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Why did you Start to play Bass?

#21
The first instrument i ever touched was piano (as one being in my house before i was even born) i would fiddle around but never had a real desire to learn, in 5th grade i took drum lessons in school, i got discuraged bcuz i couldnt move my feet and hands at differnt beats together, (which i still cant do! even with just two hands having differnt beats, ie playing left and right hands of "linus and lucy" together, on bass or piano, just cant do it), later when i started listening to music(like '99-'00ish) i wanted to be in a band like all the bands i listened to(mostly the Popular punk/thrash/metal/alternative of that time) when i realized i couldnt sing, and noone had a keyboardist/Pianist i figured guitar, but i didnt like guitar it seemed to unoriginal, so once i found out that a band didnt have 2 or 3 guitarist it had one or two guirists with a bassist, then after listening to limp bizkits 'Re-aranged' and green days 'longview' i was like i think i would rather do that, and around '02 i started playing bass, and well ya
 
#22
Shalom.

I started on trumpet in sixth grade, and every year I shifted to a larger horn. They had an apparent plot to get any big guys in the brass section trapped under a tuba, come high school marching band.

Not long after I started playing trumpet, I decided I wanted to play guitar, as well. But after a couple of years of trying to find my voice on guitar, I figured out that the problem was from playing tuba and euphonium. I had gotten used to listening to the low end.

So, my freshman year in high school, I saved my lunch money for around five months and bought a beatle bass copy. It was junk. But it was MY junk. That was 1979. I've been a "Bass player who plays AT everything else" longer than most guys on this board have been alive.
 
#23
Kinda weird, but I picked up an acoustic guitar first. It just didn't feel right, and felt really tiny. A friend suggested I try a bass cause they're "bigger" than guitars. The first note that rumbled through my body made me an instanst low end addict!
 
#24
I grew up in Detroit during the 60's and 70's. Motown years. My dad was a a jazz fan...Miles, Adderly, Lou Rawls, Donald Byrd (my moms prom date!)...post bop. Miles played at one of my dad's high school dances back in his day.

One day we had a Junior High/Senior High Dance. I lived near Westbound Studios and George Clinton was booked for the party. It was the first time I had heard a live band. I didn't know at the time who GC was and didn't care. The bass player was the absolute top of cool. Groovy. Far Out. Boss. Took a hit of acid and that was it.
 
#25
I played tenor sax in our schools year 7 concert band. I liked the sound of those guitar things that played up the back....At the time i had no idea of what they were called haha....

So i decided to take up the bass half way through year 7 and then i quit the sax at the end of year 8 because i found bass much easier to practice with and just to muck around on. I was having more fun with it.
 
#26
I was in a band when I was in 8th or 9th grade. I'd been playing guitar for a few years but I still wasn't very good. My friend played drums and we found this amazing girl in our high school who played guitar as well. We played together for a few months with me doing my best James hetfield impression, but we couldn't find a bass player anywhere. So I ended up asking for a bass and amp for my birthday, I think it was my 15th.

It turns out I was a far better bassist than I was a guitarist. The first bassist who really influenced me was Cliff Burton, then Geezer Butler, then Jaco. Since then a lot of people have influenced me, but those 3 laid the foundation for the bassist I am today.
 
#28
Well I started piano when I was 9. By the time I was 12 I wanted to branch out a bit so I started playing classical guitar. Then, My friends and I got the crazy idea to form a band. One guy wanted to play the drums. The other guy wanted to play guitar. I decided I would play bass since no one voulnteered for it. Well I got myself a bass the next week. It ended up taking them 3 years to get their instruments, and they are still trying to figure out how to play them. But once I started playing the bass, I knew I was home. I loved everything about it and practiced all the time. Now I don't do anything more with those friends besides little jams where they struggle through Blink 182 chord changes and making sure the measure has 4 beats. I still play Piano and Guitar (among some others), but bass is and will always be my main instrument. I love it.

As far as musicians who have influenced my bass playing, Jaco was probably the first. He caused me to rip out my frets about a month after I got my bass. I grew up listening to a lot of Jazz, Soul, and R&B, so my style is heavily influenced by those types of music. I play so many different styles though, it's really hard to pinpoint specific influences.
 
#29
Well.

Growing up, I remember watching my mom play guitar. Then, when I was six, she died. Her guitar sat unplayed for years. In 5th grade I started tinkering around on it. Then I bought my first electric guitar. A few months later, my (deaf) brother bought a Washburn Lyon and a Peavey Microbass. It was the first time I'd ever even heard of a bass guitar (sad, I know). I was immediately hooked. I went and sold my electric and my amp for a Fender MIM Jazz 5. I sort of inherited my brother's amp for the time being. From then on, it's been nothing but joy. As (dare I say) corny as it may sound, I feel like I'm getting to know who my mom was through music. Like I'm doing it in honor of her... and God.

I love bass, which is most likely true for all of us, and it's going to be a part of my life for as long as I live.
 
#30
I started on guitar in a band with drums, bass, and 2 guitars. Our bass player at the time left to become a full time truck driver. Someone had to play bass, so I decided to give it a try and it turned out that it felt more natural to me than guitar did (weird, because I never ever played bass with a pick). I was a HUGE Iron Maiden and Rush fan at the time, so having Steve Harris and Geddy to emulate didn't hurt my ambition either.
 
