If you weren't a Bass Player...

[rashrader]

Saxophone. Probably Tenor.... Maybe Baritone. Tough to say. Maybe both.

 

[dbsfgyd1]

What other instrument would you play?

for me it would be the drums.... when I was 10 my parents suggested I learn the cello - which I did for 6 years along with the clarinet, but when I was 13 I met a boy at my high school who played the drums and that was it...

I remember going home from school that day and saying to my parents at dinner time "I'm gonna learn to play the drums"! - my dad replied "not in this house you're not"! and that was it - my dreams of becoming the next Keith Moon or John Bonham were quickly extinguished.

my friend at school sat me at the drums one day and said your right hand goes here, left hand here and you use your feet to control the kick drum and hi-hats... and it just somehow came naturally to me and I found I could play the drums, but I knew my dad and no actually meant no.... so when I was 15 I picked up the only bass at school (it was right handed and I'm a leftie) and because I could read music I just figured out the notes and began to teach myself to play right handed.

I got my first bass when I was 17/18 and began to leach myself to play U2 songs (this was the 1980's) but when I tried to learn other songs I found it difficult - then I learnt that U2 had 'tuned down' a half step on their first 3-4 albums and I had tuned my bass to the key of U2's first albums!

anyway I've been playing bass ever since and when I was about 22 my originals band broke up and I realised my dreams of playing at Wembley or Madison Square garden had all but diminished and I needed the day job to pay for rent / food..etc... I then joined my first covers band - we got paid 2 pizza's and a bottle of Jim Beam for our first gig and got paid $25 each for our next gig - I thought I had got it made!

I still play the drums if any of the drummers I play with will let me jump on their kit for a bit and I've always said to my wife that if we win the lottery I'll buy a big house in the countryside and buy a kick ass drum kit - like Alex Van Halen uses on the video for 'Jump'.

So if you weren't a bass player - what instrument would you play instead?

Play??? I would have been a plumber......

Seriously, I can play a decent guitar, but I would have to build a band around the style, and I wouldn't be able to hire me as the bassist as there is no way that would work. Death surely would follow....

 

[The Mogpipe]

I'd be a traveling brain surgeon. ... It's not too late to come to your town for a check up.

Just like Jethro!

 

[ForestFriend]

I'd be the guy changing instruments every other song... Oh wait, I already am. Decided to give up playing guitar in my band because it was too much hassle bringing a guitar rig, keyboard rig, glockenspiel, flute and a sax to shows.

Bass is actually my first instrument and I want to play it in a band too, but being the bassist and a multi-instrumentalist doesn't work out very well. Money just wouldn't sound great if I stopped playing bass to play the sax solo.

 

[Feel-X]

This is it:

 

[logdrum]

Cowbell

 

[Chrisenbacker69]

Trombone is my first instrument and I was probably better at that than I am at bass. But playing trombone attracts even less female attention than playing bass does so I'm staying put.

 

[BassBrass]

It would probably be trumpet for me. I played trumpet in elementary school and progressed pretty quickly (was first chair the entire time), then went to a junior high school where the music program was so far behind what I had already learned, I was bored to death the entire year. It got so bad I made mistakes on purpose, stopped bringing sheet music (I had memorized all of our songs in short order) or played with it upside down, and did other little things to try to hold my interest. I quit trumpet right after that year, but I wish I had stayed with it. I later also tried piano and keyboards, but I was horrible at them.

In junior high (7th) we had a band led by a 75 yo venerable (Italian born) torturer (teacher) and they put us into hs marching and concert bands at grade 8. You don't progress in brass unless you have a structured group torture (repetition, over and over and over) that's what conditions the lip and everything else. I don't recommend adults take up trumpet usually... but a come back is always possible....

 

[Gaolee]

I am pretty horrible at all of them, but aside from Bass, I play or am learning Guitar, and Drums...

To be good, you must first suck.

 

[mikeoso]

Having hauled gear around for decades, I have decided that, in my next life, I'm coming back as a piccolo player. Don't worry, in this life I started on violin, and was tough enough to not get beat up at the bus stop, so I can handle the downsides.

Get an Irish tin whistle. Even lighter, and absolutely nobody will try to beat you up.

 

[Ggaa]

What other instrument would you play?

for me it would be the drums.... when I was 10 my parents suggested I learn the cello - which I did for 6 years along with the clarinet, but when I was 13 I met a boy at my high school who played the drums and that was it...

I remember going home from school that day and saying to my parents at dinner time "I'm gonna learn to play the drums"! - my dad replied "not in this house you're not"! and that was it - my dreams of becoming the next Keith Moon or John Bonham were quickly extinguished.

my friend at school sat me at the drums one day and said your right hand goes here, left hand here and you use your feet to control the kick drum and hi-hats... and it just somehow came naturally to me and I found I could play the drums, but I knew my dad and no actually meant no.... so when I was 15 I picked up the only bass at school (it was right handed and I'm a leftie) and because I could read music I just figured out the notes and began to teach myself to play right handed.

I got my first bass when I was 17/18 and began to leach myself to play U2 songs (this was the 1980's) but when I tried to learn other songs I found it difficult - then I learnt that U2 had 'tuned down' a half step on their first 3-4 albums and I had tuned my bass to the key of U2's first albums!

anyway I've been playing bass ever since and when I was about 22 my originals band broke up and I realised my dreams of playing at Wembley or Madison Square garden had all but diminished and I needed the day job to pay for rent / food..etc... I then joined my first covers band - we got paid 2 pizza's and a bottle of Jim Beam for our first gig and got paid $25 each for our next gig - I thought I had got it made!

I still play the drums if any of the drummers I play with will let me jump on their kit for a bit and I've always said to my wife that if we win the lottery I'll buy a big house in the countryside and buy a kick ass drum kit - like Alex Van Halen uses on the video for 'Jump'.

So if you weren't a bass player - what instrument would you play instead?

Drums. Or be a sound guy.

 

[Russell L]

Well... i also play guitar and keys already, always have. Thought about buying a cajon, though. I can play a little drums, but have no place for a set. Used to play clarinet and sax.

 

[MrLenny1]

Piano or tenor sax.

 

[EatS1stBassist]

Piano or tenor sax.

Tenor Sax was always my inspiration!

 

[devnulljp]

I always wanted to play cello but culdn't afford it. Cheap cello is a grand at least. Cheap guitar is $20. My brother bought a guitar for $20, and I learned on that. He got jealous and sold it, so I upgraded to a $40 guitar. Then when I was a teenager, to impress some girl he said his little brother was a great bass player (I'd never played bass) and pushed me to audition for a band. I borrowed a bass and got the gig. Haven't looked back since.

 

[murph7489]

I started out on trumpet, was okay but I didn't love it, then I went to drums which I loved and was very good at it..made 1st chair all county..so was the best around my small pond..but I knew drummers and a band needed a bass player. So I started playing bass I already loved rush and liked geddy so it was a solid choice for me..I owned a sonar drum kit, and a simmons electronic kit in the mid 80s..but got rid of them all and bought a washburn force bass..I've had a few basses over the years, never went back to drums..I did play the drummer in my band's alesis kit..everyone in the band was like holy crap..you're good...you should play a song or two on drums..uh..no..I also can play piano but too much money involved in getting keyboard gear...so the answer is Drums.

 

[murph7489]

This is it:
View attachment 3402602

I have that same Korg..not a bad little keyboard..

 

[garp]

If I was a sculptor but then again no
– Elton John, "Your Song" (1970)

Piano.