with this. At practise today I ended up having to use a pick for half of the material, and I usually only use one for a couple of songs. I did, however, have an idea. The strap on my main bass is quite short, and I felt the effects of plucking with my fingers much less on the bass that I use for Eb tuning, which has a longer strap. This means that the angle of my wrist is much less acute. I wonder if this angle is something to do with it - am I plucking in the wrong direction, for example, as a result of poor wrist technique? I've ordered a longer strap, so we'll see. Thanks, JRK

It depends on how much you like the bass, I suppose. I'm happy with mine, and both were a lot less than that. I'm not saying I wouldn't buy one for that money, just that I'm happy with what I have now.

I have an unnatural dislike of them, having not missed them in their heyday. They were poop then and they're still poop 20 years on.

The Status Symbol; essentially the same as the standard model but with a few bits picked out in shiny chrome; essentially a bass version of the Vauxhall Calibra.

The Fender Recidivism Bass; only to be played by Police tribute acts.

I've got a sort of anti-MPP story that piggybacks off another band's misfortune. I come from a small town in Wales/Whales with a lively but incestuous music scene (stop sniggering at the back!) and once you've played a few gigs you end up playing with pretty much everyone on the scene in the local area by some sort of patchouli-powered musical osmosis. I'd just formed a jam band, which we christened Rock 'Ard, with my flatmate, Ste, and we had a couple of rehearsals with a view to gigs etc down the line. Ste also played guitar in another band, Wylfa, with a few of our friends. Wylfa had a gig in the local pit, known as the Monty, so we all went along to see them. Long before stage time it became apparent that all was not well, as nobody could find their guitar player, P. Phonecalls were made, his regular haunts checked.... nothing. No P. Two minutes before stage time P arrived, absolutely steaming, wandered onstage and started blundering into everyone's gear, unplugging things etc. The band hurried onstage and started up. P just detuned his guitar, gurgled into the mic and generally made an derrière of himself. Ste tried turning P's amp down, but P was having none of it. He murdered the first two songs and then carefully put his guitar down and wandered off into the night. The band struggled through another song and came to a standstill. A hurried conference was had and Wylfa decided that they couldn't do the gig without P, but there was a roomful of punters who were getting good-naturedly rowdier by the minute, so what to do? Jazz Odyssey not being an option, Ste suggested a set by Rock 'Ard, as all members were in attendance. We only had about five songs, but we played the hell out of them. "Rock N Roll" lasted about fifteen minutes, as I recall. Still, it went down well - we actually got paid and some lovely young ladies danced in front of me for the whole set. P was eventually found trouserless behind the recycling bins in the town car park. He never played a gig again, sadly.

Fender Indecision Bass; takes thirty visits to Fender's website to actually build up the courage to buy one.

Well, you say that, but Paul Barker from Ministry played an acoustic bass onstage at The Big Day Out in Milton Keynes in July 1999. I don't know whether he did this often, but it worked on that day.

Every bass ever made: The Good-For-Metal Bass

I drank a bottle of Buttercup Syryp just before going on stage once and tripped balls all night.

If I had a mic I'd drop it.

Whoever made that is obviously not running from the grammar fuzz, but is petrified of the punctuation rozzers.

I agree with @neepheid; that's top flight sheethoosery right there.

Oh man, so many.... One was when our singer (who is still one of my very best friends) stumbled up to me just as we were due onstage and slurred "Is there a better mic stand? This one isn't going to hold me up"; things went downhill from there. When I forgot the verse riff to the latest song we'd written, leaving the rest of the band to try and cover for me whilst I pretended it was just drones of feedback. The time we played a festival in the widdling rain, which flooded the stage and blew up the monitors. When I got carried away and jumped on a table, kicking drinks all over the unhappy drinkers who were sat at it, finding out later that they were the parents of the young lady whose 18th birthday we were playing. Those are just some that spring to mind. There are others, unfortunately!

Mate, I'd come and see that!

I'm doing my best to avoid that and use the method you suggest; it's odd, because I'd swear that I use the pad of my finger rather than the very tip, but it's the tip that's complaining. I think I'll just have to try and play for a shorter time and do it more often for a while, and see what happens. I mean, if all else fails I can use a pick, but I want to play with my fingers as much as I can. Thanks all, JRK

I'm new to bass (and BC, too) and have found the advice and help available on the forum to be invaluable. The advice given above is great; I bought a very nice Mexican Precision at a very reasonable price indeed from a BC member a few weeks back - bargains can be had in the classifieds section on a daily basis.

Excellent - I'll see if I can dig it out.

I've never played with anything other than roundswound strings, so it could be. Are they known for being harder on the fingers than flats?

I hadn't thought about it that way; it doesn't feel like I'm overdoing it when I pluck the strings, but after an hour or so of the string sliding over the end of the fingertip it's definitely starting to get sore, and on a couple of occasions has resulted in a small blister. I assumed this was due to friction that I'm not used to, but after reading what you said above, maybe I need to refine my technique. This is just my right hand index finger. If I'm playing something fast I will use the middle finger to take up some of the work, but it doesn't get enough use to cause any problems. Neither is there any problem on the fingers of my left hand, but they've had years of guitar playing, so maybe the skin is thick enough that any nickel sensitivity is reduced. Ow, that doesn't sound nice at all. Thankfully mine don't do anything as unpleasant as that, I just get the world's smallest carpet burn on my fingertip.

That's great - real world experience is worth a hundred YouTube "reviews"! Thanks very much for taking the time to respond in detail.

Not as far as I'm aware; I've played guitar for years (badly!) and used nickelwound strings without issue.

Thanks Douglas, that's great. I'll try that method. I know that playing is the only way to develop those calluses, I suppose, but the how is what's been beating me so far. I think I may have to for certain songs, as much as I'd prefer to use my fingers. I'm not Robert Tujillo yet!

How do you find it in general?