I've heard of doing this. A few years ago when I got into the three finger picking I found a really helpful section on DiGiorgio's website, I can't navigate it now for the life of me, but pretty much, you wrap a rubber band around your ring and middle finger, and use just those two to pick your bass. Don't have it too too tight, just tight enough to create a little bit of uncomfortable tension, and start playing your scales slow up and down the neck. Then release a little tension and repeat. Take it off and start incorporating all three fingers. I know it sounds vague and odd, but it does help some people.

I tried it back then, I didnt really like how it felt. I just started to play all my scales with three fingers, trying to get the feel down without having that gallop or triplet feel going with the picking. Practice makes perfect though.

Another thing that is helpful, and you may already do is stretch your fingers. Pull them back one at a time. Have your arm straight out and pull your fingers back to your body, not so you hurt yourself, but just to stretch it out. Do the same with your thumb but pull it toward your arm. It helps keep your picking hand nice and limber and loose.

Doing those things I mentioned for the first month or two of adapting the three finger picking technique really helped me out a lot. I got discouraged some times because I couldn't break that gallop feel, and kept on trying to make my playing style so I wouldn't have a predetermined finger to start leading with, but no one is perfect and there's no right or wrong way to use three fingers to pick, everyone's got their own style.

Hope that helped.

Cheers, I might give it a go!

I really want an Ibanez SR506. That thing makes my mouth water. Got to jam on one for a little while last time I went to Guitar Center. It sounded awesome. Hopefully that'll be my next upgrade in my music gear.

hey, im really interested in getting a distortion pedal.. probably fuzz or overdrive, and im just wondering, if i buy a guitar pedal, will it work the same on my bass? or will it sound like a POS?

I.E. boss fz-5 fuzz pedal compared to a boss odb-3 overdrive pedal (odb is bass, fz-5 is guitar)

thanks ahead of time

You'll probably end up loosing a lot of the bottom end of your sound, so your bass will end up sounding more like a guitar. I've heard of people sending two seperate signals into their amp - a clean one and a distorted one - to keep the bottom end but to capture the distortion, although I don't know enough to help you with doing that.

Whe using a distortion or overdrive on a Bass it will normally mess up the lows that make the sound of the bass. If you hav a decent od/dist pedal it will have a blend knob on it to blend the amount of clean signal with the amount of processed signal. This will help retain the lows needed for bass. If the pedal doesn't have such a feature you should use a splitter box combined with a second box which lets you combine those two signals after processing one of them. This will give the same result and results in you feeding just one signal to your amp.

I don't know much along the lines of pure Bass distortion, but I use a Big Muff Pi from time to time to add in some extra fuzz and distortion from time to time. It keeps the bottom end quite well and is nice and ultra-fuzzy, even with the sustain and volume up high.

i've been playing bass for 12 years and the best times ive had playing wan on a fretless. Easily my favorite bass, and easily my favorite bass sound. and i completely agree about the DeGorgio talk that he played his best in Death

DiGorgio is probably my favorite musician of all time. When I learned he played in Autopsy in addition to Death, I was extremely satisfied. He was really good in Obituary and Sadus as well.

Hails !

I've been thinking about buying a new bass for about a year but due to some "budget" problems It only remains as an idea but, 3 days ago I was passing by musical instruments shop and I just saw this :

http://www.guitar.com.au/guitars/bass/b ... t_bass.jpg

B.C Rich Beast Bass which I was totaly blown away by it's sinister shape and since I saw it, the image of me holding it and playing some Morbid Angel/Deicide songs on it didn't get away from my mind .

But on the other hand, I was also thinking about buying 5-string Ibanez bass so I was wondering if anyone can give me some useful informations about what should I buy and what's the difference between 4 and 5 string bass ?

any good bass on the 400$ range?

Check these
http://www.guitarcenter.com/Ibanez-SR37 ... =603156217

http://www.guitarcenter.com/ESP-LTD-F-1 ... =439942288

http://www.guitarcenter.com/ESP-LTD-D-4 ... =439942793

I guess these basses are really good quality

What would you guys recommend, maple or rosewood fretboard/neck?

I would go for a maple neck and a rosewood fretboard.

@DemonofDarkness: The differebce between a 4 and a 5 string is that on the 5 string you have more possibilities without having to stray from a standard tuning. You can play more positionally instead of having to race up and down the neck which will improve your fretting speed.

I have a couple of 4 strings but I mostly play on my 5 string. The BC-rich is a beautiful Beast but if you were to get it in a 5 string version it would even be better!
According to the BC-rich site they no longer manufacture the Beast as a Bassguitar.

