Pick technique ( to pick or not to pick)

[Rockin Mike]

Well - the audience doesn't care if they don't hear anything wrong with what they are listening to. If a 'Chris Squire' sounding, gritty, picked bass line were laid under Patsy Kline's rendition of 'Crazy' - the audience would care.

You can use the tone knob on your base to make adjustments for songs like that.

 

[Rockin Mike]

Has anybody else found that certain basses just cry out to be fingerpicked, and others equally want to be flatpicked? I was a flatpick only player for years with Rickenbacker, Carvin, and Squier. Now I have my Spector and it just seems to want the fingers.

I didn't decide to start fingering more, my bass told me to.

 

[lfmn16]

No brainer......just play YOUR way.

For the life of me I'll NEVER understand why there always needs to be a "right way" and a "wrong way" when it comes to technique.

Amen! I see so many people worrying about playing like this guy or that guy - we've already got one of them. If you spend as much time developing your own style as copying someone else's, you'll be way ahead. Do you want to be a technician or a musician?

There, the old fart has spoken!

 

[anonymous122511]

If you spend as much time developing your own style as copying someone else's, you'll be way ahead.

Amen! All great stylists have ultimately pursued the sound that was in their own heads, not the ones in someone else's.

The advise to learn all techniques and use what is "appropriate" is flawed in a couple of ways.
First, unless you are aiming to be a mercenary hired gun sideman determined to pay the rent playing bass at all costs learning a technique you will never use by your own choice may just be sidetracking you. There's no time limit on this stuff and you can always learn it later if you feel you need to.
Second, what's "appropriate" is determined largely by your ability to hear a part and sell it using the techniques you have down and more important genuine conviction.

 

[deesonic]

Whatever works... I play both. I recently recorded an album with a psychobilly rock type band (RIC 4003 and not typical stand up bass though) and played finger style exclusively. Now working on a thrash metal band (at almost 40yo haha) and feel much more comfortable playing almost exclusively with a pick in this band. My preference is to play finger style when I can, but if a pick works, it works. I started out playing finger style all the way until I started taking on some heavier bands where the pick just worked better for me and the cuts through the roar a bit better.

 

[ShredderMaximus]

[SARCASTIC-TONE] Everytime a bassist uses a pick, a puppy dies...[/SARCASTIC-TONE]

You should always concentrate on you sound first and foremost, the only people on earth who really care about picks vs fingers are bassists, and I doubt your ever gonna play to a high enough concentration of bassists that anyone would ever say anything or notice anyways. Do what you like and sounds best, they both have their own pros and cons.