My Journey To The Bass

Music has played a huge…HUGE part of my life. My mom was very influential in this. She watched MGM musicals all the time, sing show tunes around the house and she even performed off Broadway before I was born. Both of my parents had a MASSIVE vinyl library of eclectic music ranging from Steppenwolf, Crosby Stills & Nash, Santana, Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, various musical sound tracks, Barry Manilow and Bette Midler. Just about any and everything under the sun…old and new, rock, jazz, soft and even some country. I loved the smell of the vinyl. I was allowed to peruse the collection and listen to what I wanted to. I mainly was attracted to some of the cool album covers…hey, I was just a kid. I really had no taste. I remember the some of the covers vividly like the Herb Alpert, the Steppenwolf and the one that started my love affair with music…Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Band.

I remember being drawn to Sgt. Pepper’s due to its vibrant cover. It was also the first album I remember having the lyrics printed in it and there was also card with these paper cutouts of mustaches and badges to dress up like the band. I HAD to listen to THIS album. I have heard of The Beatles and heard plenty of their songs on the radio but every song on this one I had never heard before. This was well before the 80’s and the invention of the “classic rock” radio station. It was nothing like I have ever heard before. It seeped into my very being even though I was just a dumb kid. Later I learned the history of that album and its effect on the music recording industry. Even the Doors that hated the Beatles for being bubblegum pop shit had to take a step back and take notice and pay respect for the masterpiece that Sgt. Pepper’s was. I made a point to seek out any every Beatles album I could. I saw numerous albums in the vinyl collection but I filled in the gaps through the local library by checking them out…over and over.

I had three more albums and few songs that hit me like this later on at pivotal points on my life. Through the mid to late 70’s, the album buying by my parents pretty much stopped and the music input I got was from the radio and my parents kept it mainly on the rock stations and as a result, I did too. I grew bored of what I was hearing over and over. It was the same old shit. Yeah, there were songs that I liked (I really took notice to Bowie) but most of it was banal crap. The new wave moment started with guys like Joe Jackson, The Knack, DEVO (RIP Bob2) but Gary Numan hit me like a ton of bricks with Cars in 1979. Electronic music?!? Hell yeah! I soooo loved that sound. The early 80’s exploded with that new wave sound all over the place. I ate that shit up. However, corporations completely assumed control of all radio and started shoving crap what THEY think YOU should be listening to. All of top 40 became a wasteland of R&B pop with very little rock at all. Fuck Paula Abdul, Mariah Carey, boy bands and everything in between. Now for those albums, let’s investigate those…

At a point in the mid 80’s I was at a party and somebody at the time I vaguely knew from high school but knew was popular comes storming with a girl under each arm proceeds to bring the party to a stop and made an announcement that no party can truly start until Oingo Boingo’s Dead Man’s Party was played. Thank you Jeff Pool, you have had huge impact on my life with that album. Also, this was nothing like what I ever heard before. That shit was never on the radio. Another black mark was dealt for radio that night. Oingo Boingo led to my love of ska music since they heavily borrowed from that sound. Shortly after that in 86, I had a coworker (Mark) drop The Cure’s greatest hits album, Staring At The Sea, in my lap. I just discovered goth music. Again…none of that shit was on the radio. Now I was fully suspicious of the radio. The Cure became my gateway to bands like Bauhaus, Joy Division, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Sisters of Mercy and etc. Of course, those bands reflected the old guard of underground music of the 70’s and strengthened my love and my respect for guys like Bowie, Iggy Pop, Velvet Underground and Marc Bolan. Then the final nail in the coffin for radio was this final album. The man that ended up the best man at my wedding and vice versa, dropped probably the most influential album on me, Nine Inch Nails Pretty Hate Machine in 1989. Another thank you goes out to Chris Szurgot. I ended up recalling Gary Numan had this effect on me with Cars. This level of electronica fused with metal and/or punk with a dash of goth had my head spinning. I went seeking more of this and dove in head first. I love me some industrial music and the various sub genres thereof. Anything from BiGod 20 to Skinny Puppy to KMFDM to Meat Beat Manifesto to Nitzer Ebb to Gary Numan to Ministry to Die Krupps. ALL OF THE INDUSTRIAL MUSIC. 

