I've never gotten into this style of playing. I mean, in 10 years of playing I've learned the techniques and experimented with it a million times, but I've just never been excited about it.

What I've gravitated towards in the last few years is fingerstyle with a lot of tapping. I slap often (to get a nice attack in the B string range for metal), but almost never pop.

Anyone else just not a slapper?

I used to use it all the time when I was younger, but barely use it at all now. I enjoy playing it when it sounds good for the music. I almost never tap though. I've rarely found a place in the music I've played that it would sound good for the music.

In general, I've grown rather sick of slapping. It's becoming almost as annoying as the tap guitar solo :scowl:

I use it regularly. Smooth Jazz, R&B and Gospel requires that you know it. However if your style of music does not require it don't worry about it. But it is a very common technique that every bassist should "toy " with even if they don't use it regularly.

I learned slap before I learned fingerstyle. Not that it's a good way to learn, it's just how I learned. Once I got past the flash, I found that slap is terribly difficult to really master, there are infinitely more ways to slap than I first thought. Many people get the octave slap/pop thing down and call it a day. Once you start digging in and learning double-thumbing, double-popping, and non-octave slap fills, you start to appreciate it more. Want to learn some cool stuff, slap style? Get a drum book and practice paradiddles and flams and flamadiddles and rolls and complex rhythms. That's when it gets really fun, and cooler than stock 70's basslines (Carwash comes to mind)...

i don't mind it, it has it's place. i just hate it when i go into GC and there's some 15 year old kid slappin' and poppin' the heck out of everything in sight even though he doesn't really know what he's doing... that gets annoying.

i don't mind when other people slap/pop/tap but i never do it. i just fingerstyle funk all the time every time.

Fingers and pick are my style. Slapping is fine for the other guys.

I personally can't stand it, except in one or two very specific and unique contexts. Leigh Gorman of Bow Wow Wow incorporates a lot of it in his style, but he's also a monster fingerstyle and pick player. Bow Wow Wow are not a "funk" band, they sort of merge old school glam rock, punk, spaghetti western/rockabilly guitar, funky bass and Burundi-inspired drumming (with timbales in place of rack toms). Usually extrememly hyper stuff. Many incorrectly think of them as a "new wave" act and foolishly lump them in with one-hit-wonders of the 1980s because of their popular cover of the Brian Poole & the Tremeloes cover of the Strangeloves' "I Want Candy."

i for one love slap pop lol, but it does get on my nurves when you see some kid randomly slapping his bass over and over doing octaves, but know one can judge slap pop from that, i love to hear people like, louis johnson, larry graham, marcus miller etc slap pop, and i love to play it my self

I can do it fine, but I don't particularly prefer to play that way.

I don't mind it, but I like it a lot better when it's played without that biting trebly sound. 70's slap on old funk records is a much cooler sound than that trebly twangy stuff.

I agree with Jimmy. I want a biting, mean sound with more high mids than highs. That sounds coolest.

I haven't really learned to slap properly, partially because I just can't get my right (weaker) hand fast enough to do the patterns I want (I'm a lefty playing righty). And I've been working on it for years... Hence, I stick to fingerstyle most of the time but I use it sometimes as an effect.

I learned slap before I learned fingerstyle. Not that it's a good way to learn, it's just how I learned. Once I got past the flash, I found that slap is terribly difficult to really master, there are infinitely more ways to slap than I first thought. Many people get the octave slap/pop thing down and call it a day. Once you start digging in and learning double-thumbing, double-popping, and non-octave slap fills, you start to appreciate it more. Want to learn some cool stuff, slap style? Get a drum book and practice paradiddles and flams and flamadiddles and rolls and complex rhythms. That's when it gets really fun, and cooler than stock 70's basslines (Carwash comes to mind)...

Do that in the real world, on a session, and you'll never work!

I can slap better than most, and I haven't done it in almost 20 years. It's a spice, not the main dish IMO.

slap and pop is ok when dne propperly, flea can slap well. But i personaly prefer a funky fingerstyle bassline than a slap one i just find them more intresing and more filled out

i don't mind it, it has it's place. i just hate it when i go into GC and there's some 15 year old kid slappin' and poppin' the heck out of everything in sight even though he doesn't really know what he's doing... that gets annoying.





