As a guitar player who's doing bass, I usually just play the exact same thing the guitars play, or do the roots and fifths. Could anyone give me a few pointers on how to spice it up a little, it gets boring as hell but I'm not sure what else'll sound proper, since we only have one guitar and one bass, and most of the sound relies on the bass chords for the backing.

Always glad to help a fellow bass player! Just spread the word!


The most important issue is the impedance (amount of Ohms) of the cabinet and at what impedance those watts are delivered by the amp. If they match there shouldn't be any problem whatsoever. If they don't match it might not pose a problem as long as the impedance doesn't go too low. If it does you might fry you cabinet completely! If there is a mismatch it is better to closely observe what the combination does.
A higher impedance for the cabinet means a lower output from the amp.
The other way round means a higher output and this might fry your speakers when the power the amp delivers is too high for the cabinet!


How much space do you have in the music. If the guitar is shredding everything until there's no space left you might be better off laying down roots and fifths but at a lower attack rate. This will surely make the bass more audible.
If there is enough room to spare for the bass try some licks starting from root through fifths and sevenths and back to thirds and root. Some octaves of those notes might also give you some more fun to play around!
Start listening to some well known bass players to hear what they do to get some ideas as well! Try to get into the vibe of the bass guitar and treat it like the instrument it is instead of a lower tuned guitar!

Alright, thanks for the tip. I've always had the previous mentality that a faster attack rate will increase the bass presence but what you've said does make sense. I'm playing around with playing the basslines for songs ascending then descending just to vary it a lil.

I'm still stuck using a pick. I guess I just need to practice finger technique way more but honestly I don't think I could learn to do what I can already without sacrificing at least a year of hard work. I can sweep, sweep tap and alternate pick runs as fast as my fretting fingers can go. I still get shit from inferior bass players(they literally sound terrible) for using a pick. Is using a pick that big of a deal? What are the advantages of using fingers other than tone? I can do two hand tap things by rolling the pick under my pinky finger so that isn't as obstacle.

Why are picks shunned so much? I know guitarists who only use fingers so what's the big deal?

Rounder tone, more control. Also, with four finger picking you can play fast for a longer time without getting tired. I also think it's a bit eaiser to do quick patterns that jump around between strings a lot with fingers, especially if you're jumping two strings (like playing octaves).

But the reason they shittalk you for using a pick is probaby immaturity. I use pick for some music when that kinda attack is the sound I'm after. Right tool for the right job, always.

And I don't really think that it'll take you that long to get the hang of finger picking... Also, it's not like you've gotta stop using a pick in the band while you get up to speed with using your fingers.

But I really think you should develop a good finger technique. Great tool to have in your arsenal.

When I get the time I'll start working on it. It's just not nearly as loud and since I sweep in every song I play( I play 6 and 7 string basses) I figure I'll have a hell of a time doing that at the speed I do with fingers. Thanks for the info though man.

Don't try plucking hard with your fingers when you start, it'll just sound like crap and build bad technique. Let the amp do the job for you, there's a reason they build them with volume knobs you know.

You'll build both speed and strength faster than you'd think.

This. There's no reason to pluck particularly hard, especially if you're going at high speeds Watch the technique of someone like Mike Flores (who does a lot of sweeping himself) and you'll see he doesn't pluck the strings that hard.

Like others have said: use the technique that is most appropriate at a certain moment and don't switch to another technique just because others say so.
If sweeping comes more natural to you when using a pick: stick with it!
If you have mastered fingerstyle playing and you do something new fingerstyle and it sounds better: use it at that moment.

I, for one, have never beleived in reviewing all the material I've done before and using another technique just for the sake of it. If you've done something a certain way most of the time it's better to keep on doing it that way. Otherwise you never get to finish writing songs: there is always something new you've learned that you could incorporate into that song so it's an unfinishable job.

The attractions of older songs lie in the fact that they were mostly writting with a fresh mind towards creating songs opposite to songs you write later on in life including the use of what style to play (finger or pick) and which techniques to use (sweeping, hammer-ons etc). You write with the knowledge and prowess you posses at that moment. I think it's really fun to look back on those moments and relive that vibe once in a while!

How do I sweep with my fingers? I just don't get it unless it is an individual plucking of each string, and in that case, it isn't really a sweep. I play classical guitar using finger technique but bass is relatively new to me. And I started with a pick thinking that I would eventually gravitate towards using the fingers but it just hasn't clicked yet. I'll keep trying but being a working musician I just can't sacrifice what I can already do you know? I record music left and right and can only practice techniques I am not familiar with on the side.

