So about 13 months ago i was looking to do something more with my friends and they were looking for a bass player. They had a 3 piece that was doing mostly Rock covers for fun and a once a year thing with other friends in bands. Nothing for money. The bass player wanted to do rythm and lead guitar with his dad who was the singer and doing guitar as well. So they started showing me how to play there songs.
At that time i grabbed the Bassbuzz class and started going thru the lessons, i still havent finished lol. Between those lessons and them showing me how to play the songs i slowly started learning.
My first epiphany moment was when i realized that i could play fast enough to music i had written down to keep up with the band. So i memorized at least one position for every letter and all the open strings so that i didnt have to think about it. The guys were teaching me very basic versions of the songs and so it made this pretty easy to write down. No moving around the frets. So this allowed me to add 2-4 songs every month. It took the lead a couple sessions to get with this setup, he has been playing his whole life and just âknowsâ how to do it, but once i showed i could keep up he went all in and would even have songs written out for me. Although there were still times when i would call him out , âdude, 6 months, i have been playing for 6 months, cut me some slack.â
One of the tools i really started enjoying to use for figuring out songs is songsterr.com, not only for finding TAB but the ability to loop just a specific section over and over. For instance the beginning bass solo on sweet child of mine. Man, i go to sleep hearing that in my head lol
One thing that really helped was that we practiced every Sunday afternoon and i would practice for a little bit at least a few times each week before that. Our brains are funny and weird. Like you feel like your just doing the same thing every time you practice and nothing is changing or happening and than all of the sudden it just clicks and your like âwhy did i have problems with these easier songs beforeâ.
That was my second aha! moment. For some reason in going thru some tutorials for Hotel California, which should have been super intimidating with 8 chords and tons of hand movements, for the first time saw a song as the patterns you go thru. All 8 of chords were this same L shape i was seeing. I didnât have to memorize a hundred things i just had to remember the order of the letters and do the same shape over and over. And now it has made every song i learned before it seem like baby songs and i want to go back and relearn them the âcorrectâ way.
So keep practicing, you are doing something, you are building up your skills even if it doesnât seem like it at the time.
So after a year of practice I had my first âconcertâ in front of 17 other bands and there families at a private event. Was so nervous, everyone is so much better and will know how the songs are supposed to be played. But thatâs not the reality, people are there to have fun and enjoy the music. I had to keep telling myself that band practice is for perfection, playing live is for having fun.
Had a few issues with the monitors, i couldnât hear myself well enough and they couldnât turn me up anymore so during the second song i just slowly walked backwards until i was closer to the bass amp stack and made my own âmixâ.
We got thru our 1 hour set and it was great. Couple mistakes but we had practiced enough together that we didnât stop and just kept on playing. Talking to the other bass players over the next day or two, they were very kind. Helped me to see that even playing âsimpleâ versions of songs was great.
So i guess im a bass player now lol
I had stopped the Bassbuzz lessons once i could keep up with the guys, but im pumped up again, need to go finish those lessons!