Serious question: is there a cure for a gas?

[bassalien]

But seriously, if you want a cure, you have to ask yourself why you want the gear you don't have? Is it easier than practicing 5 hours/day to get better? Most of us seek what is easier as a way of avoiding the thing we know we must do to reach our real goals that we care about.

If you just love new gear and have insatiable desires, you can try reading The Art of Happiness by the Dalai Lama. He talks about insatiable desires and how to mitigate them.

I usually give myself a goal to hit before I reward myself with new gear. Like, if I want a new bass, I'll say "I won't buy it unless I practice every day for X hours, or learn the song X, or cleaned out the basement..."

Even then after I accomplish the chore/task/project, I will wait until Christmas or my birthday to reward myself, knowing I deserve it instead of just buying stuff aimlessly for my insatiable desire.

I hope this helps!
Now if only I can get my wife to stop buying crystals...

 

[Matthew_84]

Now if only I can get my wife to stop buying crystals...

Quite honestly, if my wife could calm down her spending for a few months, gas wouldn’t be as big of a deal for me - I’d have the money to buy what I want

 

[DJ Bebop]

I was into getting basses, I don't really think I was collecting them. I was hoping I would sound different, better. Nope

So I started working on me instead of getting more basses. I play better now and I'm much happier and understand that it's not the bass that makes you sound good but the player that makes the bass sound good!

Having said that, I still have a bunch of basses

 

[rtslinger]

I hate this place - I cannot be satisfied with what I have, and even when I think I’m certain about what my next bass will be, it is sure to change to something completely different - often multiple times a day.

I currently have two basses: a fretted 4-string PJ with rounds, and a fretless 5-string with flats and a foam mute for that thump.

I am currently studying jazz and want to be a decent jazz bassist and jam/gig with others eventually (I am currently just learning by myself, though I am looking for other jazz newbs to practice jazz standards with). The obvious next bass to get is an upright. I love how it sounds, I feel like it’d suit me perfectly, and I want to take jazz seriously - it’s a win win… The issue is that I also just really, really love bass guitars, especially fretlesses. If I could own a few really nice fretlesses (preferably an aged/worn fretless P and a slick/clean fretless J), I’d be a real happy man (with or without an upright). I really have no practical uses for the fretless P and J mind you, but I still want them to a near-desperate level…

I know what’d happen if I got them, I’d barely play them, and go “yeah… I should’ve got the upright”, but I cannot stop this itch…

And if y’all could stop posting pictures of your glorious Ps and Js (fretless or not), I’d really appreciate it. Thanks in advance!

(I’m joking btw, keep posting your beautiful basses… It’s a me problem).

I would say after over 50 years of playing bass the answer word be no

 

[Jay2U]

Yes, there is, but it's beyond the limitations of TB.

 

[TN WOODMAN]

Short answer. Not really.

 

[H K]

Sorry, there is NOT. Unless you do serious work on yourself. As in buddhism and/or getting over consumerism in general.
I personally buy and sell used gear, so my GAS is always terrible. I'll buy 2-3 basses per week, some times more.
Other gear too. At the moment sales have slowed down a lot aswell, so it's not great. But I just can't pass up a good deal. It's a proper addiction, but atleast I make my money back (+ some extra) most of the time. Problem is, I spend that on new gear, either to resell again, or to keep for myself... I've bought myself my "dream" bass several times over, and still I keep looking at new gear... I'm never satisfied. I'll enjoy a bass for a few weeks and then it's on to dreaming about a new one.
The only upside is that I do tend to play more when I have a new bass, and I take good care of them, so they keep/increase their value. I also learn a lot along the way. Hell, even just a year ago I couldnt even setup my own basses. Now I'm fixing electronics and doing general repairs. So atleast there's that.

 

[nonohmic]

Sitting down to practice is a great cure for GAS.

