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What to practice when you don't know what to practice?

B

Bear_Bass

Dec 28, 2011
69
1
#1
K well,

Today i was watching some more jaco video's, so i decided to practice again for my usual 2 hours. Last night during practice i nailed teen town, opus pocus, liberty city, band songs and otherwise did some theory work and improv with a looper. Today i hop on my bass, couldnt play any of those songs, couldnt improvise to save my life and spat the dummy quite badly before having a chance to practice theory:spit: i've never been so pissed at bass in my life and i just about broke my bass and amp by throwing the bass at it :rollno:(out of character im normally very mellow.) After a few hours i went back in to do scales, still couldnt do songs or improvise:bawl:

So what i need to know is what do you need to practice, when you can't practice or don't know what to practice? :help:
 
#4
Bear...i have had the same thing...my prof..tells us/me...rudiments..rudiments...rudiments...play a song...mess up...go back to rudiments...the other thing that he always states... is know the melody inside and out...so this gets back to my problem when i havent prepared myself....i have started to listen and visualize the tune...(this could be closing my eyes for a few minutes,,count in the tune and sing it to myself...some how it rights itself with timing and feel...)
Hope it helps...if not go back at it in a few hours...
 
#6
I recommend, in all seriousness, illegal drug usage.

I have written the best, most creative songs of my life under the influence of substance.

Also, I would like to site the immeasurable impact of psychedelics on the creativity of music in the 60s to 70s, the impact of marijuana on blues based metal/rock (Stoner is actually a popular genre), and the fact that Nine Inch Nails, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, and others have written their best material to date during periods of extended heroin usage.
 
#7
Time.

Shout, shake, stomp and clap like a savage. Work on polymeters, swing, whatever, just practice time.

And when you practice improv, simply scream the pulse and play against nothing but that. Internalize, internalize, internalize.
 
#8
Schpector said:
I recommend, in all seriousness, illegal drug usage.

I have written the best, most creative songs of my life under the influence of substance.

Also, I would like to site the immeasurable impact of psychedelics on the creativity of music in the 60s to 70s, the impact of marijuana on blues based metal/rock (Stoner is actually a popular genre), and the fact that Nine Inch Nails, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, and others have written their best material to date during periods of extended heroin usage.
Click to expand...

Your drug use has FRIED your brain. Bad advice. I hope you are joking.
 
#9
Schpector said:
I recommend, in all seriousness, illegal drug usage.

I have written the best, most creative songs of my life under the influence of substance.

Also, I would like to site the immeasurable impact of psychedelics on the creativity of music in the 60s to 70s, the impact of marijuana on blues based metal/rock (Stoner is actually a popular genre), and the fact that Nine Inch Nails, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, and others have written their best material to date during periods of extended heroin usage.
Click to expand...

Hello, enjoy your trolling tonight much?
 
#10
Schpector said:
I recommend, in all seriousness, illegal drug usage.

I have written the best, most creative songs of my life under the influence of substance.

Also, I would like to site the immeasurable impact of psychedelics on the creativity of music in the 60s to 70s, the impact of marijuana on blues based metal/rock (Stoner is actually a popular genre), and the fact that Nine Inch Nails, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, and others have written their best material to date during periods of extended heroin usage.
Click to expand...

LOL!!!
 
#13
Thanks for all the advice. I took a day off, came back and did a portrait of tracey/okonkole y trompa cover with my band. I asked keyboard player what he thought happened, apparently too much practice in 1 seating can do more bad than good? Anyway everythings back to normal and i apologized to my bass and amp;)
 
#14
I've been playing for 40 years. Some days it's gold but the next day it can be crap. Where a player is really at is somewhere in the middle. The point of practice is to make even bad days acceptably good. Don't sweat a bad day.
 
#15
Pick a song that you like most. Maybe one with a tricky bass line... play it via Windows Media Player and you can slow down the playback so you can pick out each individual bass note. Practice that and when you get good at it, up the speed to normal and play along with the song. It wont be as boring. Its hard to practice the bass by yourself. I get A.D.D. by just doing scales/runs on the bass. That lasts about 5 minutes and I give up.
 
#16
Don't do 2 hours a day - you sound like you are quite advanced. Thinking about it, reading about it all serves as practice. Switch to a few days a week and less time. Unless you have a band, just keeping your fingers moving an hour a day 3-4 times a week is good. Learn to change a song key quickly with Theory. Get in a band
 
#17
Actually sounds to me like you may have overloaded yourself in the first session the night before. I do it all the time, learn a bunch of stuff only to have it disappear later. It's usually because I took too much in at one time.

My fix for re-inspiring myself involves a half-sized Yamaha keyboard. I randomly pick one of the preset 2 bar songs (this one has 100) pick a key, and try to emulate the bass lines. It's one of the most satisfying learning tools I've come up with. A bonus would be that I have 100 really cool bass lines to use whenever I want.
 
#19
Bear_Bass said:
Thanks for all the advice. I took a day off, came back and did a portrait of tracey/okonkole y trompa cover with my band. I asked keyboard player what he thought happened, apparently too much practice in 1 seating can do more bad than good? Anyway everythings back to normal and i apologized to my bass and amp;)
Click to expand...

Sometimes the best thing to do is something else to clear your head. Take a walk, play a game, or what ever you are into. Then come back to bass.
 
#20
madurolover said:
Don't do 2 hours a day - you sound like you are quite advanced. Thinking about it, reading about it all serves as practice. Switch to a few days a week and less time. Unless you have a band, just keeping your fingers moving an hour a day 3-4 times a week is good. Learn to change a song key quickly with Theory. Get in a band
Click to expand...

I did play more than 2h a day for the vast majority of my musical life ... Going to college to earn a degree on the classical DB. It was more of a 5h a day of practice + every others homework that I had and on weekend 5h practice with my band. It was the most creative moment of my life and we were studying complex music and of a matter of fact, it ended in what we were playing too.

But yeah, sometime you have to take a break, thinking of nothing.
 

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