Introduction:... Transcription: Sing A Song Taking It To The Woodshed Beginner s Corner: Another Brick In The Wall...

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2 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction:... 3 Transcription: Sing A Song... 5 Taking It To The Woodshed Beginner s Corner: Another Brick In The Wall Blues For Bass Column Time And Groove Column Review - Beginner Slap Bass with MarloweDK Offers For FB&B Subscribers First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

3 INTRODUCTION Welcome to Issue 171 of First Bass And Beyond. Wow - it s only 11 days to Christmas. Seriously this year has flown by for me! Please don t forget that there will be no issue between Christmas and New Year - so Issue 172 is published on the 21st December and Issue 173 will be published on the 6th January. (There will however be some extra bass goodies in your stockings ;) ) This week s main transcription is the bass line to Sing A Star by Earth Wind And Fire. As I said last week, we ve covered a lot of blues rock recently - and the Blues Column is set to run for another 12 columns, so we ll cover a bunch more there. But in the main transcriptions we ll move away from blues rock to either rock, or funk and soul. And Verdine s bass line to Sing A Song is definitely worth looking at. In the Beginner s Corner this week s line we ve got Pink Floyd s Another Brick In The Wall. This is simple - but it s also played in Drop D tuning so it gives those of you who ve never used Drop D a chance to try it out. Column 18 of the Blues column looks at another staple of the Blues Repertoire - it s Stormy Monday as originally envisaged by T Bone Walker. The theory column I talked about won t start this week...i got some great feedback last week and I m just planning on the best way to take this forward. So we have Time and Groove 10 - which features a really interesting exercise involving switching from one rhythmic pulse to another. How To Contact Me If you ve got any questions you can me directly. My address is: paul@how-to-play-bass.com Or you can post on my Facebook Page, which you ll find here: Com/ First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

4 Please note that whilst my Facebook How To Play Bass page is always open, I have started paring my personal Facebook page down to just close friends and family. Please don t be offended if I ve unfriended you from Facebook...I m having to prioritize my time to remain productive and this is one of the things to help me do that. Anyway, if you re on Facebook you can find me on the How To Play Bass Dot Com facebook page - so don t hesitate to stop by and say Hi! Have a great week. Paul 4 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

5 TRANSCRIPTION to SING A SONG by EARTH WIND AND FIRE - bass by VERDINE WHITE Sing A Song by Earth Wind and Fire features a great bass line by Verdine White. When Verdine was in his prime he came up with dynamic bass lines that both drove the songs forward, contained interesting subtleties of rhythm, and also managed to use the melodic range of the bass and add in some high end fills that never disrupted the groove or the song. Whenever I ve had to learn EW&F lines for gigs I ve always enjoyed the challenge and the experience - and some of those lines have been featured in previous issues of FB&B. September and Boogie Wonderland spring immediately to mind. And I also transcribed Got To Get You Into My Life too. Sing A Song is another from Verdine s playbook of great lines - at heart it s a mid tempo tune with a predominantly 8th note bass line. But it s a great study of subtle rhythmic and melodic variations - as we ll see in the Woodshed column! Here s how the bass line lays out: Letter A - Intro Letter B - Verse Letter C - Chorus Letter D - Horns Letter E Verse Letter F - Chorus Letter G - Horns First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

6 Letter H - Chorus Letter I - Outro As always, the tab reflects my fingering system, hand size and scale length. If any of these differ for you - the probability of which is high - then feel free to change the tab positions around to suit YOUR playing system, hand size and bass length. 6 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

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16 TAKING IT TO THE WOODSHED - SING A SONG As I mentioned in the intro to the main transcription, Sing A Song has an inventive bass line that features some subtle variations. Studying how the professionals do variations will give you some ideas of how YOU could do it. This column will hopefully give you some ideas you can take to your practice area. Firstly, here s the main four bar groove with the chords superimposed so that you can program this segment with Band In A Box, Garageband, Cubase or whatever program you use to create backing tracks. What I suggest you do is learn this first - you could even do some of the exercises with this groove that we ve done in the recent Time And Groove columns! (And the exercises we ve done in that column should be done with other grooves...not just the three grooves I ve based the column on). Here s a simple variation - what I suggest you do is compare each of the variations with this main groove to see what Verdine White is doing: In this variation, the 4th bar is where the variation happens - what you get is a sustained note followed by a pair of 16th notes that lead to the next target note (E) and then an immediate interval drop to the low E. 16 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

