I will keep trying both. Yes, seems to be helping. Thanks Josh. Love this format of lessons and forum!
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I’m struggling with my fretting hand when doing the major scale improvisation exercise (C major, 15th fret). I’ve revisited the lesson a few times, but I can’t seem to find a comfortable position for my fretting hand.
I think my issue mostly revolves around what to do with my thumb on the back of the neck. The bass neck really squares off where it meets the body, and I have no idea how to comfortably play around that or the body of the bass.
It’s a plain P Bass, so no weird body shape or neck shape, I’m just not used to playing up at the 15th fret and could use a little guidance.
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Hey @taylor215, everybody feels weird on those frets at first (myself included).
What helps me (especially with the Fender neck block) is to let my thumb trail behind my hand (left photo), rather than be behind my fretting fingers (right photo).
Tried to take a photo for you with bass in hand but couldn’t figure out an angle that made sense of thumb and fingers at the same time, so hopefully that’s still helpful with a little imagination sprinkled in! 
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That makes perfect sense. I tried again today and looked at my left hand behind the neck when it felt awkward. It looks like your thumb is staying more perpendicular to the neck, whereas mine was completely parallel. I think that may be a part of why it felt like such a stretch for me. I didn’t have much time to practice today, so that’s something I’ll have to work on tomorrow or this weekend.
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I think what @JoshFossgreen is saying @taylor215 is to hold yourthumb like the pic on the left, so it trails behind your hand and fingers , and not right behind your fingers. Actually you will and should find your thumb in different positions up and down the neck. If you try to keep it centered behind your fretting fingers all over the neck you will probably injure your wrist or something trying to get to every string / fret. There is a link to a YT vid explaining this in another thread. Maybe @howard can add it to this thread as well.
The early Adam Neely vid?
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This video is sooo awesome and helped me a lot!
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Yeah like I mentioned in the other thread, this along with Josh’s advice on microshifting probably saved me from a RSI.
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@JoshFossgreen I’m getting stuck on the turnaround, I seem to stop every time that I come to the last bar. When I play with more than four bars I dont have the problem.
The double dot and the thin and thick line at the end of the bar seems to make me pause momentaraly. Then about two beats in I gather my wits and catch up but it means I lose a bit. I’m on 39/109 and have been on module five for over a week. Josh I admire your patience as I replay each exercise many times 
. Good thing is that I dont try to catch up anymore, I just fall into the beat.
My friends advice was practice practice practice, yes I have mean friends, you can5 expect much from guitarit friends.
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I wonder if anyone else can help with the above. I can play it blindfold, the minute I go to play along with @JoshFossgreen I’m still pausing for two beats. Perhaps no one else has had this problem.
I get it that you can skip a difficult lesson and come back to it, however it is the same again.
Sorry to repeat the same question but I’ve been a week on it and I’m beginning to think that I’m crap.
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Update, after searching turnaround problems on the interweb. I’m not having turnaround problems as it means something else. I have no idea 
what to look for. I have read every technique post and yet to discover what it is called. I have put @JoshFossgreen on my two previous posts but to no avail. If anyone can tell me what I’m looking for it would be a great help. Perhaps with me asking the wrong question, I’m not getting any replies. I don’t mind if you just guess the answer. I’m as shit on the computer as I am on the bass. Fingers crossed someone gets this message in a bottle. If I don’t get any answers then my next post will be headed with a bass picture on the gear section. Fast answers always on those subjects 
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I’m having trouble understanding what you mean. Which module/lesson are you referring to?
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Do you simply mean the repeat symbol in sheet music trips you up?
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Are you referring to a particular song or lesson, @Jamietashi or are you just saying that watching the music bars, or tabs give you a mental brain freeze?
If it’s a song / Lesson, which one? 39? Or more then just. 39?
If watching it messes you up, I would simply say, memorize the notes, and don’t use the tabs or visual cues, instead look elsewhere and use audible clues.
I don’t know if I am helping (hope so) or not, so if you can maybe give some more specific details, we can try to assist further
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Yeah, sometimes, because of the way my brain processes new things, I can either a) understand what Josh is saying/playing, and I’m ok, but sometimes I have to b) pause the vid, get my head around in my own way, play it a bit till I’m happy (I’m not watching the screen at this point - I’ve turned away), then resume the vid.
The double dot and the vertical line makes me think you momentarily stumble at that point because it’s new? (Totally guessing here).
When I first came across that, it threw me a bit too, because I couldn’t “see” all the music that needs to be played from start to finish. So I just wrote it all down. So on the piece of paper I had -
[notes / bars from the first section here] [notes / bars from the first section here as well] [final section of the notes/bars here]
So it was all laid out - and I had to keep saying to myself, “You’re doing it like this because you have to repeat the first section twice before moving to the second section”, so I understood why I was doing this.
Does that make any sense? Or even related to your issue?
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@eric.kiser I did not know what I was asking, humble apologies.
@T_dub module 5 lesson 2 but was holding everything else back.
@howard You are a genius or a mind reader, you got it in one. That was what I was trying to explain badly. I saw this reply when I woke up 07:30 GMT. I could have given you a hug It now makes sense. Doh!
In trying to find a solution I had written the notes of the riff twice on one line of tab so that I had eight bars on the line. I could then play the eight bars through without losing the two beats. I even went back to BJ and I didn’t have the problem, I skipped lesson 2 and tried M5 lesson 3 and I got the same problem.
So a big thank you to all of you B2B Grads for your help.
I’m now going to see if it was a mental block.
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Yay! Glad that helped.
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I think we were replying at the same time @quadfather yes exactly, that’s the same thing with me. Knowing the names of things makes a big difference. I just saw the repeat signs as Stop signs.
With my new found knowledge, I’m going to see if I can crack it.
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No apologies necessary. I’m just glad you got what you needed to keep moving forward.
I went through the same thing when I did that lesson and I went through it again every single time a lesson came up that used it. I don’t think we’re alone in that. 
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Thanks Eric, I don’t feel alone now. I read every technique question on the forum, I learned A LOT doing so, that’s a positive.
I’m sure Josh must have covered it in one of the lessons but I was probably in too big of a rush to listen properly. @eric.kiser
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