So..where are you now?

bassbully · #1 09-01-2009, 11:02 AM

I was working on a bass last night and got to thinking how far i have come as a bass player and musician in the last 5 or so years since i got back into music.
I thought this was a good place to ask all of you the same...where are you now since you started if you are new or in the last few years?

I got back to playing about 6 years ago. I have been in about 4-5 bands and have been lucky to have improved with each, myself as a player and the overall band and music. I can read simple music now and understand music where as when i started it was impossible. I understand the bass better where the notes are scales, modes etc. I can walk basslines play country,rock and blues,shuffles, waltzes. I still cant tap,solo or slap good but decent enough to look kind of cool adding it as an accent or two.
I understand how music is made the structure, chord progressions. I have been a part of recording,mixing , mastering and promotion.
I can set up basses, rewire, add pups, file frets edges etc.
I am a better performer live, i feel the music remain relaxed and have more fun.
I also went back to writing songs and playing guitar,harmonica and am working on learning mandolin.

WOW! i have learned allot had fun and its still going...how about you. Where are you now since you started or where have you progressed from?

StyleOverShow · #2 09-01-2009, 11:20 AM

Ditto on growth spurts and I've been playing for > forty years. Moved to cover a couple of genres in the last 10 years and that really made me pay attention to technique, reading, and style (Straight ahead jazz to covers to R&B/Soul).

TB has added stomp boxes to my regular load and it is an kick in the A to play with them.

TB has also nudged me to manage my own setups and explore different string types.

I have grown in the last couple of years and I have much thanks for this board and its members.

I might add, ironically, that a friend from high school (class of '68) showed up at my last show and when he asked how is it going, I replied "still waiting in front of clubs".

=richard

bassbully · #3 09-01-2009, 11:25 AM

Humm stomp boxes...what kinds? I use the sonic maximzer but i am still not sure its that great LOL. My technique has improved 100% since i started as well. A big + to TB like you said on string ideas..Chromes and TI JFs.

Rudreax · #4 09-01-2009, 02:11 PM

In terms of my playing, I'm somewhat happy but I want to learn more. I've only been playing for a year so that would probably explain why. I haven't gotten to a point where I can really say I'm content, but I'm still aiming for it.

P. Aaron · #5 09-01-2009, 04:30 PM

I am always thinking about either bass or guitar music, chord shapes, tones and combinations of notes. I always listen to tone, techniques, and song structure. Plus, I still have to learn songs, even if the cover band I'm in doesn't play them.

I love to learn stuff.

nutso42 · #6 09-01-2009, 05:13 PM

I've been playing for... wow, it's only been three years. But in that time, I've gone from zero knowledge to being able to improvise when I don't know the song, along with setting up and intonating my bass, changing parts, etc. I can't believe I did this in three years.

I'll check back to this thread in another three years.

whirlwind · #7 09-03-2009, 04:54 PM

I"m 41 and have just started learning a few weeks ago but i"m practicing everyday and loving every minute of it, i own really basic gear but its fine for what i need it for, in a couple of years i would like to think i"d joined a band doing small gigs and stuff, i dont wanna be a rock star, i just love playing my bass and playing with other guys/gals would be just fine for me.
At the moment its just me,my bass and a cheap crappy yamaha keyboard to provide the backing but it works for me.

djero44 · #8 09-04-2009, 09:29 AM

I've been a musician for 20 years, but have spent most of that as a somewhat introverted singer/songwriter type. In the past 5-7 years, since i've become a serious drummer and bass player, my musical life has opened way up. I've played more gigs in the past year than ever before, and have three really fun projects happening now, with two of them gigging out with real long term potential. My other band has the most potential of all, but our drummer is moving and he is key =( and maybe irreplacable around here . My musician skills have grown more in the past two years than in any comparable amount of time since I started (except maybe my first two years as a player), and i'm still going strong, learning new stuff every time I play. Being a multi-instrumentalist is pivotal in this, and I recommend playing as many instruments as possible to anyone out there. I'm quite happy about all this!

I am looking into getting a double bass and doing some more intensive musical studying this winter. I have a pretty fair base of musical knowledge, but don't sight read, though I intend to change that, and the bass is an easier way to get there, imo. In the next few years i'm going to really hit the scene and can't wait to really get out there and play a lot of shows. Becoming a team player is one of the the most important things i've done. I'm 33 and it's been a long time in the coming, but i'm so much closer to being a full time musician than ever and i'm so stoked. Falling in love with the bass has been the best thing that ever happened for me musically.