17 Let s look at another variation: In this variation the 8th note pulse is maintained in the first two beats of bar 4 - and then a subtle rhythmic figure is used on Beats 3 and 4 to drive the band towards the next main downbeat. Here s another variation: This variation has got a melodic fill in Bar 2 - plus there s also that 8th note rest at the beginning of Bar 2. Not only does that 8th note rest allow Verdine to shift position to play on the higher end of his fretboard, it also clearly delineates between Bars 1 and 2 AND it also interrupts the listener s attention because all of the previous play throughs of this progression prior to the appearance of this variation in the tune don t have the 8th note rest. So it gets the listeners attention - which is a great way to set up a melodic fill like this. Verdine repeats this use of space at the start of Bar 4, and follows it up with a 16th note rhythm before an 8th note pattern brings in the next section. Here s another variation with some interesting space in it: 17 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

18 In this variation, Beats 1 and 2 of bar 4 are played as rests - which again is unexpected to the listener...find this section in the transcription and follow along with the original track and hear how effective it is. (Paul s Note - as I ve studied bass more deeply in the last few years I ve come to regard rests as something you need to think of playing. Rather than not playing and leaving space. So if I ever say play a rest here - and you think that sounds a little strange, that s why. If you start treating rests as an integral part of bass line creation, and as another tool in the bass player s toolbox, you ll get far more mileage out of them!) Here s the final variation I m going to present in this column: This variation uses both the melodic fill in Bar 2, and space in the 4th bar combined with an increase in rhythmic activity. How To Use These Variations The first thing you need to do is set up a practice track that you can play along to. I often recommend Band In A Box - there are other tools that you can use with similar effect. I don t care what tool you use to create these tracks...but use something. Learn how to create backing tracks with rhythm and chords on. The technology is there...use it. Then you need to treat each variation as its own groove - and learn to 18 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

19 play each groove so thoroughly that you can play them effortlessly at performance tempo. When you can do that, you can try playing through multiple repetitions of the groove with your backing track and do mechanical exercises like play the original groove, followed by Variation 1, followed by the original groove, followed by variation 2 and so on. Swap the variations in and out with each other. Then do the same - but use one of the variations as your main groove. You can also create some of your own variations - e.g. combine the melodic fill with a new bar 4 variation. And swap this into the groove. This should give you a good sense for incorporating variations into your groove. Taking This To The nth Degree Create your own four bar groove to a different chord progression. Lift it from a transcription. Or create it yourself using Deliberate Composition. And then create 5 or 6 variations. And then start cycling through the variations as I just suggested with the Sing A Song groove. And do it with another groove. And another groove. When you ve done it multiple times then try this. Pick one of your grooves - even the Sing a Song groove if you want to - and start again. This time you re going to slow the track down to 60 BPM. This is to give you thinking time. Set the track running and do this - play the groove as is three times unaltered. And on the fourth time introduce a variation that you ve not worked out before hand. The work we ve done earlier in the column should give you plenty of ideas how to do this. Don t worry if your variation is only a minor departure from the main 19 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

20 groove you ve established. That s fine - what s important is that you re coming up with that variation on the fly and it is not pre-ordained. If it sounds crap, don t worry - immediately go back to the main groove and play that three more times and then on the fourth time introduce another variation. And keep going. When you get more confidence - and feel you are doing better - introduce variations on every second four bar section. DO NOT INCREASE THE TEMPO from 60 BPM until you can introduce variations every second time and feel comfortable. When you do feel comfortable though, pus the tempo to say 65 BPM and start over again. This series of exercises will help you to take a basic pattern and be able to play spontaneous variations in a real world setting at performance tempos. Some Thoughts On This Some simple ways to create variations: 1. Keep the rhythm the same and change one or more of the notes in a short section. Displacing a note - or more than one note - by an octave is one of the simplest ways to create instant variations. 2. Keep the notes the same but adding in - or subtracting - rhythmic units is another simple way to create instant variations. 3. Another simple way to create a variation at the end of a section is to simply climb to a significant approach note (either a dominant approach or an octave approach) that is held for an 8th note or a quarter note and then slide down to the note you re approaching. 4. Studying transcribed bass lines of players who use lots of variations is a great way of discovering principles rather than learning actual notes. 20 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

