Hello all. I’ve only been playing bass for a week, and at this point am just becoming comfortable with the scales and navigating around the fret board. Josh’s videos have been quite helpful (and entertaining).
As I move up to the next level, I’m wondering if it would be beneficial to invest in a machine to play backing tracks for me to practice with. I’m retired and spend much of my day practicing alone. I’m thinking that it would very helpful if I had backing tracks to play along with.
Would a machine such as the one Josh uses be a wise investment? I’ve seen them on Amazon and they’re quite pricey, so I don’t want to make a hasty purchase.
If so, what machine would you recommend? What does Josh use in his videos?
First of all, welcome to the Forums, @PamPurrs . . .
There are SO many gadgets out there to choose from, but the only experience I have so far is with using YouTube videos as “backing tracks”. I’ve made set lists and play along with those. Many videos also have tabs included so you can see what notes are in the basslines.
I’m sure someone else will chime in with more specific suggestions for you, but in the meanwhile, just focus on the basics. You’re in the right place here, too! Have you signed up for the B2B lessons?
Hey Pam! What kind of backing tracks are you imagining? Something to improvise along with, or just bass lines to bass along with?
If you just want to playalong with some songs, then you don’t need any special playalong tracks, if I were you I would just learn some songs you like to play along with!
And I don’t use any special machine for backing tracks - if such a machine existed, it probably wouldn’t be very good. I record all the tracks I use myself, (except for popular song playalongs) no special machine involved (well, besides the recording gear, and the computer, and all the million other pieces required ).
Definitely don’t spend money on anything until you’re sure you can’t get what you need for free!
The only thing I’ll add to this is the infinite resource that is YouTube. Even Spotify has some backing tracks to play with.
And, again with the plug - I love the Drum Genius app. It’s around $9 to get all the loops, but you end up with a library of really fun drum beats to play with.
I use a program called Band in a Box…you can write your own stuff and choose a hundreds of styles, also enables you to take the bass line out. its $129.00 and if your not familiar with music don’t get it. it will just make you frustrated.
I plan to use Garageband for simple backing tracks. In the past I’ve done some simple composing in it using the massive selection of riffs etc stored in the program, so if you just wanted a drum beat that’s more than a metronome it’s probably a good tool. If you have a Mac then all you need is to get the bass plugged into the Mac - not sure what the score is with a PC. I haven’t identified it yet a budget cable yet.
maybe we should start a thread like “Show your basslines over the B2B tracks”, it would be funny (and would not take as much time as a cover, I think) to do some short bass lines over the tracks we all worked on. I’d love to discover the musical sensitivity of everybody here, and I’m pretty sure we could be surprised with very different bass lines on a same backing track. could be freaking fun. I like music, I like fun, I like you all.
for those who consider as beginner : creating our own bass lines is a big thing in fact. you might think it’s easy, or very difficult … no matter. the point is the real music is here : it’s art, it’s creativity ! create your thing, friends, create your thing ! in my opinion it’s a big step over playing others basslines (covers / lessons / workouts). Again I realize we all here have very different levels and goals with our bass approach (and it’s fine and even very cool) but there is some kind of finality in creating our own basslines, and you all can do it whatever your level. some lines could be very simple (full whole note ? fine !), and this will be perfectly fine because music does not have to be complicated to be good. If you’re not sure : keep it simple, it will work well
anyway I’m not sure at all about the copyright thing or whatever … don’t know anything about this, I just play music
I would love to play along with some classic tracks. I was wondering if there was an app that has the ability to find and download a drum track for any existing song you’re trying to learn
Have you signed up for the B2B lessons?
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