playing insanely fast

[Thunder_Fingers]

I bet non of you realy can play realy fast, reading what you write

Serriously, just strap on your bass and play, walk around and play, watching TV - Play, being on the computer - Play, speed will come after a while. PLAAAY!PLAY!PLAY.

If it sstarts to hurt tough.. stop playing. and either adjust your hand to a more comfortable position, or take a break, dont force it, let you hand grow up strength over time.

other than that:
PLAY!

[uturnbass]

When learning to play at deathmetal speeds, I tried to play the music at normal speed by learning at the same time.
This messed me up a lot, cause obviously I didn't have it in my muscle memory so I was playing lots of wrong notes, and it takes a lot longer when you play it wrong, cause you have to reprogram your muscles to the real pattern, and it takes that much longer.

So, in order to go fast, you have to go slow.
Once your fingers are familiar with that fretboard, and you have well-known licks of yours mapped all over the board you could play at high speeds and not even have to think about it, sometimes.

But when trying to learn a fast line, play it at a tempo which you can play it perfectly, and bump it up a few bpms 'till you're struggling, then practice till you can play it at the difficult tempo perfectly, and bump that up, and so on.

So familiarlize yourself with the fretboard, you have to get to the point to where you don't have to think about it... you just know.

[WillPlay4Food]

This article was written by a guitar player but seems to follow what I've heard from many many people. I need to go slow if I want to go fast.

Tom's article lays out a great plan which causes me to focus on economy of motion and being relaxed. I know if I try to play faster than I'm used to I get very tense and my fretting hand cramps up after trying to play a song at fast speeds.

I'm using Tom's method to refine my fretting technique. The main problem I have is keeping my fingers ready to fret without having to come down an inch to hit the string. I also picked up Dave Overthrow's Bass Workout book/DVD combo and started that this week as well. I'm starting to see results at very slow speeds (although I still need to wrestle my pinky under control). I'm hoping these two methods combined will increase my speed/dexterity while reducing tension.