Slapping. Yeah....

[caden000]

hey, have mercy on me for starting this thread and for the love of god please dont tell me to "use the search function blah blah" or that "its been discussed before blah blah"

i just wanted to briefly share my experiences. i saw a funk band play last night. yes, thats right, funk. sure enough, halfway into the set, here comes the slap bass. it didnt make the bass line funkier or tastier in any way. instead, it made the whole crowd pause and go "what the hell....?" he was good at it, but it didnt seem to work. you see, this happens a lot when i go see bands play live. every time a bass player slaps, i want him to stop. the only one ive heard pull it off was Tim Commerford (ahem Take the Power Back ahem). other than that, ive never heard it work.

now that being said, i do know how to slap and i do it well. its something that i do for fun here and there. it sounds cool on your own. but around a band, your probably better off forgetting about it.

[bass12]

Gee, thanks for the insight. That really opened up my awareness of the TRUTH regarding slap.

[Zoa]

Good god, another one????

[dpbass613]

was this like a slap solo? that trended for a large portion of the song or like just a passing line. In a previous band i used slap quite reguarly but it wasn't for more than a few bars of the song, and it went over pretty tastefully. Its has its own time and place. A full song of it would probably be overkill. I think it also comes down to tone of the slap, some people just jump on it without considering the tone. Its tough sometimes to obtain that tone that works well both finger style and slapping. So alot of times slap sounds bad because of the tone that the player is getting.

[CapnSev]

I'm convinced. I will never slap again.

[Russell L]

I can't slap. But it has its place. Sometimes, I wish I could, especially when playing by myself. I've heard some guys do nice stuff, almost like they were the whole band, but by themselves, accompanying themselves, rhythmically and note-wise. Very interesting. But generally, the music I hear that encompasses the style really isn't me. Well, actually, that's hard to say, it's just that I don't listen to anything much that has slapping in it. I've pulled a few notes before, letting the string slap the fretboard, but it's not the accompaniment thing like I was talking about, just a note. Slap bass reminds me a little of a way I play acoustic guitar, using the front and back of my nails. Sort of an accompaniment thing there, too. Why I haven't applied that to bass, I dunno. Similarly, I don't even use a pick on bass, but once in a blue moon.

[jpTron]

Cool story, bro.

[bassteban]

The one thing more annoying than slap bass: Slap bass threads.

[JB696]

With all the excellent bass slappers around it's just a shame that there aren't more places to use it. Unless you're playing in a 70's disco/funk band how do you work it in? On everything I play in a band setting the bottom drops out if I throw in more than a couple of very short fills. So I don't do it much. Of course, on youtube there must me a thousand twelve year old slap geniuses showing off their talent, but they are always playing by themselves.

[xXColaXx]

Somewhere, Les Claypool is feeling irritated but isn't sure why.

[ffutterman]

This seems like one of those things where there's a backlash against something that's prevalent enough for people to just get sick of it. Flea and Les are good bassists, but there's so much "LesFleaLesFleaLesFleaLesFlea" that eventually a lot of people start to say they suck. Same kind of thing where the experts roll their eyes at you if you say you're a huge fan of Van Gogh or Stravinsky.

Slapping's incredibly fun and, like any other technique, can serve a song well when used properly. If someone doesn't like it, that's fine, but I'm taking another spin in the ball pit while they're forcing down a big mac and looking longingly out the window.

[xXColaXx]

I think slapping is a tool for a bassist. You use it when you need that "tool" to create what you have in mind. Sometimes it is perfect for a song and other times it's not. I don't think anyone would have to choose to slap all the time or never.

[Russell L]

I really haven't paid attention, but I just thought slapping was the one thing most bassists were after these days. So, I'm surprised to hear what ya'll are saying on here. But, me, I just never took interest in it.

[Scobac]

If you can't make it sound good in a band setting;then you're NOT good at it! That's the real test!

[JB696]

[quote=Scobac;If you can't make it sound good in a band setting;then you're NOT good at it! That's the real test![/QUOTE]

That may very well be. I quit slapping, for the most part, around 1980. That's when the novelty wore off. That's about the same time every teenage wanker across the country could slap, or thought they could. For me, it's been used very sparingly ever since. So although I've been doing it now for thirty years I don't consider myself a "slapmaster" by any means. Funny thing is, on the rare times I do hear a bass player slapping in a live band setting, it usually has that "bottom dropping out" feel to it. The groove falters and the other guys in the band look over at the bass player with scowls on their faces. I guess there just aren't very many guys who are really "good at it" performing live.