slapping question

[Baso]

hey everyone,

just have a quick question about slapping the bass guitar. ive recently learned to play The Awakening bass solo by Les Claypool and it sounds pretty good cept for one thing....slapping the G string is a LOT quieter than the rest.....now i know u hafta slap the higher strings a lot harder to get it to sound good, but im slapping the **** out of it and im not happy with the sound i get. i could pop those notes, but that solos real fast and i dunno if i could pull it off....plus i see him in the vid slapping the notes.....i was wondering if theres anything i can do to make slapping the G string sound better...i use the lightest guage ernie balls and i have an ibanez soundgear....

thanks in advance,

Baso

[Baso]

theres nobody that can help??? i just want to know if theres any way to make slapping the G string louder/better

[lemur821]

Lowering the string might help.

[avenger86]

Maybe some heavier gauge strings would help. The DR Marcus Miller custom set is made for slapping...I get great volume with it, try that out. And also, it may be the pickups on the soundgear...not exactly my idea of a dream slap bass.

[Baso]

mmkay, well im just a highschool student so i dont have too much dough to throw around, the bass was only like $300 canadian. what pickups would u recommend replacing mine with?

i just bought new ernie balls for my bass but ill check out the marcus miller's next time

[metalguy2]

Soundgears sound real good when slapped on..(or at least mine does) But you do have to make sure you have some punchy heavy strings on it. When you do that you might have to adjust the neck. It will be worth it.

[Toe-mas]

The best way I know of to get better slap volume out of your G and D is to use a bit different technique....when you slap the other stings you can get away with dropping your thumb straight on top of the string and bouncing off, but on the G and the D what I do is slap *through* the string a bit. The angle changes from a straight down sort of thing to a more angled attack. My thumb hits the string, which cracks it against the frets to get the percussive attack, and then passes by the string sort of plucking it on the way down. Hmm...that's kind of a crappy explanation. Basically it's just changing the angle of attack from a 90 degrees relative to the string to 45 or so. Anyway, hope this helps. I'm pretty sure I first heard of how to do this somewhere else on this board a year or so ago. Good luck!

[Baso]

thanks a lot for the info guys, ill see what i can do

[steveksux]

Hitting harder sometimes doesn't work, I get more sound out of a lighter touch.

Randy