I want to keep at it though. Seems a lot of things would be a bit easier. And for those interested in my bass technique please visit the following link and listen to a bass solo I recorded.

http://www.myspace.com/midnightempiremetal

I did that with a six string and a pick, plugged straight into my computer so excuse the bad tone. However, my ability should be plain as day. Not saying I'm some badass bass player but it is my job, and I would to know what I could do to improve upon it. There is a mixture of jazz, metal, and for lack of a better term heavy metal runs in there. It's nothing special as I improvised the entire thing. Just give me some feedback and let me know if I should spend the time using fingers. Thanks in advance guys.

For sweeping you could use your thumb to do the sweep parts headed towards the high strings and one of your other fingers (like your forefinger or imiddle finger) for getting back to the E or B string.
This way you wouldn't lose too much of your speed while sweeping.

But like I said before, use what feels right for the situation. Don't use techniques just because someone else says so. Use them only when you master them. If you don't the end result will always be worse compared to using a technique that you do master.

If you want to emulate a finger style sound you could try to use thicker picks. In the past I've used 2 mm picks and they seemed to hjave a less pronounced pick sound compared to thinner picks.

About your playing: try and listen to some top notch Metal players like Steve DiGiorgio and Tony Choy. Listen to their approach. What I hear is a guitar player picking up a bass but still playing like a guitarplayer! (no offence meant!)

I am a guitar player who picked up a bass. And I do listen to other bassits, Rainer from Pavor being my favorite. It'll take a while for me to seperate the two. Thanks for the advice.

Can someone tell me why people say learning bass is easier than learning the guitar? Is it because there's less strings?

Hmm....well, it's not the same for everyone really. I actually find bass slightly harder than guitar, but perhaps thats because I have more experience on it. But I think the idea that bass is harder than guitar is a common misconception. People assume that bass is easier because musicians limit themselves when making music. Many bassists play easy stuff especially in more commercial music so people simply think that it's always the same. Though i'm quite sure that if one really tries to master the bass, with all the techniques, it'll be harder than guitar.

I agree. Unless you want to limit yourself to learning basic scales and basic plucking, you'll have fun with it's ease and monotony. Obviously, I'm being sarcastic. Anyways, techniques include basic plucking, 3-finger galloping, 4-finger galloping, slap and pop, thumbing, tapping, slap-tapping(slap and pop mixed with tapping), etc. That, with my biases included, would make the bass guitar a harder instrument to master.

People who say that are normally guitar players and not bass players or people with no knowledge of playing the instrument whatsoever!

If you compare what different types of guitar there are with the different types of bassguitar there are you can easily see that there is much more to learn on a bass than on a guitar.
You have guitars in the common flavours 6-string, 7 string and 12 string (with octave strings) electric and acoustic. Added to that you have the double neck guitars which sport combinations of the aforementioned types. That's about it save for some specially made exotic guitar.
For the bass we start with the 4 string climbing up to 10 strings, one string at a time, which need to be played individually. Furthermore there are also basses with octave strings starting with 8 strings through 10 strings, 12 strings 15 strings up to the 18 string basses. Here we see that it is not just a matter of 1 octave string but also 2 octave strings per basic string. Added to that we also have double necked basses which can sport different configurations of aforementioned types.
Furthermore we also have the Double Bass and acoustic bassguitars in both 4 and 5 string configurations.

For a bass you need much more strength in your fingers compared to a guitar because of the higher string tension. Every technique applied to the guitar can also be used on the bassguitar and then some (see Erebus' post)! To be able to pull it all off you need to practice just as much and probably even more than any guitar player would.

So you can safely say that people who say that learning to play the bassguitar is easier than playing the guitar don't know shit!
I do have to admit that to be able to play along with other musicians you might not need to learn that much and in that case it would be easier than learning to play the guitar but if you want to do it properly: fat chance!

Instead of making another thread, I figured I'd post this in here: What's a good, cheap combo bass amp that sounds good for Death/Thrash metal? I need something in about the 100 watt range. I've heard good thing about Fender amps, but the people who suggested that don't really play metal so I didn't know if I should take their advice.

I've just recently realized I can use my pinkie when finger picking, and I do a fairly good job at doing so. Though, I want to exercise it more. I want to be able to be faster with my pinkie and use it more efficiently.

