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What do you like about bass guitar?

#81
Uh, the sound? Isn't that what keeps anybody coming back to whatever they play? I mean all those other trappings people mention are fine, but if you aren't in love with the sound, the sonorority, the timbre you won't keep coming back. Why the hell else are people always chasing tone?
 
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#83
What do I like about bass?

I think this sums it up nicely:


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#84
orange joe said:
Everything in the Universe moves and vibrates - everything is vibrating at one speed or another. Nothing rests. Everything you see around you is vibrating at one frequency or another and so are you.The bass guitar is my way of having a personal connection with those frequencies.
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I really like it when I can feel the notes I am playing on my bass.
 
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#89
especially as a doubler, i have a deep appreciation for electric bass.

no feedback? hell yeah.

especially 6 string basses, chordal solo arrangemetns are really satisfying since they're jazz-guitar-esque, but more unique and inherintly come with challenges built in due to it being a bass. these little obstacles force some creativity that i find really fun.

theres also nothing like driving a rock band and holding it down nice and tight. i don't get to do that much anymore, but when i do, cranking some dirt and fat low end out of my VT bass is something i really find transcendant when playing with a good band/drummer.
 
#91
bassballs27 said:
I personally love the feel of bass strings over guitar strings.
I also think power chords on a bass sounds so much better than on a guitar.
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Me too ever since I first touched a bass back when I was helping some cousins move. My uncle had a violin bass. I don't know what brand it was. I never even saw it before until I saw it in the moving truck. It was a magical moment for young Herrick. I love the feel of bass strings.
 
#92
Coming from the DB world, and having switched to a doubler only a few years ago, I have a bit of a different perspective. The big basses have a very limited range of tone. You can have the acoustic timbre or the other one, and those are it.

The reason that *I* like bass guitar is all the different timbres and volumes and effects and stuff. A giant tube amp and a 810 blow my pants legs around - there is NO part of that that doesn't kick a$$, regardless of your genre preferences. Bootsy wouldn't be Bootsy without a rack full of effects. Metal as a genre would be dead-as-fried-chicken if it all had to be played on classical guitars. The range of tone and volume required for different genres ranges widely and I love to be able to change it up and use things like a crunchy lead tone or a wokka-wokka phaser or change strings to a set that rings like a piano or have a pedal tone that sustains for long periods or a giant earthshaking dub line.

Also my strings are like $30 for flats that last forever. I'm saving up for DB gut strings that cost $400 (also take a year to break in), and that's not even a particularly expensive set!
 
#93
Who the hell wants to play a itty bitty guitar when you can have the M60 of instruments! Stand proud and stand out with your giant bass!
Also i love when the whole band is in time and sounding good. I also think the bass is the most beautiful of all instruments -particularly Fenders. :)
 
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#95
Remyd said:
Coming from the DB world, and having switched to a doubler only a few years ago, I have a bit of a different perspective. The big basses have a very limited range of tone. You can have the acoustic timbre or the other one, and those are it.

The reason that *I* like bass guitar is all the different timbres and volumes and effects and stuff. A giant tube amp and a 810 blow my pants legs around - there is NO part of that that doesn't kick a$$, regardless of your genre preferences. Bootsy wouldn't be Bootsy without a rack full of effects. Metal as a genre would be dead-as-fried-chicken if it all had to be played on classical guitars. The range of tone and volume required for different genres ranges widely and I love to be able to change it up and use things like a crunchy lead tone or a wokka-wokka phaser or change strings to a set that rings like a piano or have a pedal tone that sustains for long periods or a giant earthshaking dub line.

Also my strings are like $30 for flats that last forever. I'm saving up for DB gut strings that cost $400 (also take a year to break in), and that's not even a particularly expensive set!
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Interesting perspective - I went the other direction. I started playing bass guitar just about forever ago. The big fat violin came along for specific reasons three or four years ago. I don't remember exactly now. Both are a complete blast, but I have been having a whole lot of fun playing the upright in an amplified setting. I use all the different rockabilly slap techniques, jazz pizzicato, and bowing in the same set. It's a different way to get different sounds out of an instrument. I don't use pedals much on the electric. Oddly enough, I use more of a signal chain on the upright than on the BG. It's so that the loud upright sounds as much like the unplugged upright as I can get it.

It still causes the human species to propagate. So, there's one constant - bass is critical for the survival of humans. If it has really big strings, I really like it.
 

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