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Is playing bass easy?

#82
I'm not sure. Ease is relative. When I first started out, I knew nothing about it at all. I played for the same reason I do now, which was simply out of enjoyment. However, I did so intuitively and I remember some friends of mine asking me if I'd taken lessons, when at that time I didn't even know how it was tuned. However, I'm much better now, but it feels like it got harder. So, I'm not sure what to do with any of that.
 
#83
Richland123 said:
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Like many things in life that people make look easy but it aint.
 
#85
Killed_by_Death said:
I'm too cheap to pay for one, so I got the Chinese made Hadean:

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It's fun to take to the park & get some sun while I play for the ducks in the pond.
The stream almost drowns out the E string though.

I reference the Luna, because it's tuned like a guitar.

If I can stick to practicing, and lately I have, I'll probably buy another guitar soon. Oddly enough I wish I had back my old LTD guitar. That thing was a real gem & I only paid $115 for it!
Hmm, maybe I'll see if I can find another like it. I still have the spare tuners & bridge someone gave me.

As far as bass being easy goes, it depends on the song or the genre.
I was reviewing songs to learn on Saturday & I've always loved the Misfits but their songs are boring on bass, really boring.
Today I was having fun playing "Last Dance with Mary Jane", LOL
It's not incredibly difficult, also not incredibly boring.
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Dude, my U-Bass had a sticker on it saying Made in China.
 
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#87
It's an easy instrument to play badly.

That said, I think it's easier compared to something like guitar or sax. It's got a different role, vibe, and aesthetic. If your brain matches where a bass is coming from, it all just drops into place and you're on the way.

That's how it was for me anyway. Bass just made perfect sense. True love at first sight.
 
#90
To me, bass is about playing time. Very few musicians hold high mastery of time, in my experience. Art Tatum is one who does. Better than a Swiss watch. Is that easy? Um. Then there are the nuances of playing on the beat, on top of the beat or behind the beat and doing that exactly so, every time.

Beyond the dimension of time there is the dimension of chord articulation. It's my view a keyboard player can play A flat dim 9 all day but it isn't a chord until I articulate it. Tommy Shannon does this very well.

Bass, easy? Um. Depends on how one looks at it ....
 
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#91
I went ahead & picked up a bass again, because I realized I was going about it the wrong way before.
Stuff that was WAY over my head was just frustrating the pants off me & stuff that was slow enough tempo just bored me.

Then I realized Kim Deal (Pixies) is my go-to bass player, or possibly Dee Dee Ramone. Yeah, Ramones is fast, but the changes are easy.

I know I've posted this already, but again, it's all about your goals. Unfortunately too many players want to emulate a celebrity player.
Being just like a particular player never really appealed to me, but I would like to pull off covers of my faves.

Another aspect is noodling alone, just improvising on your own. It would be pretty boring if you knew nothing, like me.
Ultimately I'd like to be able to just sit around noodling to myself, but I'm probably far off from that goal.
 
#92
The only tough part about bass for me is all the attention from females with questionable moral character and intent.

Is there such a thing as a general purpose spray or perhaps a topical ointment that could be employed to repeal this constant barrage of female attention.

A drummer told me a sure cure is to take up guitar, but being a drummer i suspect it is simply some type of twisted desire to see me a social outcast due to envy.

I asked a guitarist and all they said was "turn down and don't get so busy during the bridge."

So fellow bringers of thunder, does their exist a cure for this particular malady?
 
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#94
Bass is an easy instrument to start out because the bare bone stuff can make you work in a band but the bar get super high when you try Victor Wooten level.

While on guitar the bar is higher to start because you have to play chords, melody and probably solo too ... but once you are good, you are good.
 
#96
slobake said:
I spent years as a mediocre guitarist. A friend asked me to play bass in her bad and I was in love with bass from the first time I picked up my beat up Mexican P. I picked it up really fast and my band mates say I am a good bassist.
I have been wondering is the bass simple or am I just a natural bassist? I have been doing my own little study by trying to teach people a simple song. Simple whole notes that go A E C E. No one has been able the play that song right out of the gate like I did.
Next up the first song I learned on bass, U2's "With or Without You." A very simple song, right? Same result, no one has just picked up the bass and played out the gate like I did.
All this to say I guess that some of us are just meant to play bass.
What do you think?
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Once again, like you, I started with guitar and then fell in love with bass once I made the shift.

Unlike you, the people I've showed simple songs to I believe may have been musically inclined because they picked up really quickly. My wife was considering playing bass for a while and had maybe a half hour total time in her life with a bass in her hands. At a cover gig many moons ago, in between sets, I showed her how to play Fight for Your Right, and she performed it next set with the band, pretty much flawlessly.

I will argue to the death that bass is much easier to play instrument than any other (aside from tambourine, triangle, etc). And it's especially easier than guitar.

If someone who never before in their life touched a stringed instrument had to get up and perform a 9 song set of their (or actually my) choice, within a week, I'm certain I could teach (if they were reasonably intelligent, willing, and knew how to keep a beat) them a set on bass and have them able to do that. I could do it in much less if the person were musically inclined. On guitar it would be next to impossible to do that, especially if the requirement was that the songs be played n4n.

It is much MUCH easier to get out gigging on bass than it is on other instruments. And if anyone disagrees I'd ask them to imagine if they had to teach someone either guitar or bass on the above challenge - and they'd be put to death if they didn't succeed. Which instrument would you choose to teach. Or have someone else teach if ya don't know how to play guitar. I think one would have to be insane to choose guitar, or any other instrument. Bass is much easier.

I played guitar for 10 years before committing to bass. I was considered a pretty good guitarist in my playing prime. While learning covers one day and working on Sweet Child 'o Mine it occurred to me how much easier it would be to be learning the bass. I realized at that point that I had a choice. I could either play guitar and be one of billion, play in average bands, etc. OR, I could switch to bass and be an awesome bass player, land great gigs, and yeah... you get the idea. I made the switch, and I was right. I've played in so many bands that wouldn't have given me any consideration whatsoever as a guitarist. Much easier to stand out as a competent bassist, than a guitarist.

Now I'll read the rest of the thread and see who's about to argue with me :).

And yeah... I know that to master the instrument, play it really well, etc. takes just as much work as any other instrument. That still doesn't make it any more difficult. 4 strings. 21 precision frets.
 

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