Save yourself years of frustration and slow learning - here are 20 beginner bass tips I wish I knew when I was starting out.
If you’re doing the Beginner to Badass course, this lesson would fit anywhere in the course, because you’ll be applying most of these tips as you go through, even if you don’t know it!
Spotify Playlist of Recognizable Bass Lines:
Beginner Bass Tips Quotes
Here are some of my favorite nuggets from this video, screenshotted below for emphasis. Feel free to print as a motivational poster.
All really good tips here, I kind of liked the Don’t Do This (leaning the bass up against a table, one of those “It’ll on be for a sec” cases, where, something, like a fall could happen to it), and the No Drinks on Amps, something that started happening when I began playing with others. For some reason, the top of an amp begins to temptingly look like a tabletop to your jam friends, and sometimes even yourself. Doesn’t help that it’s about to vibrate a lot at high volume either, lol.
Luckily no accidents, but there were some almosts, which made me follow those 2 rules all the more closely and strictly!!
You had it in your list, but essentially “don’t beat yourself up”…way too hard on ourselves and you do miss the progress. BTW, love the matrix overdub at the end
Two of my favorites! Sometimes I can work on a song for several days, but for me I find that’s what works best. When I find a song that I wanna learn I listen to it numerous times and then use Transcribe! to break it down into small bitesize practice pieces that I can select to work on as I learn the song’s baseline - probably one of the most used apps I have when it comes to learning to play music… @JoshFossgreen does mention it at the end of the B2B course if I remember correctly… Wish I’d purchased it when I was going through the course though - may have helped with some of the lessons…
Great video again
Will check out that playlist. I immediately started actively trying to listen to the bass in songs after starting to learn but as Josh says it’s not always easy and I trust the playlist is a good starting point.
Overall great reminders.
About the guidance tip: Not sure where to even start looking for a teacher… Maybe the same place I found the band I joined as I would prefer a teacher I can meet. I at least keep my eyes open.
I have done one on one’s with teachers before and always found it intimidating. I hated doing it and it killed all enjoyment of playing and learning. Just mentioning this to remind everyone that there is no one size fits all approach to learning bass. Find what works for you.
