Bass Guitar Advice

[Dragunai]

Hola and Bonjour!

Recently I have taken a new found love and interest in the bass guitar.
I got one for my birthday yesterday and Sat in my room for like an hour practising some of the riffs I learned from my music teacher.

I am progressing well I am pleased to say, getting my speed on the fret board up sharpish.

The reason for this thread is asking the experienced musicians who hang out on this forum for any advice on actual full songs I should be trying to learn to get a real foothold on the instrument.

I am considering the songs:

Feel Good inc - Gorilaz
Animal I have become - Three days Grace

with the possibility of 7 Nation army.

I currently have a rough version of the tabs for the solo in "The Chain" by Fleetwood Mac and love the full song (having only learned about it recently haha) and have been practising it.

But any songs that you guys found to be good to learn on going from newbie onwards would be awesome and well appreciated.

Dragunai

 

[Palindromes]

I've actually been getting into playing electric bass myself. I currently play upright in a formal orchestra but I've started to lose my love for the music.

My suggestions is to just play some music you want to learn. Find the sheets for songs you enjoy and learn them, I have no doubt it will make you want to play bass more. It was easier for me to just pick up and play though because of prior experience, thought I find myself shirking my oractice time on upright and focusing more on trying to play John Myung's bass line in Metropolis Part 1.

 

[similar.squirrel]

Somewhat tricky at first, but it's extremely gratifying to play.

Again, not the easiest thing to nail right off the bat, but you will feel awesome when it happens.

I hope you like Muse, otherwise this is just embarrassing. Chris is a bassist par excellence.

 

[Dragunai]

I dont hate Muse, just dont distinctly go out of my way to listen to them.
Hmmm.

Think I might stick with blink 182, Greenday, Offspring and sum 41 (all the classic stuff)
They seem to be popular choices amongst newbies and I do like their music quite a lot.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

Well, play stuff you enjoy. Other than that, there are some pretty cool and fairly simple Rage Against the Machine basslines, I've always found them fun to play.

 

[Berethond]

Learn the groove from Chameleon.
You will become more powerful in the way of the bass than ever before.

 

[Raven's Nest]

Some of the first basslines I learned were:

Nirvana - "Come as you are" + "Smells like teen spirit"
Green Day - "Basketcase" + "Longview"
Rage Against The Machine - "Bomb Track" + "Killing in the Name"
Limp Bizkit - "Re-arranged"
Linkin Park - "Crawling"
Muse - "Bliss" + "New Born" + "Plug in Baby" + "Muscle Museum"


Ah the early days of Nu-Metal...

Some of these are easy, some are quite tricky but they should make for some great targets and will help develop your technique just by trying... I still find some of them really satisfying to play...

 

[BonsaiK]

The reason for this thread is asking the experienced musicians who hang out on this forum for any advice on actual full songs I should be trying to learn to get a real foothold on the instrument.

I play bass, professionally. I've been doing it for longer than a sizeable majority of people on this forum have been alive. My advice:

Learn songs you like. Doesn't matter what, as long as you enjoy it, that's the main thing. Don't learn songs because you think it would be "good for you", learn songs because you really want to be able to play those songs. If you start learning certain music because you "think you should" rather than because you want to, that's a sure-fire way to lose passion for what you're doing. It will start to seem like work, and then you'll give up. The way to stay motivated is to keep things interesting, so learn the stuff that interests you the most. That's all.

 

[aLivingPheonix]

I'd say find a song you genuinely like, and learn that. If you try to learn something you don't want to, just for the sake of it, you'll lose interest. Trust me, it happened with me and guitar.

But, still, this song has a fucking awesome bass rift.

 

[Dragunai]

Ok, cool.
Thanks for the advice guys.

Think Im gonna add Incubus to my list. Thats good chill out music and most of the songs Ive hard by them are pretty slow (so not too punishing on a newbie I would imagine hahah)