BIG +1

Do that in the real world, on a session, and you'll never work!

I can slap better than most, and I haven't done it in almost 20 years. It's a spice, not the main dish IMO.

Someone better tell Marcus...

:p

I haven't learned to slap/pop and have no strong desire to learn how. Fingerstyle is really all I'm interested in.

oddly enough, it was bassists like flea and les claypool that made me want to start playing bass in the first place, but i have never had the desire to play like that at all. i just don't play slap. it has never fit in with any of the kind of music that bands i have been in have played. and yes, it drives me nuts to hear folks doing it in a GC or the like. it has its place, i can appreciate the well-applied slap playing, but it's not for me.

i love slap! im real good at applying it to the stuff me and my friends play. even wierd prog rock metal stuff i can get away with crazy slap riffs, groovy, but very intense. sounds great in odd time signatures too!

I don't use it a lot, but can hold my own when it's called for. We cover "Thank You" which just sounds stupid fingerstyle IMO, and we have some Bootsy style originals that just beg for slap, but 90% of the night it's M-I fingerstyle for me. And I don't hate on the young kids playing slap. I chalk it up to most of them going through their phase (hey, we all did it too) and try to show them how it's all in the wrist and not to get so crazy with their whole forearm. I also encourage them not to overdo it.

Someone better tell Marcus...

:p

I'm talkin' bout us mortals..

Marcus is from a different generation, when it was more mainstream. Now he's a stylist, and although it sounds cool, even he sometimes sounds dated. :hiding:

Slurs of seemingly random notes in fingerstyle ( i.e Jaco freaks) is JUST as annoying!

I'm talkin' bout us mortals..

Marcus is from a different generation, when it was more mainstream. Now he's a stylist, and although it sounds cool, even he sometimes sounds dated. :hiding:

Wow, somebody better tell Marcus quick!

I always like hearing Marcus Miller do the technique because he does it with taste and tone. Louis Johnson too. I also enjoy hearing people slap without the pop to make an aggressive sounding bass line. However, slap/pop is one of those techniques which is more flash than substance in the hands of most players I've heard. Very unmusical and almost grating to the ears.

Slurs of seemingly random notes in fingerstyle ( i.e Jaco freaks) is JUST as annoying!

i couldnt agree more, even jaco himself, to me, well he just doesnt do anything for me

I want to learn but i have a cyst on my thumb which hurts loads if you hit it against stuff! :(

If the song calls for it I use it.

Apparently the only way to know if a bass is good or not is to slap the crap out of it - loud, fast and sloppy.

It was fun for a few years, until Mark King got so darned clever, he disappeared up his own anal passage. :eek:

slap, like any technique, can be overdone...but I like it, if used tastefully...

recently, I've been discovering (or "re"-discovering as it may be), pick technique...I like the agressive sound of pick to really drive a rockin' song.

My 15 year old nephew does it.
Allways reminds me of a nervous tick.

Over did it myself in the 80's(like some other things . . .:). Pretty much can't stand it now. I'll pull it out at a session if my hand is forced though . . .

oddly enough, it was bassists like flea and les claypool that made me want to start playing bass in the first place, but i have never had the desire to play like that at all. i just don't play slap. it has never fit in with any of the kind of music that bands i have been in have played. and yes, it drives me nuts to hear folks doing it in a GC or the like. it has its place, i can appreciate the well-applied slap playing, but it's not for me.

+1 fully backed!

What's with the hate for GC slappers? Whenever I go into GC, I test out the instruments with my full range of techniques, including slap, fingerstyle, harmonics, double thumb, all of it. Maybe you're more talking about the people who go in exclusively to slap?

I don't like the people that just walk into a music store to wank when I am trying to to actually buy something. There is ALWAYS some guy there sitting on his lunch break and all you hear is biggity biggity biggity biggity biggity biggity biggity. Ok, I get the point, you can slap a trip-o-let. I like to play slap www.tellhazelrun.com has one of slap warmups I recorded, but I don't sit in a store and do that stuff. I check intonation, harmonics, some runs and minor slapping.

I am sick of percussive slap bass when it's overused, slap in itself in a technique is fine.