21 If you learn a specific run you have to practice it a gazillion times in different contexts to employ it effectively. If you learn a principle you can use it in any situation. Caveat The one caveat with all this is that as well as learning how to create variations - and then delivering them with good time and feel - you ALSO have to develop the sensibility and sensitivity to know when to use them, and when NOT to use them. Make sure you communicate with your band mates so you know what THEY expect before trying to wow them with a ton of variations. 21 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

22 BEGINNERS CORNER - ANOTHER BRICK IN THE WALL by PINK FLOYD This week s Beginners Corner is some more 80s pop rock - this week it s the bass line to Another Brick In The Wall by Pink Floyd. This is a pretty straight forward bass line - the one spanner in the works is that you need to use Drop D tuning. D. If you re not familiar with Drop D tuning, this is where you detune your E string to the note If you re not sure how to do it, I prepared a tutorial video a while back that shows you two ways of achieving drop D tuning. You can find that by clicking the link here: If you have a 5 string bass that s tuned B, E, A, D and G then of course you can use the D note found at the 3rd fret of your B string rather than worrying about detuning. Ok, here s the basic pattern for the verse: 22 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

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24 The verse leads directly to the chorus - which once you ve learned the verse won t be much of a challenge for you! Here s what the chorus looks like: And finally there s a 4 bar pattern that repeats underneath the guitar solo: Note: there are a couple of different versions of Brick In The Wall out there...this one is the basic single version. I haven t listened to the longer version for a long time now...but I believe I m right in saying that all the parts you need are contained within what I ve taught so far in this lesson. 24 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

25 The video will be along early next week and there will be a bass less backing track to play along to as well. So watch out for those. One other note - if you ever have to use Drop D tuning live in a gig it s absolutely crucial that you remember to retune after you ve used Drop D tuning on a song! (And ha ha ha - hands up if you ve been guilty of forgetting to do that on a gig!) 25 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

26 BLUES BASS FOR BEGINNERS COLUMN 18

27 BLUES BASS FOR BEGINNERS - COLUMN 18 Introduction In every column I ll restate the Goals of this course: 1) Develop your proficiency in the rhythmic feel known as swing 8th notes. 2) Teach you 30 real world bass lines to songs based on the blues chord progression. These songs and bass lines are going to range from early Rock and Roll (like Chuck Berry) to 60s blues rock (like Cream and Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix) to dudes like Robert Cray and Stevie Ray Vaughan. There are soooo many songs to choose from that we could run this column for the next ten years! Every man and his dog have recorded blues based songs. 3) Extract core vocabulary from those 30 real world songs. 4) Get you to practice that core vocabulary in all 12 keys. (Backing tracks will be provided to help). 5) Get you experimenting with this core vocabulary so that you can jam. In Lesson 18 we re going to do three things: 1. Look at the classic tune Stormy Monday by T-Bone Walker. 2. Extract relevant vocabulary from Stormy Monday. 3. Get YOU to Use that vocabulary in a 12 bar blues - today we re going to look at Blues Form 2 in 4 more key centres - Ab, Db, F# and B. Let s get going. 27 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

28 SONG TUTORIAL - STORMY MONDAY Today s song tutorial is going to be another blues classic - Stormy Monday (or They Call It Stormy Monday). This was originally done by T-Bone Walker and is another blues song that has been covered by lots of different artists. Stormy Monday is a ballad - so there are some interesting lessons about playing a ballad that we ll get into when we get down to the vocabulary section. We re taking a slightly different approach in this column in that I m presenting the whole transcription for you. So here s Stormy Monday: 28 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

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31 Here are some blues ballad playing guidelines that we can adopt based on this transcription: 1. In a ballad the emphasis moves away from the quarter note as the basic unit - and onto the half note. 2. Because our notes are now held longer - and sound on beats 1 and 3, it s vital that we use consonant, chord tone notes for these beats. If you look through the transcription (and cross reference with the vocabulary section) you ll see that roots and 5ths predominate. 3. That doesn t mean that s ALL we have to play though...there are some nice patterns we can lift and add to our ballad vocabulary. 31 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

32 BLUES VOCABULARY PART 18 Stormy Monday can provide us with some good, basic ballad blues vocabulary. Then if you re playing a slow ballad, you can use this basic vocabulary as your starting point and know that your playing is doing the job it s supposed to do. As I said above, playing roots and fifths in half notes is a great foundation. For C7 that looks like this: Here s a variation of that with a lower 5th used: Another nice pattern we can lift for variety is this: 32 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