Are there any exercises or songs that would be helpful for getting used to using a fourth finger? I play a four-string, so everybody knows.

Thanks.

I play bass a tiny bit (played it before I played guitar) and play guitar mostly now. There's tonnes of different kinds of guitars..different scales, different amounts of strings, there's 8 string guitars, 10 string guitars, baritone guitars..

Just saying, it's not like bass is unique in that way, and most basses over 5 or 6 strings are fairly exotic too.

Amps are not designed for specific types of music so you can use it for every kind of music you like. Just try one out and see if YOU like it! If it sounds OK to you: buy it. If nt look for something else.
There are also good combos by Marshall, Hartke, Galien Krueger and Ampeg to name just a few.
Just do a Google on combo bass amps and I bet you'll get loads of pages!

i would go with ampeg. good brand, and if you're looking for about 100 watts, the ba115 is a good amp for its price

What's wrong with playing my six string bass like a guitar? I really like the style I have going on and I absolutely love playing leads and solos on the bass. It sounds killer.

You can do anything you like.

So what basses do you guys use/prefer to use?

I myself currently run a complete pile-of-shit legacy bass starter pack (I got it for myself when I was just starting out a year ago). However, I've currently got a Fender 24-fret active bass with a 3-band EQ arriving soon. Sounds killer!

Also, just out of curiosity, what pickup configurations do you guys prefer to use on basses?

If you wade through this forum you will find out what we play and prefer!
It seems like there is someone every 10 pages or so that gets here and asks that! If everyone will post there setup again and again this thread will be cluttered with the same posts and I think that is not the meaning of any forum!

PS: that is not directed to you per se!

I'm after a specific bass tone, and I'm hoping you guys and gals can help me get a little closer to it.

For those of you that have heard the band Grand Magus, that is the bass tone I want.

I do not have a bass amp, so I know that will make things much more difficult, and I'm sure that's where most of the guy's tone comes from. I just use a direct input for recording bass on all of my recordings. Well, basically I have a tubescreamer and a 31 band EQ, and I've gotten some really nice tones out of it, but even with my 5 string, it just doesn't have that full, powerful low end that I want, especially on the higher strings, where it just sounds kinda flimsy. Do I need to spend the money on a basic bass amp and mic it to get the powerful sound that I want, or can I get a badass, thick and heavy bass tone with DI and some EQ/compression/overdrive?

I prefer using a six string though i've gravitated towards seven string in the past. I used to think the more string the better but six seems perfect for my style. I have a piece of shit GK head and cabinet and wouldn't recommend them to anyone.

I love six strings, but the only seven string I've played was one of those Conklin Groove Tools and it was not comfortable for me to play at all.

What is more important is the setup of the bass of the Bass player from Grand Magus. What kind of strings does he use, what kind of pickups does his bass sport? The tone begins at the player's fingers not at his Amp. I've played over Amps that were provided by the venue because of limited space but I have always got compliments from the guitar players for getting my own sound inspite of that!
My bass and my playing make the tone, the amp and cabinets only help sound it out!

If you have a bass with single coil pick-ups and GM's bass player has a bass with humbucking pick-ups you already have a major difference in tone which can hardly be overcome with the aid of electronics. So that is why I advise you to take a good look at the basses GM's bass player plays.

Furthermore what will help a bit is indeed to amplify the sound through an amp combined with a 15" speaker cabinet. The bigger the speakers are the better they propel the lower frequencies.
An amp with at least a pre-amp section that is tubed will also be in your favour but that is where your tubescreamer might help as well!

Buzz question:

I recently bought a new Ibanez GSR200, and I am having a lot of fret buzz in the area with the first 4 frets. Should I try to adjust the saddles with an allen wrench, mess with the truss rod, or take it to someone who knows what they are doing? The e string seems fine, and the action overall is pretty low. Also, I just started playing bass, could this just be poor technique?

It could be any of the factors you describe.
If you want to be sure it's not your technique: play in front of someone who is more experienced in playing bass and let him (or her) play on it to compare. No buzzing or faulty playing technique will be spotted easily.

Adjusting you truss rod depends on the fact of how straight the neck is. If it is very straight trying to make it a bit hollow might solve the problem but will also make the action get somewhat higher.

Messing with the saddles might help you ruining the intonation of the bass which means that it isn't very much in tune any more on quite a few positions!
Of course the positioning of the saddles might already be the cause of the problem to begin with so getting its intonation checked might also be the problem solver.

