What are you struggling with?

I don’t ever anchor my thumb (I use floating thumb technique) and have found that my plucking fingers automatically follow my fretting fingers, and always magically pluck the same string that I’m fretting. I don’t even have to think about it.
It just takes time and practice.

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struggling with this sh*tty stock pickup on the Plywood BEAD P-thing :

look at the EQing I have to do to make it sound not-too-bad, that’s ridiculous :

… a better pickup is already on the road !

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Wow that’s a lot of mids for a P.

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the high-mids are crazy and there is a weird dynamic behavior in the low-mids. not very easy to work with … the new pickup comes from a MIG Warwick, it must be a much higher quality :grin:

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Yeah depending on the Warwick, they might even be EMG’s.

I like the MECs on my Rockbass, the P sounds nice. Not as nice as a better pickup but certainly fine for stock on a budget model.

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no it’s a MEC but from a MIG Warwick, it’s not the same range than on the Rockbass. anyway I had MECs on my Rockbass at the time and I was pretty happy with them.

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This is the MEC P soloed on my Streamer, dry signal:

that’s on a 3.2kg Carolena Pine bass. It should sound even deeper on the Ply-bass, plus you got a better MEC I am sure, the MIG pickups are way better.

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your MEC P pickup sounds at least 1000 times better than my stock Jim Harley pickup already :grin:

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Yeah they are decent, yours will sound awesome on the heavier body I bet.

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wait and see !

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My struggle today: now I play* two instruments that each have an ocean of shitty, shitty tabs.

I’ve been learning guitar for a total of what, three days now? I know like three chords, and I am already spotting errors in like half the tabs I find for the songs I am looking for. I don’t have to be a guitar hero to know that there is no C# in the C major chord, for example, even if I can’t play that chord yet.

It’s like bass tabs, but twice as bad.

*lol sure I do

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100 times the number of bassists all putting out bad tabs. :rofl: :joy: :rofl:

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Pretty much yeah

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… with more strings and more chords, which brings even more room for transcription mistakes :grin:

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Struggling with very sore fingertips from playing bass. They feel like sandpaper too :joy:
Now it’s my fretting pinky… And I’m still having a very sensitive plucking finger after I peeled off some hardened skin from my fingertop :see_no_evil:

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Except the 5 minute rule I haven’t found my sweet spot either. It’s been bugging me for years, to get a daily routine that works for longer then a week…
Any suggestions?

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Really applying myself to the “pop”. blister on my finger it one thing, knowing its blistered in the wrong place means my technique is bad. Also trying to learn Sweet Emotion, I can get that intro using my thumb to play that A drone but that not what I’m shooting for.

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Still struggling with thumb anchoring which isn’t going to change in the 18 days since I last posted about the same problem, but it is starting to become more annoying now that poor anchoring means poor E/A muting and a lot of unwanted ringing of open strings now that I’m working on scales etc.

Also found that I’m experiencing a LOT of mechanical noise and unintentional hammer-offs once I get to any speed above slow workouts.

I think this is the stage of learning where I’m over the “holy cow I can actually pick up an instrument and play something!” honeymoon and falling into the “holy moly this is tough and it’s really discouraging feeling like I’m going backwards with technique”. Just need to keep plowing through it and stay positive though :slight_smile:

Motivation is another thing I struggle with based on the above. It’s really easy to get demotivated seeing yourself fumble through simple scales and wondering how you’ll ever get it together to play with any semblance of speed. But again – just need to plow through and believe that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel!

I’ll say this: I was ALSO struggling with note retention (in the sense that a lot of notes over a lot of bars would just confuse me and send me packing back to the couch) but once scales and keys entered the picture it’s really nice to know that I don’t need to expect all the notes on the fretboard to be in play, just a certain subset which is way easier to remember than “oh man where am I going to need to move my fingers next??”

Anyway that’s that, thanks for coming to my TED talk :smiley:

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What I’m struggling with is Higher and Higher by Jackie Wilson. It’s my new Billy Jean :grimacing:

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Hang in there @LittleJackal,
Stay motivated,in 6 months time you will look back and say to yourself, how easy is this :thinking:, and you will probably have a laugh at yourself :woozy_face:
All the buzzing, thumb not providing enough strength to allow pressure on E & A will diminish in no time.
Hang in there buddy.
Cheers Brian

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