33 There s a nice triplet run in Stormy Monday too - often used to move from G7 to C7. Here s that pattern transposed to C7: That pattern will also work played up an octave: Those patterns - worked through all keys as with previous patterns - will start to build your blues ballad vocabulary. We ll add to this library with other patterns in future columns. 33 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

34 ALTERNATE BLUES FORMS - BLUES FORM 2 We ve looked thoroughly at the very basic blues form. And I ve shown you various play throughs as well of all those variations. For the rest of the course we re going to look at alternate blues forms. Each alternate form will last over three columns - that s because of the time it takes to render and upload the backing tracks at different keys and different tempos for you to play along to. Plus I ll print a blank music chart for each progression so you can see the chords - and you can use those charts to write in some of your own lines if you want to. Last week we looked at Blues Form 2 - which has the IV chord on Bar 2 and covered it in the keys of C,F, Bb and Eb. This column has the keys of Ab, Db, F# and B. Here s Blues Form 2 in Ab: In F it looks like this: 34 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

35 Here s Blues Form 2 in Db: 35 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

36 Here s Blues Form 2 in F#: 36 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

37 And finally here s how it looks in B: Action Plan As always there s a lot to take in. To paraphrase a saying over our side of the pond: learning the blues is for life, not just for Christmas! Firstly there s Stormy Monday to learn - this is a blues classic...and knowing the classics will help you if you play in a blues band, or go to blues jams. Secondly, there s the vocabulary suggested by Stormy Monday. This vocabulary can be used to give you some basic patterns to play any ballad blues in any key. Obviously YOU have to do the work and practice in all 12 keys, and do all the things we ve talked about, and practice playing through the different forms of the blues in all 12 keys. 37 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

38 Thirdly, we ve got a variation of the blues form. This week it s presented in 4 key centres, so all the practice you ve been doing up to now can be repeated with these new tracks. Next week we ll add the last 4 key centres with this version of the blues. The most important things that you can do are: 1) Practice thoroughly so you assimilate a library of authentic pieces of vocabulary (both melodic and rhythmic) 2) Try out that vocabulary with backing tracks to simulate the real life playing of blues in a jam scenario. Don t be afraid to start really slowly and only increase the tempo as you get more comfortable. (Although I have provided a slew of backing tracks, Band In A Box is the best way to do this kind of practice and ensure your practice tracks have both rhythmic components and chordal components). Summary There s a lot of practice suggested in the Action Plans. If you truly want to master this genre this practice then thorough preparation is a necessity to build up your rhythmic vocabulary as well as melodic vocabulary. Always ensure you practice with backing tracks - the subliminal ear training you get is priceless. Questions and Comments If you have any questions, please send me an First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

39 TIME AND GROOVE COLUMN 10

40 TIME AND GROOVE - COLUMN 10 Introduction So far in Time And Groove we ve been working on exercises to develop your sense of internal time - and with our three grooves we ve been working on increasing the amount of space in our click tracks and backing tracks so that we have to take more responsibility for counting time. In Column 10 we re going to use just the Brown Eyed Girl groove - along with variations of it. What we re going to be working on today is working on what are called Middle Changes. Paul s Note: Back in Issue 138 I reviewed a drummer s book called It s About Time by Fred Dinkins...the exercises we re going to do in Columns 10 and 11 are based on exercises in that book that I ve adapted for bass. Auditing your playing of these exercises will give you a great idea of how well your perception of different subdivisions of the beat are. So What Are Middle Changes? Middle Changes are the name that Fred Dinkins gives to those parts of a song - say going from a verse/chorus format to a bridge - where the basic subdivision of the groove changes. The obvious example of this is where your bass line goes to double time or cut time...but there are other examples too. What we need to do to practice these changes is to create some different versions of the Brown Eyed Girl for you to learn thoroughly based on different time divisions. And we re going to learn to play these at 110 BPM. So here s the basic Brown Eyed Girl groove that we already know (and love!). This is an 8th note groove: 40 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

41 Here s the version of the groove that we re going to use that has a quarter note pulse in the bass line: If we take the groove we already have - but interpret the 8th notes as swing 8th notes then we have a version of the groove that has the swing 8th note as the rhythmic subdivision: And finally, here s a 16th note based groove for this chord progression: The first thing you need to do is just work through these grooves and make sure you can play them fluidly at a tempo of around 110 BPM. The quarter note and swing 8th note versions should be straightforward - the hard part will be learning the 16th note groove! 41 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

