r/Bass

My other thread about home practice rigs got me wondering how many of us bassists handle all the PA/Recording/Monitoring gear for our bands as well. I've always had an interest in that stuff and even pulled a stint as an engineer at a small local studio for a while, so most bands I play in I handle all that stuff if someone else isn't paid to handle it for us.

How many of you are in the same situation? If so, how involved are you? Do you do full-on recording and mixing, or are you just posted up by the board for rehearsal/gig monitoring and occasionally handling FoH if the gig doesn't have their own setup? What's your go-to gear?

Can someone name all the five prog bassists that do not use dingwall?

I've been giving my home rig a lot of thought lately, so home setups are on my mind. And that makes me curious:

• What equipment are you working with?

• How do you have it set up to work better with your bass than with other instruments (specific hardware, plugins, etc.)?

• Do you use it primarily for practice or recording?

• If your home setup is different between recording and practicing, how so?

I have my own rig I'm (mostly) happy with which I'll describe in a comment below, so I'm mostly just looking to get some conversations going. Whatya got?

I'm trying to learn a song that I learned how to play on the guitar by ear, but most of the time the bass is hard to hear in the song, is there a tip on learning bass by ear?

I unashamedly love Adventure Time because it's honestly just a show made with a lot of love, with a good story, and something new to notice every time I watch it.

There are what look to be some Chinese-made versions of Marceline's axe bass on eBay. I know that there are people who make custom ones, but those run into the thousands of dollars. For those of you who know more about such things than me, do you think it's worth the $300ish to grab one of those?

Believe me, if I could justify spending the couple thousand on one of the custom ones I've seen, I would, but I also don't want to buy something that turns out to be miserable to play at that price. I know it's not going to be easy to play, but I have heard it's doable.

I know that there's a good likelihood I'm just buying a $300 novelty, but I would like some opinions before I take the plunge.

Every time I'm playing a song withy bass I lost stamina one minute playing it and I just can't play the note perfecty I'm too tired. How can I improvey stamina?

I plan to buy from a reputable shop with a physical storefront, so I’m not so much worried about scams.

I’m particularly looking for folks’ experiences with customs fees. I’ve read conflicting information that seems to suggest these could cost me anywhere from nothing to 1/3 of the instrument’s value. This would seriously make a difference in how economical it would be for me to make my purchase internationally, so I’m hoping to gather more input from people who have done it before.

I know customs fees would be waived if it were a US-made instrument, but this would not apply to me. I’ve seen a base rate import duty of 8.7% on guitars, which would be doable, but I’m concerned about the potential for courier fees and additional taxes. It seems from what I’m reading that tariffs and other import fees are really applied inconsistently, which is where some outside testimony would be helpful.

Hello guys. I need an advice

I was scrolling eBay and found a listing with Sterling Ray 4, mint color, maple fretboard. It's lightly used based on photos, great condition. The price was 280 euro, I managed to drop it to 200 if I collect it personally. And I promised a guy that I will collect the bass a little later when I will have free time to come and our schedules will intersect. The payment on place.

That's a good price for a lightly used Ray 4, I guess. Considering that the new instrument cost 460 euro here in Germany.

But there's a thing.

About a week ago I've found other listing and eventually I won the bidding. It was a bundle of slightly used PJ Ibanez SR300 FM , Fender Rumble 15, guitar bag, strap, and 2 sets of new EXL 170 D'Addario RW strings.

I got it for 77 euro. And I couldn't believe in that until I collected the bundle from a woman. I will make a separate post about this purchase later.

It's not the best bass, but it simply works. I lowered the string action, turned the truss rod, played with saddles, adjusted Pickup's height and in the end everything is more than fine to play and get better with skills.

I'd like to get the Ray 4. It's not a "super deal" though 200 euro is a very good price.

But do I really need it?

Will it affect my playing? Will it make me better? I think no. Not at this point because I'm a beginner.

And I started to think that this purchase can make it worse than better because 2 bases can be too much for now. The second one can simply distract my attention and I don't have neither too much free time for playing nor the extra space in my room in a dormitory. So 2 bases can literally be too much at this point of time.

Guys, what do you think ? Should I skip this Ray 4 and take everything from my PJ Ibanez? Because everything with that Ibanez went in my favour.

Thanks!

I just fitted a new fender neck on a fender body. I was just wondering if it is ok to leave the bass without putting any strings on it for a few days without damaging the neck/truss rod. I was hoping it wouldnt just because there is no tension on the neck.

I tend to mostly use my (right hand) fingers when playing a 4 string bass.

However, I have a bit of trouble with the narrower string spacing on a 5 string, and I've found that using a pick tends to help with that.

Anyone else do this too?

I've noticed just about everywhere I've found referring to this technique, the three frets are handled by the index finger, the middle finger, and then the ring+pinky fingers combined. However, I've found it significantly easier to fret with index finger, middle+ring fingers combined, and then pinky. Am I a freak? Am I setting myself up for failure?

What is you favorite metal bass line in B standard? I was wondering what bass lines people think are cool and like to play.

I don’t know what to do to improve and I feel like nothing from youtube is communicating to me. I don’t think I know much music theory. I make bass only songs and I know how to (basic-ly) construct a song but I feel like the songs are too simple. How can I become better to where I can make more difficult songs? What could I learn?

Curious

So I am about to buy my first bass and need an amp too.I am between these too amps.Cort M40B is 40 watt 10 inch and is 20% cheaper than Fender rumble 25.But I have some concerns about the quality.Should I just buy the Fender rumble 25?Also how is boss katana mini as a bedroom amp?

Hi, recently I’ve played a pf-500 with a 4x10 and loved it for the sound and weight (I come from an SVT). But after searching a bit on the internet and reddit I’ve read a lot about people having trouble with the amp turning off whilst playing. Is this also the case with a Ampeg 410he? Does everybody have this problem with the amp? And what cab are you using if you have this problem?

I need 3 songs for my audition and I’m lost the school I’m applying to doesn’t care if you know theory before coming to the school as long as you know your instrument. So far I have nuclear burn by brand x down any other suggestions?

Looks like alembic buut its clearly not that.

Hi all, question for you all before I go down the rabbit hole of what gear to buy, etc - I've been a casual bass player for years and am getting back into it, I picked up the new Line 6 bass pod express and I want to send the bass audio from it to my Macbook, but also be able to play along with music and adjust song volume vs. bass volume, etc.

Will garageband do this? Not looking for anything professional, I just want to play along with music and hear my bass playing without cranking the volume on either/both while wearing headphones. I am limited on space so I'm playing electric through the pod to the macbook and out headphones. Not using any amp.

I've mostly played a fender jazz 4 string but have an ibanez 5 string, I just pre purchased a new BTB605 ibanez multiscale bass to try out - I tried a dingwall a few years ago and it looked amazing but holy crap the price tag. If i love multiscale maybe I'll save up for one of those one day. :)

Thank you in advance!

Yesterday during band practice, our drummer put his phone in the center of the room to record ourselves. Just like hearing my own voice in a recording, it's very rough. What bothers me especially is note duration; it feels that I choke notes a little prematurely and that there is some sort of staccato going on, so the bass lines don't sound as smooth as they should. I really try to pay attention to this however, especially when I play a walking baseline so every note lasts it's full extent. I use a little bit of compression while playing in a band and it seems like there's almost no note decay at all. So when I listen to a song, the bass is not fully legato as the notes naturally die out but when I do it, I either hear this premature choking OR everything is fully legato and that's not what I want either. Do you guys have any advice or exercise to work on this issue?