Your very 1st song

[SH73]

Wrathchild at age of 16

[Paul S]

I learnt guitar playing along to the early Status Quo album Piledriver so when I migrated over to bass that's what I did as well.  Nothing complicated and nothing's changed. 

[diskwave]

Probably something from Bad Companys Straight Shooter album. My poor mother sticking her head around the bedroom door..... "are you playing for much longer, it all sounds rather thumpy."! Cheers mum.

[FretsOnFire]

Guitar - teenage kicks

Bass - Wheels of Steel 

[AndyTravis]

Stand By Me - Ben E King.

 

It was definitely the first song/recognisable tune.

 

My mum came in from the kitchen…”Was that you?!”

 

A Kay P bass copy through a gorilla guitar amp…

 

[Sandypjb]

Dire straits- Sultans of Swing on my sunburst Squier P. 1984/1985.

[EBS_freak]

Love Me Do - The Beatles

 

In my early days, I just worked through The Beatles complete scores book, pretty much in line with albums.

 

[Baloney Balderdash]

On bass it was an original song, don't remember which, with the originals noise rock band Prune, that I, after having picked up a bass randomly for fun at a rehearsal with a band I played guitar in at that point, and falling in love with the sound and feel of it, right there, went to "audition" for playing bass in, and got in on the job, with praise of my playing from the drummer, who was actually a relatively trained multi instrumentalist, who also played keys/piano and guitar on the sideline and knew how to read and write music, not even owning my own bass at that time, and previously only really having experience with playing guitar for a couple of years.

 

That's when I found out bass was really my instrument, and that playing bass came much more naturally to me.

 

And we are not talking merely root notes.

 

Somehow all the practice that I struggled with really integrating meaningfully into my guitar playing came in place, and suddenly made much much more sense to me.

 

Edited January 26 by Baloney Balderdash

[mikebass456]

First live gigged song - Road to hell by Chris Rea around 1991.....

[FretsOnFire]

5 minutes ago, mikebass456 said:

First live gigged song - Road to hell by Chris Rea around 1991.....

What a song that is

[squire5]

'I Can Hear the Grass Grow' by The Move.It has an opening riff played on bass.Took me ages to get right.14 I was.(simper)

[pigface]

Bad Moon Rising by CCR (on guitar). In the early 70s that seemed to be most players' first song, where I was, at least. 3 chords, no barres. House of the Rising Sun came shortly thereafter but required an F chord.

[Geek99]

4 hours ago, AndyTravis said:

Stand By Me - Ben E King.

 

It was definitely the first song/recognisable tune.

 

My mum came in from the kitchen…”Was that you?!”

 

A Kay P bass copy through a gorilla guitar amp…

 

Me also. And also zombie (cranberries) which I performed recently at an OM night on a whim. I asked the lady who runs it if she’d filmed (she usually does) but she said she was enjoying too much and forgot, I therefore assume my volume was at 0. 

Edited January 25 by Geek99

[Geek99]

9 hours ago, Kiwi said:

U2 - New Years Day

It kind of blew my mind and made me aware of the power of a good arrangement - how closely musical parts could fit together and still sound completely different to one another.

 I had the same experience with U2, his bsss parts sounded impressive but also accessible to me like I could maybe do that too…

[Bass4real]

On 24/01/2025 at 04:05, MichaelDean said:

I can't really remember the first song, but I did get the tab book for Rage Against The Machine's self titled album very early on. That was a really good introduction to bass. Lots of good rhythmic work, some speedy fingering, and a whole lot of fun.

Great fkn album 

[Bass4real]

20 hours ago, SH73 said:

Wrathchild at age of 16

Steve Harris 

The first Maiden song I learned was 

Run to the hills 

Phantom of the Opera is my favorite Steve Harris tearing up his bass song, there is so many though

[Bass4real]

12 hours ago, Geek99 said:

 I had the same experience with U2, his bsss parts sounded impressive but also accessible to me like I could maybe do that too…

I liked that song from the first time I heard it

Great song , and kick ass bass line,

Thanks for reminding me

I'm gonna go play it right now , I haven't heard it for years 

 

 

[Bass4real]

16 hours ago, Sandypjb said:

Dire straits- Sultans of Swing on my sunburst Squier P. 1984/1985.

I'm a Philly METALhead through and thru.

And I have always be a fan of that song 

 

[Bass4real]

15 hours ago, FretsOnFire said:

What a song that is

The first song I played at the first live show with the first band I was in ( AFTERSHOKK) was DETROIT ROCK CITY - ki§§

Damn that was a long time ago I joined AFTERSHOKK 2 weeks before my first show with them I was playing my KRAMER XL8 bass I had 10 days to learn 35 cover songs , most I never heard before and 5 originals. I pulled it off and to this day It's hard for me to believe I learned every song and we played every fkn song 4 10 song sets . I thought I was gonna f*** up alot of those songs .

I'm still proud of myself I didn't miss a damn note.

I don't think I could learn 40 songs in a month let alone 2 weeks now.

Maybe if I was hired by a great band and paid good money.

Maybe :?)

[SH73]

4 hours ago, Bass4real said:

Steve Harris 

The first Maiden song I learned was 

Run to the hills 

Phantom of the Opera is my favorite Steve Harris tearing up his bass song, there is so many though

Phantom of the Opera was my second Maiden song I learnt at young age, how funny I can't play it as good now as I was able to when I started out.

[Lord Sausage]

It was 'Another Brick in the Wall'  

 

Not by choice. I had bass lessons for a year. The teacher was a jazz fusion guitarist but could play bass. He taught it me, then basically solo'd over it whilst I kept playing it. 

 

So used me as a backing track essentially.

[KingBollock]

Megadeth - Peace Sells… But Who’s Buying.

 

I was 13. Until that point I had only ever played blues riffs from a book I had. I actually had the tab book for Guns & Roses - Appetite For Destruction, but I just couldn’t get anything to sound right… I had no idea that you could tune your bass differently…

Then I joined my first band. It was decided that, because Peace Sells was the most difficult song to play, it should be the first for me to learn. It took me two weeks to get right.

 

I can’t remember how many songs they had in their set (they had been playing the same set for two years at that point), but Peace Sells was the only one I had ever actually heard. There was Metallica - Seek And Destroy (I’d only heard the Master Of Puppets album), King Diamond - Dressed In White, and a song by Zodiac Mindwarp (no idea what the song was). I’d never even heard of King Diamond or Zodiac Mindwarp. I think most of, if not all, the rest were originals.

[chriswareham]

3 hours ago, Lord Sausage said:

It was 'Another Brick in the Wall'  

 

Not by choice. I had bass lessons for a year. The teacher was a jazz fusion guitarist but could play bass. He taught it me, then basically solo'd over it whilst I kept playing it. 

 

So used me as a backing track essentially.

 

I had a few lessons with a guy that did that. A session guitarist called Peter Maxim, an incredibly softly spoken man who taught me things I'd not normally play like the bass parts to Bill Withers and Ian Dury songs.

[Lord Sausage]

1 hour ago, chriswareham said:

 

I had a few lessons with a guy that did that. A session guitarist called Peter Maxim, an incredibly softly spoken man who taught me things I'd not normally play like the bass parts to Bill Withers and Ian Dury songs.

Looking back he was brilliant for me. I'd ask to learn a song and he say no. He'd have me clapping to metronome, playing octaves against bass and snares in odd times. Spelling out extended chords. Non of the stuff I wanted to, but stuff I was really grateful for years later.

[Rodders]

Sweet Home Alabama, first song I gigged was Wishing Well by Free.