RUSH Freewill

[the_hook]

Originally Posted by 4001

Thanks for the compliments.
I envy you with your Rush jam band. It must be exciting to be able to play that stuff with two compitent misicians.
Good for you!

I knew if I wanted to really learn to play I had to work in a band setting with experienced players. So I looked around and found the guitar player, then the drummer answered an ad to play Rush tunes and things took off.

I organize all the jams and they happily show up. They have years of experience over me (I have maybe 2 years of bass playing), but we all get along great and have fun doing the songs.

Adding the synths has been a headache, the learning curve is not like the bass was, plus co-ordinating both instruments hasn't been easy either. I've been learning piano along with it so I at least understand the keyboard layout and how to make chords.

[4001]

And Geddy makes it look so easy.

[factorplayer]

Originally Posted by the_hook

You don't really appreciate Geddy's playing and bass work until you dig into a lot of Rush's songs and play them live.

Very true. My main project last year was a Rush tribute band and we played the songs as close as possible to the originals. Used Taurus T3 and Roland PK-5 pedals a LOT. Fun, but a lot of work juggling all that stuff. Songs like Jacob's Ladder were just killer concentration-wise.

Originally Posted by the_hook

I've just added a synth and pedals and I'm currently working on Camera Eye. What a challenge, but I'm getting it to work somehow...

Wow. Good luck with that. Lotsa synth parts in that one. get the guitarist to help out.

[genstormbringer]

Great tone great playing looking good brah!!!

[the_hook]

Just viewed your videos again, man that is killer playing and tone!

Update: I'm still jamming regularly with my Rush band and our repertoire (first 9 albums) is growing slowly but steadily. It is a total blast to play songs like Xanadu, Camera Eye, Natural Science and many others. I have a really good handle on keyboards and pedals now, even programming sequences and triggering them so I can play bass over certain parts. And I even sang on Tom Sawyer and Jacob's Ladder...but I'd rather leave that chore to someone else....

I finally found a good bass/guitar tech and I'm ready to tackle the stereo PU setup like what you have. I'm just not sure yet if I want to do it to my SX Jazz or put together a piece by piece bass like a Warmoth or Carvin.

Did you get your Wal setup as well? Have you made any changes to your Fender split PU setup?

[sloppy_phil]

dude, amazing job on this tune! I guess i'm coming a little late to the party here, but nice! That sound you're getting is definitely all about the right-hand technique. I've been learning a whole whack of Rush recently, and I was planning on doing this one next. Looks like I'll have a good reference point for myself!

The lines get pretty damn quick during the jam-out sequence; were you able to pick all the notes out by ear or did you find yourself turning to transcriptions at all? I'm trying to learn everything by ear, but that particular section scares my ears a bit I suppose I can watch some fingers now, too!

[Floyd Eye]

Man, that's just fantastic. Great tone and excellent playing. Seriously bad ass. Nice job.

[the_hook]

Just wanted to post that my SX Jazz was setup in stereo last week. The tone thru two amps is killer!

I've even hooked up a guitar and bass amp, with some distortion thru the guitar amp, and the tone is knarly and sounds like a hybrid guitar/bass beast. I can switch off one amp and run the bass cabs as before, then bring in the other amp for a total change in tone.

It opens up so many new sound possbilities.

[BassIdiot]

I really like your video.

I've played in a Rush tribute for about 2 years and I know how hard it is play. Many people try to cover Geddy and are not always successful, but you did. I always played a normal fender jazz bass, but now I am thinking of getting me a Geddy Lee one.

This is a demo we recorded in a garage. We recorded the instruments in one take (we played it many times because if anyone made a mistake we had to start all over again) and at the end of the day I recorded the vocals(just one take a song so what you hear is what you get) so we had a demo for bars we wanted to play.

The bass is a mexican Fender Jazz and the amp a Ampeg SVT Pro 2
http://soundcloud.com/bassidiot/rush-tribute-band-red
http://soundcloud.com/bassidiot/rush-tribute-band-the-spirit

[Definitely]

I don't like it, it makes me feel bad about my own . Although I did screw up in my youtube attempt....

[worxforme]

Got a call to play bass in a new original band so I'm thinking of coming back from the dark side (guitar) so I thought I'd watch the newer version of your video to inspire me.

Reminded me that the guitar, in many ways, is easier than the bass.

Great job, as always!