 

[swarfrat]

Upright is cool but different enough and doesn't live in the same ecosystem. Definitely fretless P

 

[Lesfunk]

There is a cure!
But you won’t find it here

 

[Starthief]

-There's a ton of cool gear out there that you know, and have researched, and haven't found yet.. You won't have it all. can't have it all. You don't need it all.

Aha, that's pretty close to something else I meant to say. There's a lot of cool stuff in this world, and you can't own it all. But you don't have to own it to appreciate it, and I know sometimes in my life I explicitly had to remind myself of that.

The same goes for instruments and genres -- you can't and don't have to learn to play them all. And for learning skills and having experiences in general, for that matter.

 

[tbz]

Stay away from Talkbass.

Don’t go to reverb.

Pick several pieces of music that will challenge you. Learn them. Repeat.

 

[Dr. Cheese]

I think insatiable desire for new gear could be a sign of too much time on the hands.
That's not meant to sound judgy or preachy. I wish I was in a position to have this problem. Unfortunately, life has made it so I've barely played in over a decade. There was a stretch in there where I didn't open the case for 5 yrs.
So, for me, there's no gas. I'd be happy with one nice bass that I really love playing and the time to play it.
My advice is to buy one nice fretless (not worn) and play it so much that you put your own wear marks on it. Don't give yourself time to have gas. Challenge yourself. Do something wacky like learn an entire old YES album note for note on fretless. I find that when I'm buried in a task, I'm thinking about the task,....not new gear.
A long time ago, that made me a better player.

That is great advice because truly learning is time and thought consuming.

 

[joel the bass player]

Gear is fun. Lots and lots of fun.

 

[CallMeAl]

My anti-GAS strategy:


1. There is an essay titled “Spectral Objects: On the Fetish Character of Music Technologies," by Jonathan Sterne. In a nutshell, it says that:

- musicians tend to believe that gear has magic power, and by owning it we can possess that power. (Marketing contributes a lot to this belief or at least takes advantage of it.)
- instead, we should believe that we are the ones with power. Gear is just tools. We need tools, but they are inert objects.


2. Don't fix what ain't broke -- if you love the gear you have, you don't really need to add to/replace it.


3. Remember that GAS can be healthy! It might be curiosity, an urge to learn or experience something new. It's only a problem if you experience it as a problem. (Obsession, dissatisfaction with already good gear, an endless cycle of chasing stuff and never really appreciating it once you have it, spending beyond your means.)

So maybe ask yourself why you're wanting a new piece of gear -- is it just for the sake of owning stuff, or is there a better reason?


4. The internet does tend to encourage GAS. It's 100x easier to talk about gear than it is to talk about technique, creativity, emotion etc. -- so that's what we do online. It also makes it easy to gawk at a wide variety of sexy gear photos and specs and reviews.

I wish I could like this twice. Quotes for emphasis. All 4 points are spot on.

 

[kerrycares]

The mind is in a constant state of desire …….. you chose what it will desire !
Bass is a pretty good choice.

 

[ThudThudThud]

The cure for GAS is to acquire all the things.
That is all.

Invalid Link Removed

 

[NKBassman]

One glance at my bank account and/or credit card statement usually cures it for me.

But, I picked up a bit of a "dream" bass and speaker cab over the pandemic in a fit of "retail therapy", and have been totally satisfied with what I've got ever since. No more bass/cab GAS, other than still wanting to try building some of my own some day. So from that perspective, I guess my advice would be to go buy what you really truly want and don't compromise. Buy once/cry once, as they say.

 

[jazz5757]

Well it's either Pornhub or the Talkbass classifieds...the latter is currently taking up more of my time...

 

[RicoTheBassMan]

Part of the GAS problem is the potential for criticism from a significant other. I solved my "apparent" bass gear GAS issue by introducing my wife to an activity that is even more pricey: sailing. And she loves it! So now she is buying me basses and heads and stuff for the holidays and my birthday and she thinks nothing of it since anything labelled "marine" is so marked up!

In short, get another hobby to give perspective.