I play way too hard...

[xzzy]

Originally Posted by paf77

I get way too into the songs and dig into my bass way too hard.

You gotta learn to detach yourself from the emotion of the song (not entirely, but just enough to stay in control).. you're not performing for yourself, you're performing for the people in the audience. I think everyone tends to tighten their grip and attack a little more strongly when a song has a lot of energy, but it's pretty detrimental when trying to actually perform.. it wears you out, and changes your tone.

Use your practices to train yourself to focus on the pieces of the song, such as the rhythm, or the changes, or whatever. By keeping yourself analytical you make it easier to avoid getting sucked in. ;)

Originally Posted by paf77

My playing and everything is great when I'm just practicing alone, but when I practice with the band and play gigs I get way too into the songs and dig into my bass way too hard. My drummer told me to take all that energy and put it into moving around and stuff so that my bass isn't buzzing and my amp isn't getting overloaded and distorting. I thought that was pretty good advice, but I was wondering if anyone else had any advice on keeping my playing nice and clean?

it might be that you can't hear yourself very well onstage so you're over-compensating by playing the strings too hard.

One thing that will stop you playing too hard is if you turn up the treble of the bass through the monitors so your sound is really clanky. That way you'll compensate the other way. If your sound is fudgey in the lows and low mids then maybe turn some of those frequencies down and see if your sound becomes clearer

Although, the best way is to just relax and try and remember that the sound you can hear on stage is different to what's coming out of the PA. This took a bit of experience for me, because I had to do quite a lot of gigs before I could just accept not being able to hear myself well.