Quadcam · #9 09-05-2009, 01:27 AM

not a bassist but I played drums, self taught from about age 14-18 had a few garage bands. got in a serious relationship, went to college...yadda yadda...got out of said relationship and move to Florida so I sold the kit.

got in a new relationship..now married and I was telling my wife how I really missed my drums. A few months ago I get home from work and theres a drum kit sitting in the living room, my wife bought it from her friends husband. She said, " i know how much you talk about wanting to play drums again so I got these for you"

So this past april I started playing again but this time I decide to take lessons, found a teacher who is a pro studio drummer, endorses Pearl and a graduate of berklee.

I've learned so much in the past few months, more than i learned in 4 yrs on my own.
and since my wife is a very good singer I decided we should start a band. So we started that a few months ago as well.

right now i'm working working on a few different things, polyrhythms , syncopation, halftime shuffles. I'm about to get a new drumkit, I love the fact that my wife bought one for me but it's an old kit with low end cymbals and I'm looking for something more intermediate to pro level but affordable...I think I have it narrowed down to gretsch catalina maples, gretsch renowns or mapex pro -m ..all maple kits around $1000

I'm learning all about PA systems as I go, bought a behringer powered mixer a few months back but now I wish I had gone the passive mixer with active speaker route.
oh well, live and learn.

we've been doing pretty well on our songlist considering none of us have actually gigged before and we have no guitarist right now, we have a show comin up in november, a benefit for the local humane society put together by my drum teacher, that will probably be our first gig ever.

So I'm having a great time, I practice between 1 and 6 hrs pretty much everyday and cant wait to get everything in place so we can start gigging

Munjibunga · #10 09-05-2009, 02:07 AM

I'm sitting here in my bunker office at Groom right now. It's about 1 a.m., and in an hour we're going to take one of the functioning alien spacecraft up. It's a real trip. I'm not the pilot, but the on-board mission manager. I have to ride herd on the computer systems that control our velocity, because these things are capable of near-light speed, and very weird things happen as you approach C, not just for us, but for anything within 100 miles of us. We don't push the velocity until we get at least a light-minute out into space. No one is sure what could happen to local space if we were to bump on the speed of light in near-earth flight.

The computers are unusual in their own right, because they are composed of bio-circuits, and are arguably sentient. There are no physical controls for them; we communicate telepathically with them. There are chemical controls to constrain them to their specific mission, otherwise, they could develop their own free will, which would be no bueno at speed. It takes hellacious concentration to keep the mission on track.

I've got to go suit up now. That's where I am.

One Bad Monkey · #11 09-05-2009, 05:40 AM

I've been playing non-stop for over twenty years and have regularly done a good amount of gigs, but I'll focus on the last five.

I had left my rock band (of five years) because I wasn't content with rehearsing for 3+ hours every Sunday, stroking our egos and playing out 1-2 times a year. I had just started playing in theatre pits again, and really liked the demands that it placed upon a musician. Reading music has always been easy for me, but the demands of locking in with the rest of the musicians after two rehearsals was the real challenge. It look a lot of listening, questioning other musicians if parts weren't quite lining up, and in some cases, simplifying the bassline to fit better.

The second thing I wanted to do was really learn that fretboard. Sure, I knew where the notes were and if I had to play a scale in a different spot, I certainly could. I remembered my former bass teacher telling me that a five (or six) string really was more for the "economy of motion" that you get across the fretboard as opposed to the extra notes you get in the "first position." So with that, I consciously forced myself to play higher up on the neck passages that normally would be farther back.

Where I am now? Still trying to really solidify my fretboard fluency, but it's really good. The last shows I've been doing, I've been really confident with staying up fairly high on the fretboard, and playing everything up there. From that, I've changed my eq settings to compensate for the extra "boom!" that comes from playing that high, but it's okay.

As for the theatre stuff, my diligence in "playing well with others" has paid off. I'm pretty much THE guy in town for theatre work, and stay pretty busy with it. I'm very happy with where I've come in the past five years, and am looking forward to what the next five will bring musically.

KrisH · #12 09-05-2009, 06:02 AM

After having played bass professionally for 20+ years, I got out of it for about 10 years. When I started again, I worked on playing guitar, which helped me learn chord structures. When I seriously started playing bass again about two years ago, I knew more about scales, arpeggios, etc. because of the guitar knowledge. Plus, I've been more conscious of different tones and effects, probably because of the discussions on this forum. Working on different techniques, such as third-finger plucking and some slap. The most important change in the past couple years has been learning to handle and play the double bass.

Soverntear · #13 09-05-2009, 07:34 AM

im 1000000% better at bass then i was a year ago. stated taking lessons been in two bands that never went far. this week my old bands old bass player decided he was coming back so im booted.

but then i was reviewing my buddies cd and so i called him to see if he wanted to start out project again (we did punk rock covers) and both of us were thinking long and huard all day about starting original material. i think its a good sign.