What might also be another problem is the nut. If this isn't right it might make the higher frets get too near to the fretbaord which will cause them to buzz at the lower frets. So is this a brand new bass or a second hand one?

If you are unsure of what to do exactly go see someone who knows a lot about guitars to help you.

Thanks Rob!

I actually wasn't the first to notice it, a more experienced bass player was telling me that the action was too law and I figured at first that such comments were just naiveté toward how metal is not like jazz but then I started noticing it too after playing more.

Given all of what you said I think that adjusting the truss rod might need adjusting, it is a brand new bass (other than my playing over the past weeks). I will definitely have someone look at it so I don't mess up the intonation.

Thank you again for the advice. It seems odd to me a new bass would have this problem but then again I didn't really break the bank with my choice.

Now if only I was better with my fingers . . .

would it be bad to put different kinds of heads with different kinds of cabs?

As long as the impedance of both the head and the cab are matched and the amp doesn't give more power than the cab can handle there shouldn't be any problems whatsoever!

When you stray from this golden rule there are certain things to bear in mind:
1 The impedance of the cabinet shouldn't be too low for this might cause your amp to blow!
2 the amp may have a higher power output but if the impedance of the cab is higher than the impedance stated at the topmost power output this won't be a problem when the conclusive power output is left beneath the maximum power handling of the cab.

You could do some maths yoursefl in this case:
The power at a certain impedance will be lowered when the impedance is higher and vice versa when the impedance is lower.
It all comes back to the simple Physics law:
P (=power in Watts) = I (= current in Amperes) x R (is impedance in Ohms)

So this means that when the maximum power output is reached at a certain impedance the power output will be halved when the impedance is doubled.
Likewise the Power output will be doubled when combined with a lower (halved) impedance.
So if you have a cab that can handle 500 Watts @ 16 Ohms and you have an amp that can deliver 200 Watts @ 8Ohms you will have a resulting power output of 100 Watts.
If the Cabinet can handle that power @8 Ohms and the Amp @16 Ohms you will see that you have come to a power output of 400 Watts.

Good luck with combining but be careful!

Hey guys, I am having issues with one of the bridge saddles on my Ibanez GSR205. The one for the 5th string continuously sinks lower while I'm playing, and I constantly have to tighten it to get it raised. The rest of the saddles sit fine except for that one, and I was wondering if I would be able to find some spare ones somewhere and if the replacement process is easy enough to do myself.

You could try to put a drop of loctite on the screws that should keep the saddle in the right position. If that doesn't work you could try to get a replacement and replace it yourself. It shouldn't be too hard to do that!
Getting a replacement sadle shouldn't be much of a problem either since Ibanez usually has a good after sales department. It shouldn't cost too much, I am sure!

I own a similar bass and I have the same problem, except it happens on all 5 strings. I have noticed that it gets better if I set the action higher. It seems that the higher action puts more tension on top of the saddles which makes them resist more easily to the vibrations that seems to cause this problem. Maybe your problem is the same? I'm thinking of buying a new bass just because of this problem.

I will look into both of those options, thank you!



I could try doing that, but I don't want the strings to sit so high that the notes are a pain in the ass to play. It may be cheaper to just replace all the saddles, no need to get an entirely new bass unless you're really set on getting a different one.

What might be a problem with these Ibanez Basses is that they have a scale length of 34". This might cause the string tension get too low when the action is relatively low as well resulting in the problems the both of you mention!
Don't forget however that these are budget basses which will not sport the same quality materials as other higher priced basses have!
Buying another bass might be a good idea but since these basses will not gain you much when you sell them or when you trade them in you might want to hang on to them just the same. Getting some new saddles or applying some loctite might also do the trick and will help you playt until you have (or have the money to) bought a better bass!

If you do like Ibanez Basses you might be better off with a bass from their BTB series. These have a longer scale length (35") which will give better tension on the strings resulting in a tighter sound combined to the (G)SR series.

To be perfectly honest, I have my GSR200 tuned to B (sometimes A) and have never had this problem with any of the saddles. Try adding loctite to the saddle screws and if that doesn't work, try to replace them. Perhaps the threading is stripped for the screws.

On a side note, this bass holds a low B/A far better than my fretless 34" scale bass. I have a .135 string on it, but even a .130 held a low A just as well. It was a little bass-heavy (tonal wise) but that's to be expected with such a thick string on such an odd body wood.