I play bass and I love it!
I use a Ibanez Soundgear SR-506[6 strings]

@PhoeNNix
classic guitar and bass are two differnt worlds
the lessons may improove your skills, but is not the same

Damn man...a 6? That high C really throws me off. But I've played your bass- it's sooo smooth, the neck and body are so perfect. I love how sleek it is.

@phoenix,
Im self taught, I honestly really suck with a guitar or acoustic in my hands, but right now I wish I had a teacher since Ive been involved with bands and writing music. Teaching yourself is good if you are determined, but you always need someone to learn from especially with the notes and scales.

Tnx. I was never really sure about it, since most musicians are multi-players, but I guess that comes with years of composing.

@Phoenix,
It never hurts to be multi skilled, in fact it will help you alot regarding scales and notes and help you familiarize yourself with other instruments so that if you ever have a band you can coordinate many instruments by yourself. I play bass mainly, but Ive play piano, cello and Ive done baritone before that, and Im telling you that keeping your brain active with music and creativity pays off, if you want to play the violin or the frikkin' trombone, why not? Skills like that will make you fluent with the musical language if you know what I mean.

Here I am! I play the bass too!

Written by Sunioj on 17.07.2006 at 14:20

@Basso,
If you want to play fast as in shredding, you should use a pick...but that sometimes takes some tone away from the bassy sound, but if you are refferring to playing notes fast as in arpeggios, then your fingers are just as fast; train your left hand with practicing scales and arpeggios, and you will see that in time, you will be able to connect notes on the differrent strings without even thinking.

I have already decided to only use my fingers. I dont want to use a pick ^^ and I hopefully never will. (It is hard as hell to have the stamina enough though I am currently trying to train the stamina in my fingers ^^.)

Thats cool. Training your fingers and also hammering you can do everywhere....for instance, like practice plucking when your bored on a table if you are in school are something in class, and as you get your calices, plucking would be easy as hell. (I decided to go with picking, but my fingers arent coordinated enough to pluck yet cuz im so used to picking)

Then if you wanna practice arpeggios, and hammering, put the way you want to position your fingersto be in keep practicing it on any surface, for me it comes by default when my crazy romanian teacher taught me cello he told me to practice nonstop. (its almost a habit)

Haha nice ^^.

I prefer to use my fingers too, also in my BM band

I only like to play Power, in bass it is amazing to play helloween songs, fast and perfects. Also play funk, i use to have a Jackson Bass and was incredible, very difficult to play but i love it!

Written by Vinnie R. on 02.08.2006 at 02:19

I only like to play Power, in bass it is amazing to play helloween songs, fast and perfects. Also play funk, i use to have a Jackson Bass and was incredible, very difficult to play but i love it!

I have a Jackson bass too, but if I play power I use to play Kamelot.

kamelot have many good bass lines, i think is very difficult to play BM in bass, my fingers doesn't amswer!

I play bass and vocals in a band called Moloch. I love playing with my fingers, but our style calls exclusively for tremolo picking. In most cases, the bass plays fast as the guitar, which sounds awesome.

I play Bass,It fucking rules!! ,I have a fender jazz master,some cheap shitty bass,and i have a home made 5 string,took a year two make,but it's awesome! ,I only really play jazz on it,stuff from the yellow jackets ,etc,beutiful bass lines,But seeing as this is a metal forum I shouldn't be talking about jazz,I havent heard any metal bass lines worth the time of learning,except maybe that metallica one,can't remember what Its called though,

Written by Daniel on 05.08.2006 at 12:41

I play Bass,It fucking rules!! ,I have a fender jazz master,some cheap shitty bass,and i have a home made 5 string,took a year two make,but it's awesome! ,I only really play jazz on it,stuff from the yellow jackets ,etc,beutiful bass lines,But seeing as this is a metal forum I shouldn't be talking about jazz,I havent heard any metal bass lines worth the time of learning,except maybe that metallica one,can't remember what Its called though,

If you want some metal bands with bass lines worth learning check out Necrophagist, Death, Quo Vadis, Dream Theater, Symphony X, Tool, Atheist, Control Denied, Mastodon, Opeth, Orphaned Land, and Primus.

Written by Vinnie R. on 02.08.2006 at 19:00

kamelot have many good bass lines, i think is very difficult to play BM in bass, my fingers doesn't amswer!

Yes, 'cause of this I use pick to play BM, really a fuckin' metallic sound : great

I'm not a fan of playing with a pick, because I don't like the tone I get from it... I'm not saying it wouldn't sound good in a band when you can't hear the bass that much and it's in the beckground,, then it probably is good...

@Poo scented,
Ive been playing bass for awhile, and I can truely say that Ive trained my ear to pick up bass and its easy. Yeah your right about the bass sound thing, bands with audible bass is Death, Stratovarius, COB, Morbid Angel, etc. But seriously without the bass, most bands sound really unfinished.

Written by Sunioj on 13.08.2006 at 15:08

@Poo scented,
Ive been playing bass for awhile, and I can truely say that Ive trained my ear to pick up bass and its easy. Yeah your right about the bass sound thing, bands with audible bass is Death, Stratovarius, COB, Morbid Angel, etc. But seriously without the bass, most bands sound really unfinished.

Oh, I completely agree... and I didn't ever have to "train" my ears to hear bass, it's a natural thing for me... but I was trying to say the only time bass guitar sounds good with a pick is when it is the foundation for the riffs,, that's all, I wasn't saying that you can never hear the bass... The thing is when there are bass lines that don't just go along with the rythm is when music is actually thought out and "intelligent" music.

Bass player.
My bass is a Aria STB-series, not too shabby... but, I saw a B.C Rich Warlock Platinum Series a few weeks ago... and I just HAVE to have it. Anyway, my favourite band to play would have to be Death.

@poo scented,
Cool, I agree!

Peavey Grind 6 String Bass, Been playing for 5 years I believe...not too long, still have a few dream theater songs left to learn but hopefully soon I shall be done

Hi guys!

I'm thinking of starting to learn bass besides drums. tell me if the cheap beginners combos are any good?

@markku,
Cheap beginner bass, would be a Ibanez Soundgear or a Cort action bass, preferably a soundgear.

Alright since this thread seems like it's getting kind of boring let's discuss some other things. Is there anybody here who likes to play bass with effects? I do I only have one bass pedal right now which is a Boss Chours pedal it's a pretty good pedal it's great for getting a really clean nice tone. I also like to play with distortion sometimes to but I don't have a proper bass distortion pedal yet so I just use my MetalZone MT-2 for now.

I use only bass chorus sometimes; I don't like effects too much.

I dont any effects whatsoever, however a synthesizer sounds pretty trippy on a bass and as well as heavy distortion sounds pretty evil on a bass when you play chords!

Im curious does anyone here play chords?

Yeah I play chords quite often in the songs I write because I feel sometimes it is the best way to accent things it makes some things sound so much heavier. Also when I play alot of Iron Maiden songs alot of them have chords on bass played in them so I do them then to. As for a synthesizer on bass I wish I had one to do this with because as you said it sounds really trippy but not only that but I want to have one so I can play songs by bands like Muse and have my sound more accurately fit there's.

wooow Muse has incredibly fuckin expensive gear. Nonetheless they are a great band.