Recent content by Russell L

Hey, no matter how simple, you still gotta articulate them notes right, and it can be different for each song. Sometimes cut 'em short, sometimes let 'em ring. And then there are things like dynamics, what octave, etc. Even slow root/5th songs can have a groove. Look, I majored in music on...

Well, try this: take a bass line, preferably one with some subdivision in it, and simply play it over and over like a loop...til you drop. Sounds silly, but what will happen is that your hands and fingers, in fact even your arms, shoulders and whole body will loosen up and become immerserd...

Anything from the 1950s.

I'm with you on Rush and Jaco, but I like Neil Young (although not all). I'm also not into Tower of Power.

Comfortably Numb Love Will Keep Us Alive Have I Told You Lately

Jewel and the Rubies

Um...been about five years now. But I don't gig anymore. Even so, I love dead roundwounds.

Hi, SWRnut. Nice place. I'll have to get out there sometime. I'm just down the road in Cayce by Columbia.

What I do is play a ghost note (muted, dead "thunk") on the root, plucking it with my index finger or sometimes middle finger, inbetween every beat. Like 1x2x3x4x, beatwise. Or /1x3x5x6x / 8x6x5x3x/ notewise (two measures shown). The rhythm is like the piano music pic above.

One night I was really getting into playing All Along the Watchtower when all of a sudden a pain shot through the tip of my pinky on my fretting hand. Turned out that in all my zeal and reverie I had been gripping the strings too hard. The result was something like a stone bruise under my...

Played a TV 15 one night when my band was hosting a blues jam. I really thought it sounded great. Looked great, too.

The rest is yet to come.

It depends, but more often than not I try not to listen to the singer's timing, but more to the drummer.

One of the best things you can do is picking out bass lines off of recordings. By ear. Do that in addition to whatever lessons or studies. It helps train your ear. And if you study some basic theory you'll learn what it all means, how to reproduce it, and how to improve even quicker...not to...

Well, the bass part is usually different than the guitar part, so think about that. Also, learn regular written music.