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Originally Posted by lilxmissxsadist  hello, obviously i'm new and yes i am a girl. i am just starting to learn bass, been playing for a couple months now. i've never played anything else. i know nothing about reading music or scales. can't play by ear. i am teaching myself cause i can't afford lessons and don't know anyone who will help me out. i can't even afford a bass so i borrowed one from a friend. it's a ****** ibanez 5-string jazz bass.
i've looked up tabs online and from them i can play some Misfits songs, and am currently learning to play "Cage" by Dir en Grey. i practice about 2 hours every day. |
Everyone says "take some lessons" and of course they are right. The reason is that the easiest way to learn something new is to go have someone who knows how show you. A person that knows how can spot your bad habits in a second and fix them so you won't have to "unlearn" them later. But, hey, I'm self-taught on bass myself. I didn't have money for lessons (although dad was a drummer and taught me to play drums). So who am I to demand you get lessons. But please note I DID have to "unlearn" some bad habits later I developed as a newbie! Get some beginner books, DVDs and tabs of your favorite bands and dig in!
So what is there to playing bass beyond learning all the notes on the neck (start with learning the strings) and the various scales that use those notes? Well, actually EVERYTHING! Dig. This is MUSIC where you are poking your snoopy nose. There is so much to learn that no matter how much you learn there will ALWAYS be more. You NEVER will know it all! But there are rewards as well. Be warned. Music is as highly addictive as any drug. Most of us here play because we MUST. Once it gets you, you can never let go.
And the next point is that for an absolutely free source of the best compendium of bass knowledge around download and print Wheat's bass books (3 volumes).
http://wheatsbassbook.org/ And then get busy. It's all up to you then. Read it and learn it ALL. Believe me, it will take a while!
Don't think that you can cop out of bass with the "I'm a gurl" excuse. Here, go look up Carol Kaye. Being a girl didn't stop her from being probably the most influential pop bassist of all time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Kaye
And lastly let me note that music is about performance and bass playing gets boring without the rest of the band, so once you get some of your favorite tabs down and can play with the recordings, see if you can find some other noobs at your level that you can practice together with. It will give your enthusiasm a big boost. (even if you suck at first...hey you should have heard MY first band!)
And lastly I"m going to give you the best advice you will ever receive only it's about dancing and not bass playing. When I was a dancing newbie, I was learning the tango. I was taking this cheap-ass class and had learned exactly THREE steps. There was this big dance coming up I was going to where a bunch of experienced dancers would be who had been taking lessons forever. And I was worried I'd look like a jerk. So I got this tape from the public library (A great source of free DVDs and video lesson tapes, by the way) on how to make the tango LOOK right. Note well, it was NOT about more steps. It was all about how you hold yourself, the look, the feel, and the overall appearance as you dance the tango. I practiced THAT rather than my three steps! I do my 3 tango steps in front of all the "experts" and they went nuts falling all over themselves praising our dancing. They are all guessing how many years we'd been taking lessons <snort>. The bottom line for you is that dancing like music is ART. It does not matter so much WHAT you do as it does HOW you do it! You don't need to "shred". Sometimes just one note is plenty...if it is the RIGHT note. And "right" has to do with the "look and feel" of the music. Get it?
So now it's all up to you. If you have the talent you'll eventually rise to the top like a cork in water. And if you are just like many of us here who are simply "hooked" even though we aren't "great". You'll still never regret learning to play. And here's really good news: Today for very few bucks there are beginner basses out there that are absolutely amazing compared to the crap for sale when I started out. Here, go here and dream!
http://www.rondomusic.com/bassguitars5.html My SX basses are amazing! Go check out the SX threads here!
And I saved the best for last. Not only is playing bass the most fun you can have with your clothes on, but eventually people will actually PAY you to do it! And when that happens use the cash to buy your first bass.
Welcome to my world.
fresh meat 