42 Once you ve got these grooves down, then we re going to play a series of exercises along with some drum tracks to get you used to going from one time feel to another. Exercise 1-8th Note Based Groove to Quarter Note Based Groove The drum tracks we re going to use are going to have bass drums on beat 1 and 3, snare drums on beat 2 and 4, and then the hi-hat is going to spell out the appropriate subdivision. This will help you internalize changing time feels. In Column 11 we re going to make things a LOT harder! Here s what Exercise 1 looks like with a drum track added to the notation and tab: Exercise 2-8th Note Based Groove To Swing 8th Note Based Groove This one is really interesting...going from straight 8th feel to swing 8th note feel is a good challenge of your perception of time! Here s the notation and tab with drum notation: 42 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

43 You ll notice that the drum track has the hi-hat hitting the kind of 3 to the beat pattern that you d more likely encounter in 12:8 time feel - I experimented with just a swing 8th note drum track but felt that spelling out the sub-division was the best way of emphasizing the difference between straight 8th notes (where there are two 8th notes to a beat) and swing 8th notes (where there are three 8th notes to a beat). Advanced Exercises Once you really start to get a handle on these exercises, then try it WITH- OUT the drum tracks for this lesson with the subdivisions marked out. Either try doing these exercises with a metronome. Or with the 2&4 click tracks from the earlier lesson. THEN once you ve done that, you should work on the following combinations: 43 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

44 Exercise 4 - quarter notes to 8th notes Exercise 5 - quarter notes to swing 8th notes Exercise 6 - quarter notes to 16th notes Exercise 7 - swing 8th notes to quarter notes Exercise 8 - swing 8th notes to straight 8th notes Exercise 9 - swing 8th notes to 16th notes Exercise 10-16th notes to quarter notes Exercise 11-16th notes to 8th notes Exercise 12-16th notes to swing 8th notes If you play in either the urban hip hop genre, or the smooth jazz genre (Jeff Lorber springs to mind here), then I d suggest you add in swing 16th notes to these combinations as well. Playing through these exercises will demonstrate if you have a solid grasp of the different time feels. And because that solid grasp is needed to play these exercises successfully, these exercises are a great way to actually audit that and give you feedback on how well you have internalized these time feels. Homework For Column 10 Your Homework for Column 10 should be straightforward. 1. Learn the quarter note, swing 8th note and 16th note Brown Eyed Girl variations. The quarter note and swing 8th note variations are straightforward - the 16th note variation is a little harder. 2. When you re happy you have the variations worked out, then move onto the exercises. You should find Exercise 1 straightforward, which doesn t mean you should not spend any time on it. Exercises 2 and 3 provide the challenge. The challenge for Exercise 2 is switching from a straight feel to a swing feel without losing the beat. The challenge for Exercise 3 is the increased technical demands of the 16th note section - again record yourself and check that switching to 16th note from 8th note isn t throwing you off the beat. 3. With each of these exercises, when you are comfortable with them, 44 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

45 then try playing them along with either a metronome clicking on Beats 1,2,3 and 4 OR with the 2 and 4 click track. This makes YOU responsible for accurately nailing the subdivisions. 4. Using either metronome or the 2&4 click tracks, try the different combinations of grooves (e.g. quarter to 8th, quarter to swing 8th, quarter to 16th etc). This will really hone your perception of the different subdivisions of the beat that are implied by different time feels. IMPORTANT: If you ve not thoroughly learned the grooves, then go back and do that before trying to do these exercises. You should be able to play along with the backing tracks from Column 1 WITHOUT needing the notation or tab. You need to have these grooves memorized. Summary The exercises in today s lesson are all about making sure that you thoroughly understand the different subdivisions of the beat implied by different time feels. Not only does this make your rhythmic feel more precise, it also prepares you for changes in songs where you move from one rhythmic pulse to another pulse. And allows you to practice making that change and being able to immediately establish that pulse in your playing at the point of change. In the next column we ll push this further out and start incorporating space into the drum tracks - so you really need to have these exercises down cold before you move on! 45 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