Yeah, Industrial may be my overall preferred go to genre of music, but I pretty much have a love of most music with some exceptions…country, top 40 shit on the radio, gangsta rap and anything like what shows American Idol is pimping out is ALL crap.




Now…the reason for this long winded opening of this post. Sometime about 20-24 years ago, I started thinking of learning to play an instrument and I was really attracted to the bass guitar. I just like the sound of it and found myself generally humming out the bass lines of quite a few songs or humming out the root note of the chords…which is pretty much what bass players are doing. I had an acquaintance sell me her ex’s POS silver Palmer p-bass and Gorilla practice amp for about $50. I started learning a few things on how to hold it and few basic easy bass lines but had a very hard time learning it even suffering the normal finger blistering and peeling that comes from that. But I was not making any headway and I put it away. Every once in a while, I would pull the bass out of storage and try again. Again, more trouble. Away it went again. I tried again and learned that there were issues with the bass and I learned how to repair the wiring and some body maintenance. Improved the bass and was able to learn a little easier but still had trouble getting it. Away it went again. This went on and off for about 20 years. I even thought to myself a few times that playing may not be cut out for me.

For the past few years, I started making musician friends online and it would come up if I played anything and I would skirt it or say something like “I would love to learn” and etc. This last year, the number of people in bands I talk to online has even grown more. As a result, my interest in the bass cropped up again. I pulled it out of storage, cleaned it up and made a promise to learn the damn thing back in November. At the insistence of Chris Kniker, one of the guys behind Primitive Race, egged me on to pick up a copy of Rocksmith 2014 and swore by it. He nailed it. It has been teaching me quite a bit and my fingers have callused up quite nicely. I ended up picking up the first Rocksmith and some DLC to go with it. I still had issues with that bass however. Now with the internet being full of info now, I did some research and realized that my bass was fucked up with all sorts of issues and learned how to repair those issues. I was able to repair most of them but one was beyond my scope. The neck was so warped and the adjustment of the truss rod could not fix it. The action on the strings took too much effort to fret it right. The bridge was jacked up too and I could not hit the harmonic on the 12th fret even if I adjusted it. However, I kept practicing despite not being able to have the software hearing the notes even though the bass was mostly tuned. The wife saw me getting frustrated and making adjustments after adjustments to no avail. She encouraged me to take it in to get properly repaired or possibly buy a new one.



Due to finances, buying a new one was the way to go and I got a decent Fender Squier PJ Bass. The first thing I noticed that it took nowhere near the effort to get a note played. My hands were much stronger than I thought. The learning took off significantly with the software.

I still need to work on my dexterity and accuracy of my fretting hand but it is getting better every day I practice (which I try to do at least an hour every day). At least my fingers do not burn anymore. I also have been reading up little on music theory and the typical role of the bass play in a band like hit the root of the chords and etc. blah blah blah. I really need to learn how to read sheet music when I get a chance. However, a side effect has come up from learning the bass…I am starting to recognize some of the different types of tuning like E flat, Drop D and standard. I see patterns in everything I am learning and sometimes can have an idea what fret is getting played…not all the time. I am not that good yet but things are looking good.


Now to what inspired to write this post…Tonight I learned a simple song without the assistance of software and did it all by ear. I heard the song GROOVE ME by King Floyd in the car and I immediately thought “Hey, I can I think I can play that.” I fired up the computer and listened to it again and started figuring out the song. After 3 play through attempts, I was able to pretty much nail the song. Because of this seemingly small hurdle clearing, I am feeling VERY confident on how it is going and somewhat accomplished.


Les Claypool, Geddy Lee, Flea, Sting, Victor Wooten, Bootsy Collins, Paul McCartney, John Entwistle, Cliff Burton, John Paul Jones…I am putting all of you on notice. I am coming to join your ranks. I will learn this instrument and WILL be one of the greats like you.