There was no volume issue with the bass guitars themselves. But I started doing the recording and during that time my girlfriend went to sleep. I wanted to finish but not keep her from sleeping so I turned the master volume down and I tried to dial it in at the same volume with gain settings of my mic. Also it isn’t as bad as I thought at the time. It’s not as loud as a youtube video that has been edited but not as quiet as I deemed it to be at the time.
I tested my old bass yesterday, the beginner modell and by now the Cort is out of the race. I’m noticing more and more little things that I don’t like about the Cort and It may be that I’m just used to it but even the beginner bass felt better playing than the Cort. I reached a state where I’m like: “And I liked this thing? What’s wrong with me?”
The differences are very small and it’s not like “oh this one is an awesome bass and this one sucks and I would never wanna play it.” but it makes it easier for me if I stretch the range to min/max anyway when talking about it. Anytime I make a comparison between the two or three it usually is more of a detail and/or preference thing.
But I gotta say… The neck on the Cort just looks and feels a bit cheaper compared to both my other basses. I’m probably wrong… but I had a closer look and it’s not even where the frets are build into the neck. You can see and feel unevenness on the neck. I don’t on my beginner bass and of course not on the ESP.
Edit
I noticed I called the ESP already “my” bass. I take this as a sign that I internally already made the buying decision. Which is good because I wanted to return one tomorrow
Better resale value too if you sell it down the line. Someone else has already taken some of its depreciation hit, whereas the Cort, you’d be taking that hit
No but @howard has brought up a great point. Maybe not what I had considered before. Buying a used higher spec bass that’s in Good condition will always get your Money back. This is what @T_dub is doing, buying selling and upgrading his core bass gear.
Jamie
Yes. I already got that recommendation from my thread asking for help chosing a bass and it is a great recommendation. In fact I probably also will only buy used from now on.
Except maybe when I made some kind of software that made me super rich. Then I buy a new and fully customized and as upgraded as possible Herr Schwarz. Let me have my dreams.
I love the Used market, and like @Jamietashi said, I have been fortunate to find gems for great prices, and flipping a couple allowed me to upgrade one to the exact one I wanted to upgrade to at the time. That one happened to be new, but it’s because it was the model and color I wanted, I have only ever seen this modes up for sale one time, and it was the way wrong color for me. So, buying new is not horrible if you know it’s what you want. Plus, it was only a $300 Bass new, so it’s not like it would be much savings if I found it used.
I do love the used market tho, and this Covid lockdown has been a great buyers market. Like stock, I may get others to hold until it’s a sellers market again. Lol
I’m still working on the song, but if I have any tips its to mainly practice, practice, practice. I use the Billie Jean line to warm up my fingers everyday with a metronome or drum loops, and slowly increase my speed. I start with 90 bpm, then 100 bpm, then 110 bpm… however the original speed of 117 bpm is still out of my reach.
I notice when I’m playing I tend to lift up my fingers too much, so there always the release harmonic twang sounds, especially in the E - C# - B transition. To counterattack this, when I move my index finger from the D string to the A string I’ve been trying to lift it less, and “shift” it over more so there is less of a sudden release of the D.
Yes. I’m also having the problems with flying fingers. I am currently trying to add Step 3 into my finger technique practice exercise so I get my flying fingers under control.
Another thing I noticed is that my right hand is too angled and that causes more fret buzz than If I did it right, meaning the fingers coming down to the string in a relative straight line. Also it’s a bit harder to control dynamics precisely with my angled right hand approach I think. Not sure about the last point.
I have a problem with my pinky that I haven’t heard about from anyone.
My pinky is happy to participate, but whenever it goes down on the fretboard, my middle finger reaches out to the ISS.
So… when I play a major triad arpeggio, and the pinky lets go, the middle finger has to come down fast… and it comes down hard! as in “don’t bother plucking that string” – it’s the hammer-on from hell, waking the hood up!
I have it the other way around.
Pinky goes down, middle goes up.
Yours sound more annoying to deal with. For me it’s just effectiveness that’s lost I think.
Another tip I found helpful is when you play the higher shift of the bassline (bars 5 & 6 in the notation), the first time you end the loop (bar 5) hold the F# with your ring finger; however the second time you end the loop (bar 6) hold the F# with your pinky, so its easier to transition back to the lower shift of the bass line (bar 7).
Ahh, yea I have a big problem with fret buzz. I’m sure a bunch of it is my fault, however I am playing on a super old beat up (free) bass so I think I need to get the action adjusted and frets aligned. Been trying to tweak the action myself, not sure how successful I am, lol!
Although the clerk in the shop told me he usually sets the action up so the strings are a little bit curved like the fretboard. I’m not sure I like it that way yet. I am still experimenting a little. Even with me experimenting - the video helped me a lot.
Still not sure it’s the same but I gotta say I’m not at arpeggios yet so the different shape might make a difference. I can mainly speak for how I play billy jean and the finger exercise with my current skill and there I observe:
If the pinky is up already and I lift the ring finger the pinky wants to keep the distance to the ring finger and goes further away from the fretboard. Really hard to control for me and what I am currently bite-sizing.
I can keep my middle easily on the fret doing the finger exercise. However if I play billy jean and literally don’t fret anything with the middle finger then I am constantly flipping the bird - the middle finger is almost completely straight. That I find very hard/currently next to impossible to control.
I never had a problem with my middle hammering or even going down on the fretboard when I lift my pinky so I don’t know why it should be the same!?
I don’t even use my ring finger for the most part, play it with 2 fingers, index and pinky most of the time. Once in a while I add the ring finger to help prevent fatigue, but only here and there just for a quick break
