No Offense Intended...

Geez, you don't even have to walk on guitar.

 

As a guitar player who converted over to bass and never looked back, I'd say yes it's easier and harder too. When I brought home my first guitar and a "beginning guitar" book when I was 12 years old, I was playing 3 chord songs within 20 minutes. Having learned those three chords, I was pretty much qualified to play the majority of the rock songs on the air at the time and everyone thought I was a child prodigy. Over the years, as I dug deeper into theory and chord structure, reading notation, rif building, classical styles etc..It did get more and more difficult to the point of being a lot of work. Fast forward to many many years later to June of last year. Just burned out on guitar, and tired of always having to compete with so many dime a dozen guitarists for every gig, I brought my first bass home and was playing within 10 minutes. Oh I was just banging out the roots on some I-IV-V songs but sounding pretty good at it. Ahhh but then the journey began from there. Scale theory, modes, walking bass lines, finding the groove and then maintaining the groove while the instruments and vocalists around you dance all around across and up and down and over your bass line as you provide the foundation that holds them all together. Taking a chord progession from a chart and making it your own unique creation. It feels so good. The hardest part about being a former guitar player is knowing when NOT to play. We tend to think that all of them fancy rifs we did on guitar should be carried over when often all that's needed is to lay down a simple 4 quarter note per measure groove. Playing bass can be as simple as banging the root within a few minutes of picking one up for the first time, or a complex art form that can never fully be mastered in it's entirety. I am enjoying the heck out of the journey though and after a year I've only slightly scratched the surface of what a bass can do. I never have a problem finding gigs and still can't even pop/slap to save my life...but I'll learn someday. It's all good.

 

Hmm, personally I think to appreciate how incredible Jaco was you have to actually play bass AND have at least a basic understanding of thoery to even begin to appreciate the complexities of his playing.
I also think because Jaco's playing fell in the era of 70's/80's fusion it is not apropriate for all listeners.

Re: Wooten - Classical Thump, in my opinion this is an cack example of bass playing. The song is tired, tacky, immature and generally weak and from what I remember of the recording it's some pretty shabby technique too.


This kid obviously doesnt know sh1t from shovel when it comes to playing bass (no offence intended), or he wouldnt have asked for 'hard bass songs'...

So my suggestion is Stevie Wonder's Hotter Than July, Nathan Watts lines on there are a perfect example of great bass playing IMO.
Not the most simple lines, but not over filled with chops, they also groove so so much.

Other examples would be early Police and Aston Barret from the Wailers as some one else already mentioned.

 

At first I thought you meant wooten....

 

ha, lol! no, although listening to classical thump you might think so?

 

confession time:

confession one - didn't read all the responses to this thread.

confession 2 - i was first a guitarist, for a good amount of years. back in the 80s i wanted to join a cover band. i learned a handful of songs and one day realized, if I were playing bass this would be 1/10th of the work and i'd be able to get into one of the best cover bands around. as a guitarist, my head was spinning. learning 5 van halen songs, note for note was, uhhh.... slightly easier than learning the same 5 on guitar. i found that to consistently be the case with the majority of bands.

for the most part, and very generally speaking, i would have to say that yes - the guitar is easier than the bass. it's all relative of course and it all depends on how far you want to take it. yes, jaco, flea and wooten blow away johnny ramone. and mark hoppus is very successful doing one millionth of the work that i did trying to learn the guitar to 20 cover songs.

 

For the most part true but have you ever heard Tal Farlow with the Red Norvo Trio? He plays bass lines and chords while Charles Mingus Is soloing.

 

Cool thread! A couple of my own observations (I'm a guitarist turned bassist):

1. you can't wank on bass. I mean you *shouldn't* wank on guitar, but you *can't* wank on bass. Very few people will think you're cool.

2. Bass will always be technically easier than guitar for "guitar band" music, 'cause it's all about showing off how good your guitarist is. But that's sort of a trivial observation.

3. If you have a big ego, play guitar. The better you play, the better people think the guitarist or lead singer is!

4. Bassists are always in greater demand than guitarist because of #3 and #1.

5. groove, baby! Listen to Stevie Wonder, he's often got great bassists. Motown stuff, etc. I agree with Jazzbo -- don't start out (or necessarily ever try to emulate) the solo stuff. It's not terribly useful for most situations. Get your basic accompaniment chops first!

 

I consider a lot of slap to be wankery. And slap wows the hell out of just about anyone...


well... except for bassists who know better.




I stopped reading most of the replies after Jazzbo's post. Leave it to the ol' JB to set things straight.


Where's crazylegZ?

 

He's only posted twice, both times in this thread on the 5th. Since then he is gone.

I guess he already gave up on bass?

 

Sure you should be able to play bass as well as you do guitar without much effort. BUT sounding like a bass play is a different thing. Lot of guitarist play bass and can be easily spotting, they don't have the feel, they play too buzy.

It's like atheles some can play multiple sports and play both equally well, but most only play one sport great and the other so-so.

As to your question what is an example of some hard. Well any bass play that can groove. sure there are bass players that can play insanly fast, or inhuman technique, but if it doesn't groove it don't mean a thing.