Help me pick my first bass!

[Ricky 4000]

10 hours ago, pepsi-abi said:

piano i got up to grade 4 and sadly had to stop, guitar not so much just couple chords lol, so bass is completely new to me

Sorry you had to stop, but I'm sure you'll be fine with the bass! 👍

 

 

[ubit]

7 hours ago, pepsi-abi said:

thats true! i found that i got a lot of ringing so i switched to play it on the E string and it sounded a lot clearer, once i know how to mute open strings then i can switch between the two

Don't worry too much about playing open strings. Obviously an open string will ring out until you stop it. This can sound messy if you don't do it immediately. Why she plays open A for this song is beyond me when clearly the A at the fifth is clearer and easier to play. It's obviously her style and is in no way beneficial to the song. You will eventually get used to muting with other fingers and it will soon be second nature.

[ubit]

I am actually quite jealous of you. I wish I was beginning my bass life with all the tools that are available for you these days. Back when I were a lad, we had to move the record stylus back and forth on t' turntable to learn our parts. You try telling the kids of today! 😏

[ubit]

This guy is also a good bet for teaching techniques. He caters for pretty much all levels of bass players and has a good clear way of coming across. Worth subscribing.

 

 

[pepsi-abi]

18 hours ago, ubit said:

I am actually quite jealous of you. I wish I was beginning my bass life with all the tools that are available for you these days. Back when I were a lad, we had to move the record stylus back and forth on t' turntable to learn our parts. You try telling the kids of today! 😏

that sounds so cool and retro though, i love that, i try to go to a lot of record fairs as i love listening to music on vinyl  

[pepsi-abi]

10 hours ago, ubit said:

This guy is also a good bet for teaching techniques. He caters for pretty much all levels of bass players and has a good clear way of coming across. Worth subscribing.

 

 

ahh brilliant thank you again!  

[naxos10]

The guy in the video above puts his videos on YouTube under BassBuzz. I have been using some of his lessons on there recently and found them useful.

[P-Belly Evans]

On 05/04/2020 at 16:45, walshy said:

Never feel cheeky with an offer, they can always say no! Oh, and deffo get a colour you want.

Totally agree with this. I walked away with a free Epiphone EBO with my 2013 Thunderbird from Guitar Guitar for not much north of a grand. Wanted the EB3..... tight buggers said no.  Now before you all start, the TBird has no neck dive and the EBO 'looks' bloody great........ 

 

Also I got a natural finish VM jazz about a month before the Sires were first announced. It is lovely but probably would have waited if I had known, although my CV 70s P (black 😁) is different gravy for the price with flats and a foam mute under the ashtray

[Guest]

On 17/04/2020 at 13:04, ubit said:

This guy is also a good bet for teaching techniques. He caters for pretty much all levels of bass players and has a good clear way of coming across. Worth subscribing.

 

 

That’s a decent video but it’s worth pointing out (but certainly not worth getting too worried) that he is hanging his elbow down, which puts an acute angle between his forearm and hand. Teaching the basics should also have a physical dimension. Plenty of players do this with few problems but playing long-term like that compresses the nerves in the wrist, which can lead to nasties like Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. One important point here is this is only really apparent seated - unless you set the strap ridiculously high, when you stand up your position changes and the elbow comes up. One of the biggest challenges I had was unlearning technique learned mostly sitting down - when I started performing standing up I could hardly play as the angle of my arm, the bass and even my fretting wrist were so different.

So my tip for starting out is simple - try to find a consistent position seated and standing. Many of us practice sitting down, but performing standing up.

[P-Belly Evans]

Lovely bass too by the way.......enjoy🍷👍

[ubit]

So are we going to get progress reports Abi? I am dying to hear how you are getting on and more importantly, how you are enjoying your bass playing.

[ubit]

On 18/04/2020 at 20:46, FDC484950 said:

That’s a decent video but it’s worth pointing out (but certainly not worth getting too worried) that he is hanging his elbow down, which puts an acute angle between his forearm and hand. Teaching the basics should also have a physical dimension. Plenty of players do this with few problems but playing long-term like that compresses the nerves in the wrist, which can lead to nasties like Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. One important point here is this is only really apparent seated - unless you set the strap ridiculously high, when you stand up your position changes and the elbow comes up. One of the biggest challenges I had was unlearning technique learned mostly sitting down - when I started performing standing up I could hardly play as the angle of my arm, the bass and even my fretting wrist were so different.

So my tip for starting out is simple - try to find a consistent position seated and standing. Many of us practice sitting down, but performing standing up.

This is a very good point. I play sitting down with my elbow high, so unconsciously I have got around this problem. I suppose it's from years of gigging AND  playing sitting down. I have found a common angle for my fore-arm. One to definitely watch out for.