Thanks . I'll try to get a 5-string then . Yeah I know that bc rich doesn't make beast any longer but it seems like the store has it since long time ago and nobody bought it

I know everyone and their grandma hates linwe 6, but the bass amps i tried out were pretty gnarley, does anyone have one?

I need a good bassist to learn from other then Steve Digorgio and Bathory, can I get some recommendations?

Eric Wood of Bastard Noise can help you learn a lot, hahahaha! Geddy Lee of Rush is always a solid choice as well, and James Schumacher of Brocas Helm is another obvious choice. Hahahaha!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SO2poJAaE_I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNoR6VSP4wY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn9idjos4qs (This is all bass except for the noise machines!!!)

Why not try someone like Chuck Rainy, Rocko Prestia or Pino paladino?
No metal but they can teach a lot about bass-playing.
If you really want metal bass than go for Dave Ellefson, Steve Harris, jason Newsted, Jason Ward and of course Cliff Burton!

I'm thinking of redoing my pickups...

I'm looking at putting in the Dimarzio DP145 or EMG 35CS (35HZ if I went with the passive version)...

anyone familiar with either and can give some input? I'm tuning down two steps and will have the bass optimized for that but I still want something that will sound good with such low tones.

The Dimarzio is Passive and the EMG they make both active and passive. I've never played with an Active pickup before so, any comments on the whole idea of having a battery in your bass? how often do you need to change it, is it frustrating even with the fuller sound etc? Just kind of looking for some decent opinions on these things.

Also, if you have another suggestion for pickups work really well for Low Tuned instruments, let me know so I can check it out.

Actives really feel good in a nice bass, what kind of bass is it?

You don't have to change them that much (3-6months), they are more of a pain obviously, you've got to rememeber to unplug it all the time otherwise you'll drain the batteries.

The bass I am putting them into is a simple Ibanez SG. Changing a battery every 4 months doesnt seem like a big deal to me honestly. I would hate for it to happen live though, the battery die mid-show ughhhh...

I've got 2 5-string basses fitted with EMG's and they give an amount of hours before you have to replace your batteries. I thought it was something like 1000 or even 2000 hours before you have to replace the battery.
If you want to be sure of the battery life during a gig you could always replace them before a gig if you doubt if they will get you through and change them back for a rehearsal to wear them out there.

There is also the trick of making a special cord for a multi meter (essentially a jack-plug at one end and two banana plugs at the other end) and measuring how much juice there is in the battery. I don't know what the reading should be by heart but maybe you can Google that one yourself. I know that Rick Turner once wrote something about it in bass Player magazine so maybe you can start your search there.

I do have to say they sound awfully good even with the Low B!

And they don't usually just die, it just gets weaker and weaker, so you know when it's starting to happen

Rob, is there any chance you have a recording of the Low B being played with the EMGs? I'd be interested to hear it. The guy at the guitar shop also said that the EMGs would sound pretty good.

Has anyone ever combined one active pickup and one passive in the same instrument? Would that work or would the wiring get fucked up?

I'll see what I can do for you soundwise.

Concerning the combining of active and passive in the same instrument: With EMG's you use the battery only when you plug your cable into your output. If you were to combine active and passive this would mean that even when not using your active PU the battery would be drained.
Furthermore: An active PU has a higher output compared to a passive PU so combining them would blow away the sound of the passive (if used simultaneously).
The best chance is to use active electronics and make sure you set them up so the overall output is the same and there is no difference in soundlevel from either PU!

I am learning my first few songs on bass my first song was children of the grave by sabbath. Im rlly into death metal tho stuff like bloodbath and brutality. What should i play next? every song i look at is either to easy or hard. please help thanks

Songs that seem too easy are often more difficult than you think. It is a matter of consistantly playing the right notes in a steady rythm, which is harder than most people would think.
Maybe you should start with the "easy" material and steadily move onwards to more difficult stuff.
Try some Early Death songs to start with and then steadily move on to their later albums. This way you'll start with easier material while you end up on trying to play the things Steve DiGiorgio has played.
By that time you could also try some Cynic and other difficult stuff!

What is a cheap yet reliable 5/6 string out there? Something around $300-400.

Also, I find Primus to be a great way to improve bass playing skills. I'm trying to learn DMV on my four-string and its the most difficult bass line I've learned in my time.

I am interested in hearing opinions about Hartke's HA-3500 bass head. I have been using it in the rehearsal room for almost half a year and I am disappointed. The sound is very hollow and lacks mids. The EQ and Contour are quite useless.

hey I'm looking to get into playing the bass can you recomend me a good cheap bass to start with and some songs that are good to get me started and any tips or pointers from experianced players wound be great


thanks in advance

Maybe you should browse this thread some more. Several people have asked that same question and those answers still are very valid!

