Bass Mistakes That Are SLOWING You Down 

Yuuup truth

Grow dreads, people will just assume you know what you’re doing

@@andreaholcock8992 totally.

@@andreaholcock8992 or that you ignore basic personal hygiene

😂😂😂😂

Ooh I like that

now he is going to use that in a video i'm calling it

All credits go to Mr. Jeff Slepak, he’s a pretty nasty trombone player too

perfect practice makes perfect:)

That's hands down the best advice I've ever heard

Didnt knew that you also play bass!!!

My brain works better with patterns than remembering note names. I'm not a great player yet by any means, but I do see my progress speed up when I focus on memorizing the feel of a few bars at a time before moving to the next few.

Nononono! What you're saying might be a useful skill to a limited degree. However, real music is alive, don't play like a robot. The trick is to always inject your feeling, your heart, soul and emotion into every note of every bass line, so that you're never playing the same thing the exact same way twice in a row. Even if you play the exact same notes/pattens as before, it should still always be alive and "new"!

@@vigorouslethargy same for me! I like to break things down into sections but between less-than-accurate sounding earbuds and a very beginner-ish ability to feel a song's rhythms and notes, I'm not the best at translating or improvising certain songs. At least the Songster tabs app has forced me to really get the pace of a song right and little by little come up with a fingering that works. Depending on how hard the song is to learn, I might grab a small portion of notes/ryhthms that one way or another repeat in a pattern and work on playing that slowly until it's right, or I might find a slightly easier song to learn. I've noticed when doings this way that sometimes my brain just needs to "sleep on it" so I might give my bass a rest for a day or a few hours. Call it what you will, but I more often than not come back to the bassline more capable of running through the whole song than before. To further test myself, I'd record the track with a microphone app and play along, and keep on trying until I got it right. 🤷‍♂️ if anyone out there can see this whole method as a way to create unhealthy habits or something, do let me know. For now it's the best I can do as someone who works all day everyday except for some free time on the weekends. That's my spill, cheers.

I work best by remembering the key, then scale degrees and nuances like runs and slides. I do try to stick to one fingering for the most part, but it’s not set in stone. Being flexible that way makes it so much easier when the song changes key, or even if the band wants to do it in another key. I also think it’s a good idea to change it up occasionally, just to remain flexible and be open to ideas. If I learned it by fingering alone, I’d be screwed.

I'm autistic too, been playing bass since I was 17. Your description made me understand why I like Josh's lessons, and I'm sure his soft, kind demeanor helps me too.

Samesies! I’m about to buy a bass myself and these lessons are helpful for preparing

@@Readydaer omg do it! 🤩 I got songster app for the tabs to kinda see what's up with the fingers and strings. I'll have to write down the tabs to remember them. RU-vid let's you slow videos to 75%, it's choppy but works. Then I bought songster to get BT audio and speed reduction. I totally love my Ibanez bass... Everyone who hears it say it's the cleanest bass they've heard. You're welcome to follow me and ask questions on my newb bass stuff. I probably won't know what but I can at least say what I did.

@@iflifewaseasy I see, thanks for the info!

im autistic too this is exactly why i like his videos omg!

Congrats on starting bass!

Good on learning theory in high school! I waited until I was a college student, and literally everyone else in class knew more than I did. But I can honestly say that what I learned in my music theory classes has stayed with me for the rest of my life. I'm almost 70 years old now, and being able to THINK in music and COMMUNICATE in music has made my life richer than it would have been without it. Oh, and I started playing bass about a week ago, too!

I second this opinion.

Third. It's awesome!

You’re just Josh’s close family members. 😊 It’s good to hear buyer satisfaction rather than buyer remorse.

Hahaha, I really enjoyed this one, and it was amazingly helpful. I'm definitely getting the course.

My Son is almost done with the course, anybody have anything or anybody else to recommend to up his bass game even more?

School of Rock made it look easy

@@davidapodaca6827 aye that’s facts

I wish😭

Yeah, it might look easy, but try and play like Jaco Pastorius!

The way I see it bass is much harder because it has to be perfect. You can slop around on guitar and get away with it easy. Bass has to hit firm, and correct, every time.

And how much he has made us improve too :D

Thanks Nyx!

@BassBuz_Official Sounds good but not sure what to do…help!

Glad this was helpful Manuel!

Thanks for the support, rock on!

Good to hear!

Glad you're getting back into the course! 🤘

Nice, welcome to the bass family Scott!

Thank you! Will do. :)

Sometimes I will change up fingers back and forth during a song due to cramping or hand strain. Billy Jean is a good example of playing the same riff for 5 minutes without much of a break. I alternate between my ringer finger and pinky.

@@jayfoghino5392 I'm not a specialist but I got some of these too, I tried pressing less harder and it hurts way less

Nonstop octave jumps would do that to me. What helped immensely was fine tuning the neck and lowering the action. And trying different positions on the strap.

:P

Thanks Yota, welcome to the bass family!

You're welcome, glad they're helpful! :)

Thanks Ronald, enjoy the rest of the course!

Totally! So much less exciting at first though. :P

Totally! He's written a lot of great stuff.

good to hear that you love theory .. i'm a long time pro ( keyboard - bass and sax ) who studied theory from jazz and classical pov my request for you as to help me be a better teacher . Can you go into more detail as to how theory helped you ? btw I read much theory - some of modern theory i think is off putting to students . i'm not a fan of the way modes are taught . anyhow any details on how theory ( what aspects of theory ) has helped ?

Thanks Rory!

You're welcome Chris!

Thanks Guilherme!

GAS alleviator - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Nx2vmNGfKlw.html

Just hope he can make it to future shoots in time! His commute takes hoooouuurrsss.

Thanks José, I appreciate the support!

Thanks Mark!

Yes, I was also looking forward to this list. Thank you!

Added, thanks!

You are AWESOME Josh. I truly appreciate all the hard work you do to help people get better!

Yep, a few deliberate noodles can definitely work as a warmup! Thanks David.

I agree with noodling first. If you’re not warmed up enough to do a familiar noodle, you’re not ready to take on something unfamiliar yet.

Yes, it's important to go beyond the needs of the band. Some stuff stays personal but now and again you can bring something to the band that you wouldn't otherwise have thought of. Even if it's an "only play what's on the record" covers band you could still bring new songs that the others might not have thought of.

Haha, thanks Rena, and tell your daughter I'm sorry :P

Thanks Ken, glad I helped get you on the bass!

Once you can play Teen Town, time travel is child's play. :P

Thanks Rick!

Thanks Michael!

Thanks Diego!

Thanks Allan!

Thanks Jeff!