[pepsi-abi]

On 22/04/2020 at 07:53, ubit said:

So are we going to get progress reports Abi? I am dying to hear how you are getting on and more importantly, how you are enjoying your bass playing.

really enjoying it, cant do any full songs yet but getting use to it and loving it, having to fit the saxophone practice in to, which i know isnt bass related but if you or anyone is interested, please check it out here: 

 

[pepsi-abi]

Hi all hope you are all keeping well,

question, eventually I want to record my bass into my macbook, what piece of equipment should I be looking at to do this, I don't want to spend too much money but i was looking at the Zoom b3n, any opinions, suggestions and advice is welcome  

[Jonesy]

 

 

I've just started to look at recording from home and found this thread really useful

 

There's also a thread in the recording forum where it looks like @sbrag is doing exactly what you're thinking of so might be able to help

 

Edited May 1, 2020 by Jonesy

[pepsi-abi]

5 minutes ago, Jonesy said:

Thank you!  

 

I've just started to look at recording from home and found this thread really useful

 

 

 

 

[sbrag]

2 hours ago, skidder652003 said:

i used to do it with my digitec RP1 many moons ago and had some awesome results as the reverbs were so good on that old thing, hence why I thought it might be worth a try

 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, pepsi-abi said:

Hi all hope you are all keeping well,

question, eventually I want to record my bass into my macbook, what piece of equipment should I be looking at to do this, I don't want to spend too much money but i was looking at the Zoom b3n, any opinions, suggestions and advice is welcome  

I picked up a Focusrite Scarlett Solo off Amazon at well under £100. It has USB-C (not sure how recent your MacBook is); together with some desktop monitors (or even PC monitors at a push, which aren’t great but do the job) it’s all you need. It outputs decent sound, there’s very little to set up and works flawlessly. It all depends what features you need. I take it you can use GarageBand or something similar for building tracks?

[sbrag]

1 hour ago, Jonesy said:

 

 

I've just started to look at recording from home and found this thread really useful

 

There's also a thread in the recording forum where it looks like @sbrag is doing exactly what you're thinking of so might be able to help

 

Yup. Done a couple of tracks like this  and I've found its been a good way to practice too. I picked up a zoom b3 for about £70 2nd hand and its a great piece of kit. Originally bought as my new band need some fx I didn't have and it seemed a cheaper and more flexible way of doing stuff but since lockdown started  I realised it worked as an audio interface so we have been doing a few bits of recording. 

Its really easy to use and I've been using audacity but am tempted to try sonar too. Audacity recognises the zoom so its just plug in and go. I use the bassman amp sim but the SVT one is good too but there are a few to choose from. I've also put it in my amps fx loop with no fx on to get its pre amp tome which sounded good to my ears. 

I will say I'm not doing any more than recoding a bassline as I then send it to our guitarist who does all the mixing and stuff.

Edited May 1, 2020 by sbrag
Typos

[nilebodgers]

The B3n isn't an interface unlike the original B3 model, so won't help with recording.

[ricksterphil]

Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 would be the way to go. Around £80 off of eBay

[pepsi-abi]

thank you everyone much appreciated  

[Ricky 4000]

Hi Abi, hope you're keeping well, and getting to know your bass. 🤞

Regarding home recording: As the comments above, the Scarlett seems to be a smart choice. I'll be looking for one of those myself sometime... my cheap Behringer USB mixer just about works as an interface, but its frustratingly tricky to use.

Also as said above, the B3n is great for making strange / cool / funky noises, but it doesn't work as an audio interface.

Nice work on the sax by the way -- you have a great tone! 👍

 

Edited May 2, 2020 by Ricky 4000

[skidder652003]

11 hours ago, nilebodgers said:

The B3n isn't an interface unlike the original B3 model, so won't help with recording.

so was the Audio Interface discontinued on the B3N? That's a trick missed by zoom if I ever heard one, what a great feature that is!

[Al Krow]

4 hours ago, skidder652003 said:

so was the Audio Interface discontinued on the B3N? That's a trick missed by zoom if I ever heard one, what a great feature that is!

No mention of the audio interface on the B3N or on their latest iteration: the more compact and really good value B14. Must admit that was a point that had escaped me in terms of older B3 --> current B3N / B14, probably 'cos like a number of BC'ers, I've got a Focusrite Scarlett for interface duties. I'm not particularly sure why Zoom did this, other than maybe to create a niche for this very neat "mini Zoom B3N" (strictly its a mini G3N) which is their current multifx audio interface:

https://zoom-na.com/products/production-recording/audio-interfaces/gce-3-guitar-lab-circuit-emulator

Cheapest I've seen this on the net is £75 at Andertons.

One of the advantages of the Focusrite kit, depending on the model you choose, over e.g. a Zoom or Helix is having separate inputs rather than needing to route everything through your multifx so that you can clean blend some / all of drums, vocals, instrument and bass in real time together and put down a couple of tracks at a time, although I suspect for a lot of recordings that won't be an issue in that you'll lay down the drums and then layer each of the other instruments and vocals separately.

The other issue with Zoom kit is that there is an element of underlying small but noticeable "digital artefact" noise on the B3N and B14, which is more present with some of the fx patches than others. This is fine for live use, but you wouldn't want it on a recording. I wonder if they have managed to eliminate this with the GCE3?

Edited May 2, 2020 by Al Krow