#31
Paul McCartney. When I was a kid, I got into the Beatles somehow, years after they'd broken up, but years before the big revival... I blame Michael Jackson because of Say Say Say and The Girl is Mine, as in, "Who's this dude singing with Michael?" because I was young and impressionable and "Thriller" was freakin' huge. I found out Paul was a bass player, so I decided that someday I'd be a bass player too.

"Someday" came during the metal years, however. So my early inspirations were Paul McCartney, Cliff Burton (first bass line learned: For Whom The Bell Tolls), and then things went crazy for me when Les Claypool showed up.

Then I discovered Victor and the metal years ended abruptly.

In short, Paul snagged me, Cliff hooked me, Les reeled me in, and Victor smoked me.
 
#32
It was a day like any other. I was going on my morning jog through the forests of eastern B.C when suddenly 7 ninjas dropped out of the foliage. I could immediately tell they were trying to collect the bounty on my head issued by Don Boss Motzano Giseppi. I destroyed his mining operation in the Alps and freed thousands of natives.

Anyways, they encircled me, and tried to take me one at a time. The first one was a real joker, tried to give me some kinda flying punch combo. A leaping roundhouse kickto the face put him down. The next two took me on at once, trying to pin me down. Fortunately, they couldn't get around my huge muscles and all i had to do was flex and they went flying.

The next three had swords, but before they could cut me down a mystical lightning bolt transformed these swords into guitars (Gibson SG's) and put a Cort Curbow into my hands. I immediately swung the bass as hard as i could, taking out one of the guys guitars and knocking his head into the distant woods. It landed with a dull thump. What ensued was quite possibly the greatest axe battle ever witnessed in the Western Hemisphere. We dodged,ducked, parried, swung, swerved and performed the ancient ritual of guitar vs. bass for a good half hour. Then, i saw an opening, and in one fell swoop i separated one of them from their legs and the other from their feet. Bleeding, crying and dying in front of me, i dealt the final blow, a headstock through the heart. The last ninja ran away frightened, fearing for his own life. He was the smartest of them all. I finished my jog, came home and made love to Anna Kournikova 4 times.

Anyways, thats what started me on bass.
 
#35
well for me, i started on guitar along with my twin brother but i noticed he got better at guitar and i didnt. So i quit, then later that year he tried to start a band with some other people, but without a bassist, so i was jelous that he was in a band so i decided to start bass and have loved ever since.

playing bass has turned me on to many different bands.
 
#36
I played all the brass bass clift instruments in high school.
And like some others I just hear the bass lines better than treble. Also was working sound and MC ing a coffee house
and helf the time the bass player did not show up. So I started playing a bass line on a tele. I would sit in the sound boot and plug in. People liked it so I bought a bass. Not long an I was back to bass clift. Every one told me to forget guitar and play bass. I still play guitar and drums but my main gig is bass player for two bands. One Sounthern Rock & Blues
the other a Gospel Group. The Rock group is my main gig two nights a week most of the time. The Gospel group only sings on Sunday some times so it works out.
Wink
 
#37
right after i turned 21, i went to go see this band called the HELLHOUNDS play a local club here in atlanta. this band featured 3 members of the GEORGIA SATELLITES. rick richards, rick price and randy delay. i bought a guitar after hearing their first album came out because i wanted to play guitar like rick richards. after seeing him play 1, and i do mean 1 song, i realized that i would never in 50000 years be as good as him. so i switched to bass because rick price, the bassist, played bass like no one i have ever heard play before or since. also, he played the coolest looking bass i have ever seen, or not seen. he had a dan armstrong plexiglass bass. i had to have one just like his. as much as i like bill wyman, paul mccartney and john entwistle, rick price is the guy that made me want to play the bass. i will never be as good as him either but i can steal from him a lot easier than rr. fortunatley for me after a couple of weeks of seeing every gig that they did, they hired me as a roadi/guitar tech/drum tech. best 5 years of my life. i now am working on an archival project for rick richards. i owe these guys a lot and i am very fortunate that i get to work for my heroes.
 
#38
i bought my first bass in a pawn shop on a purely impulse buy, Fender Mexican P bass, probably about 3 or 4 years ago, kinda played a little here and there, but i was still more focused on guitar (see, the school i went to, no one played guitar, or at least no one talked about it, so it was fine with me to be the only one). played guitar for about 8 years up until last fall, started playing in a 'band' as something to do with someo of my fraternity brothers, realized that we needed a bassist and brought my bass up from home not too long after that. been basically playing bass since then, a little bit of acoutstic 6 string when we play for like 10 people.

the funy thing about when i first started playing bass, i would play through my Marshall AVT50 (guitar amp), which gave me this really odd, kinda retro sound
 
#39
Because I'm a pretty big guy and most guitars look like a damn ukulele when I try and play them. :smug:


Seriously though, like may others I got into bass in high school when some friends and I decided to start a band and everyone wanted to play guitar so I figured I would be different and play the bass. Of course growing up with Rush, Sabbath, Led Zep, and Cliff Burton era Metallica being played in continuous loop by my older brother didn't hurt either!

Shawn
 

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