Are You a Soft or Hard Player?

[TNCreature]

I play much lighter than I ever have, and suprise! Better control.
But, there are also times to dig in a get a little grunge going.

 

[bassbrad]

I play dynamically ranging from percussive to feather soft, from over the finger board to bridge, fingers, thumb or pick as needed.

 

[Rip Van Dan]

There are some players known for playing very hard such as Geddy Lee of Rush and Chris Wolstenholme of Muse (have to include the band names because at least one person will say they've never heard of them). A large part of their sound is the way they play very hard and either bounce the strings on the frets or come close to it most of the time.

On the other hand, some players such as Jack Casady of Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna and Gail Ann Dorsey, mostly known for her work with David Bowie, who barely waft their fingers over the strings and let the amp do work.

Where do you fall in this spectrum?

I pretty much have a soft touch and like a low action on my basses. I will dig into the strings over the bridge pickup on my Jazz to make it growl, but otherwise I let the amp do the work. Good news about playing like that is that if you need to get louder, you can just play harder, at least up to a point. I selected "cover it all" because I do, but primarily I'm playing with a softer touch as opposed to banging on the strings.

 

[Rip Van Dan]

Jorma Kaukonen is even harder to spell. Been a fan since the days of 8 track tape.

Well heck, you might even remember the 4-track tapes too!! You know the ones with the hole on the bottom for the roller to come up through?

And if you listened to 8-tracks very much you've got to be expert at pulling the case apart and re-winding the tape carefully around the outside as well as splicing tape when a section of it got too badly mangled. For those who never had to mess with them, the tape was pulled out of the center and wrapped back around the outside of the spool of tape. It was a continuous tape that never needed rewinding.

 

[Outbush]

I play pretty lightly. The bass has a low action (not as low as I'd like but there you go, tinkering time never goes astray) and the pickups are set pretty high. I reckon I can mimic a lot of sounds that way but it was all actually motivated by popping a tendon in my little finger at a gig. Since then everything has changed and I'm faster and neater too. There are many ways around a paddock...

 

[Tom Bomb]

I can go hard ​

 

[baileyboy]

I play harder than I'd like to. Playing softer would probably help improve my finger speed as well. Always something to work on...

 

[Gothic]

I'll quote Jack Black's lyrics to answer this.

"Sometimes you got to squeeze, sometimes you gotta say please."

 

[Craig Orndorff]

Given these other guys who report playing fairly hard and getting blisters and what not, I only got them on my picking hand when I first started playing seriously again, so I think I’m somewhere in the middle. I don’t get a lot of clank in my playing even with relatively low action.

 

[Vodyanoi]

I adapt to the song I'm playing; it also depends what instrument I'm using - playing soft on my fretless as well as on my SR600 (the ramp on it restricts digging in anyway), but I'm usually rocking my P copy hard.

 

[jdh3000]

Fairly soft so I can dig in as needed. I used to play hard long ago but was wearing my fingers out and didn't have any dynamics or variance. I let the amp so it's job and I do mine.

 

[David McIntire]

I can play very, VERY hard when it is called for, and then so softly that you can barely hear me, all without changing a thing on my amplifier or bass guitar. This particular skill is called Dynamics, and I feel it is the least studied of what Dave LaRue in an old interview in BP Mag called the 3 Facets of Music, or, Bass Guitar playing.
Melody
Rhythm
Dynamics

I don't just play at one volume all evening.

 

[bbh]

I don’t play hard normally but if it’s required by the song, so be it. I usually play light and use my rig power to get me to any volume necessary. My rigs generally range from 500 - 2KW. Usually running 2 x 10 cabinet for most bar type / party gigs.

 

[wazzel]

I play on the soft side. Found I am more efficient when I play on the soft side and it is easier on my fingers. Since my basses are set up for soft playing I can get aggressive sounds without having to beat the crap out of my strings.

 

[smtp4me]

I am squarely in the middle. I don't bang on the strings, unless I'm covering a song where the original artist does the same, but I actually have to focus and put in effort to play very softly.

 

[One_Dude]

I do both depending on the song and the volume of the band. I used to play with a pick only, but in the last several years it's almost exclusively with fingers. Fingers are much more expressive, but sometimes a pick and a sharper attack is necessary.

Thump on,

One_Dude

 

[Plain Old Barry]

Where do you fall in this spectrum?

I played too hard for years, causing hand issues that made me have to stop playing for a few years and have surgery. I now play much softer on far different instrument setups with lighter strings.

 

[mrperkolator]

Boy, this wasn't about what I thought it was going to be at all!

I read this whole tread to see funny comments and the above is all I found.....

You dont always have to pluck her hard
In fact sometimes that's not right to do
Sometimes you've got to make some love
And plucking give her some smoochies too
Sometimes ya got to squeeze
Sometimes you've got to say please
Sometimes you've got to say hey
I'm gonna pluck you, softly.....

 

[lfmn16]

I read this whole tread to see funny comments and the above is all I found.....

With all the whiners, TB is becoming a humorless place. Any comment or joke, not matter how innocuous seems to cause offense to someone.

It puts the moderators in a tough spot. At what point do they tell people to just grow up?

 

[Lobster11]

With all the whiners, TB is becoming a humorless place. Any comment or joke, not matter how innocuous seems to cause offense to someone.

It puts the moderators in a tough spot. At what point do they tell people to just grow up?

I don't know what you're talking about. O.P. asked a serious question and almost everyone has offered serious answers. Just how much comedy were you expecting to find in a discussion of technique?

BTW, I did find your earlier post pretty funny....