I previously took bass lessons for a short amount of time, but I'm looking to get back into it. I have a shitty 4 string bass with built-in tuner and a shitty amp, I can read tablature (well.. the easy stuff so far) and I'm a finger picker. I have material that I can practice to get my precision and speed back up (scales & certain easy songs). But, I would eventually like to play Suffocation material (especially the early era). Could anyone direct me to what could possibly help me get to that point? Are there certain scales/techniques/easy death metal songs that I could be learning at the moment?

Don't have money/time to get lessons at the moment >_<

See the post above yours!
Start with Death from their first album and work your way through their CD collection!

B.C. Rich's low end stuff is bollocks, I'd avoid it like the plague if I were you. Try out some different makes but I reccomend Ibanez...The SR series is really nice

The difference between a 4 and a 5 string bass is that 4 string basses have 4 strings whereas 5 string basses have 5 strings. I don't want to sound like an smartass - that's the main difference!

I have thought about switching from guitar learning to bass. After almost 5 months of learning guitar without result worth to mentoin, and with loosing all interest in this very common instrument, I discovered that the thing I love mostly when it comes to my music are the heavy and catchy bass-rythms.
So I thought about selling the guitar+all the equipment, and stopping the worthless guitar lessons and finally buy a cool bass to start with. The only thing that still bugs me is that I'm a poor bastard and I'm even now surprised that I managed to pay all costs for the guitarlessons...so that means autodidactive learning from books for first. (since I won't do a bass-course at the musicschool were I do guitar currently again, it would be the same boring teacher)

So, what do you experts think about autodidactive learning? ok or should I wait an save up for better lessons?

I guess you just think the budget stuff of BC Rich is bollocks becaause they are....Budget? Not every budget bass is also a bad bass. My first bass (I still have it) is a Korean made BC Rich Warlock. The bass is a very good bass, especially for the price it cost me.
Ibanez basses are not much different from BC-Rich basses quality wise. So that is no reason to per se buy an Ibanez.

When buying a 5 string I would recommend buying a 5 string with a 35" scale for the added tension to the Low B. This is something most Ibanez basses don't have. Especially when you want to play death metal in the Vein of Morbid Angel (who play in low A enough of the time instead of low B) this certainly is a must have for keeping a tight sound!

The difference between a 4 string and a 5-string isn't only the extra string but also the way of playing. On a 5 string you can play more positionally which allows for more radical note changes compared to a 4 string.



I've done some 9 months of lessons when I started out on the bass. This was nice for a basis but playing with other people in a band is where you learn most. In the band situation you are obligated to perform and that means that you have to learn fast in order not to hold down the rest of the band.
Furthermore there are enough tips and tricks to be found on the web nowadays which can help you improve your playing dramatically without the help of another person. Only when you encounter things you can't make heads or tales from is when you might ask some professional help. This doesn't necessarily mean a teacher but maybe just somebody who is more experienced!

Thanks for your input, Rob1. Yeah, I also informed myself a little bit about online-workshops and such for free, and the offered things do look quite ok.
About the band playing...I don't know, maybe I should try it. Problem would be that here in my area aren't so many people which want to make music of my taste. About the "asking a professional", I think there would no problems occur, since I know a musican-forum where you can get opinions/recommendations from professional players.

Sometimes you need an experienced player in the flesh to show you those things you can't figure out for yourself. An online forum might give you some difficulties.
Regarding the band-thing: just playing in a band, even if the music isn't exactly what you would like to make is always a very good experience. You learn to play with other people, you learn to play songs you wouldn't have thought of yourself and you might learn that something you always thought wasn't much might be very interesting after all. Don't forget that even in a band with people who want to play the same style there are always some different opinions on how to approach certain things like songstructures and layering.
Since I started to play the bass (some 23 years back) I have learnt to appreciate some music I will never buy but because of the basslines are very nice to hear once played on the radio or whatever!
I also rediscoverd a lot of songs I already liked for the same reason.

Yes, I can imagine that someone in person is way better than a description in written form.
Hmm, maybe I should keep my eyes open for workshops. Or for jam-sessions, since I hope there are also some professional players which could help me in such situations.
I get what you mean, band-playing is really an important experience. Still, the problem is: I'd be ok with almost any band, even with an industrial band which needs a bass-player...but most young bands here play some screamo or mallcore-shit, and thats the last thing I would want to play. And most people around here which want to start a band are already having some experience...sure, there are still some which are desperately seeking a bassist. But I wouldn't even know how to play bass. (sure, there are similarities to guitar-playing, but I wasn't even good at that)
Anyways, thanks for your anwers, they are really helpful.