Articles

Anyone even slightly familiar with Chris Squire’s bass playing style knows he uses a heavy-handed pick, which is part of how he got his signature sound. But it’s also obvious that the Rickenbacker bass he used also played a huge part in that trebly, clacky tone he was able to get. It’s a common belief … Read more

For aspiring bass builders out there, you may be faced with the decision of whether to build a show bass or a performance bass. An example of this is looking at two Warwick signature models, the Bootsy Collins Artist Series vs. the Bootsy Collins Space Bass. We’ll start with the Artist Series model which is … Read more

When you look up any list of “greatest bass players of all time”, James Jamerson will show up, and he’s usually in the top 5. Why is James so highly regarded? It’s not because of being flashy nor the most technically adept. It’s because he knew how to contribute the best possible bass that made … Read more

Some bassists are all about grace and pluck each note in a very delicate way to bring about the cleanest possible bass tone… …but that’s not Lemmy and it never was. Lemmy’s sound is a Rickenbacker bass using only the rear treble pickup with everything turned to 10 and played with a pick in a … Read more

Some of you may be aware of the Billy Sheehan Yamaha Attitude bass model (about $2,600 USD street price at the time of this writing) and have wondered what the benefit of having two outputs on a bass has. As Billy explains in the video below, a lot of it has to do with amp … Read more

Aston Barrett, nicknamed “Family Man” (even before he had children,) is a Fender Jazz Bass player who plays reggae music. Amazingly, he is able to get an incredible upright sound out of the Fender J: Aston is known to use a custom flatwound set of strings. He has said in an interview that custom sizing … Read more

In the video below, Mark King (you know him from the band Level 42) explains that the main reason he has to literally strap tape across his pedals is because he has big cheesy feet. Mark said this, not us. 🙂 However, this begs the question of whether pedals for bassists are really designed right … Read more

Bassist for Sly and The Family Stone from ’66 to ’72, Larry Graham Jr is not only known as being an unbelievably good slap bass player, but is also credited with inventing the technique. Below is a video of what Larry is all about, and he explains that the reason he started thumping the bass … Read more

Duff McKagan, best known as the bass player for the band Guns N’ Roses (he has also been the bassist for Velvet Revolver and Jane’s Addiction, to name a few,) is without question a P-bass player. While true that Duff has played different basses over the years, his preference is a P-bass, whether a Precision … Read more

Verdine White is a bass player that has influenced many other bassists, and is best known for his bass work in Earth, Wind & Fire. He still performs to this day, and over the years his bass rig has changed quite a bit. These days, Verdine plays Sadowsky basses. But according to the video interview … Read more