46 Book Review

47 BEGINNING SLAP BASS WITH MARLOWE DK Most of you know of Danish bass player MarloweDK from either You- Tube or his excellent website. Recently Thomas (his real name) released his first instructional product - and it s not surprisingly called Beginning Slap Bass With Marlowe DK. FB&B subscriber Mathias asked me to review it...so even though I personally don t play slap, I know there are plenty of you would-be slappers out there and this review is for you. So What s Beginning Slap Bass With Marlowe DK About? Firstly, this program is available either as a DVD which obviously gets posted to you. Or it s available as a download - I ve got the download and the download program uses your internet browser to display the educational materials to you. (If that sounds strange, it isn t - it s just maybe a little outdated to use HTML as a coding language.) So you know, it took around an hour for the download version to finish downloading...so if you re planning on jumping into this program, then factor in some waiting time. Your mileage may vary depending on how fast or slow your internet connection is. So the program is obviously about teaching slap bass. The methodology that Thomas uses is that there s a very basic thumb tutorial to start, and 47 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

48 then there are 25 licks to practice slapping with. The licks are presented in four formats - you get Thomas playing the lick along with a drum track at normal tempo. Then you get a slow version of the lick so you can see what s going on - that uses a simple metronome to mark time. Then you get the options to have slow close ups of the left and the right hand. There are also versions of the drum tracks at different tempos that you can use to play along to. Plus you get the notation and tab of each of the 25 licks that you can use to cross reference your learning of the licks. Hidden away in the menu choices are some other technique segments where Thomas has a closer look at slap techniques like hammer-ons, pluck offs, trills, shakes, slides, cross-hammers, and so on. What s Good About Beginning Slap Bass With Marlowe DK? What I like about this program is that there is a clear progression in the exercises - they get progressively more complex. As you master these exercises - and focus on playing them cleanly - you ll find that you are mastering the basic components needed to play slap bass effectively. The combination of the full speed playalong, the slowed down playalong, the left and right hand zoom ins, and the tab should give you a very clear idea of what s contained in each groove and how to play it. As with all things bass, slow and perfect practice is the key to working this up to speed. How Could Beginning Slap Bass With Marlowe DK Be Better Although there is a lot of material here, there are IMO some things that could have been better. 48 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

49 Firstly, although I think the sequence embodied in the licks is essentially sound, I think that more steps are needed. Or more beginner exercises - exercises that focus on developing the techniques before you start applying them in the context of a groove. Stuart Clayton (who I reviewed last week) calls these types of exercises mechanical exercises. And although they are boring and usually unmusical, they are a vital step at the start of learning a new technique. The second thing that could be better is for Thomas to teach the musical application of slap bass. None of the grooves are marked up with chord symbols - and there s no instruction or guidance on how you would actually create your own slap bass grooves. (Paul s Note - no-one really teaches this at the moment from what I ve seen...so Thomas is not at fault here, it s just something that would have been a worthwhile addition). The third thing is that the program is just a little clumsy to use - and there s no clear Start Here path. And it takes a few moments to orient yourself within the program. I just found a folder for example where you can find all of the grooves as a separate PDF file - it would have taken little work to have made that a book and much easier to print out. Originally this was a DVD - and it s possible that it works better on DVD than the download version. The menu system on the download version is not intuitive and takes a bit of playing with to work out. Finally, I think that Thomas s definition of beginner and mine don t match! Some of the grooves here are complex and reasonably advanced - and definitely NOT what I would call Beginners Grooves. Summary Although I ve pointed out some areas where I think this could be better, I d like to say that if you re serious about learning slap bass then this should definitely be one of the sources of tutorial learning that you use. 49 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

50 Others that I d recommend you have available include Stuart Clayton s Ultimate Slap Bass, Alexsis Sklarevski s Slap Bass DVD and Tony Oppenheim s Slap Bass book. Judicious study of those materials - and Thomas s of course - should get you slapping and popping like a thumbslinger! 50 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com

51 Offers For FB&B Subscribers

52 OFFERS FOR FIRST BASS AND BEYOND SUBSCRIBERS This is a new section where I ll list special offers for First Bass And Beyond Subscribers. Cracking The Detroit Code Cracking The Detroit Code is now $367 for the Premium Option. First Bass And Beyond subscribers get a 10% discount...if you want to enroll on CTDC and take advantage of the FB&B Discount, simply drop me an . Motown Style Grooves This project has been on hold for six months...and been around for what seems like forever. Here s the skinny...the grooves are all transcribed and written out. The hold up is the playing of them for the video demonstrations. The learning process I use on these...along with the complexity of the grooves have a tendancy to trigger RSI problems, especially for my plucking hand. So I ve been avoiding the filming. I mentioned this problem to one of my mastermind group buddies and she came up with a great answer: does it have to be YOU that plays the grooves. And the truth is, that it doesn t. What s more important is the project. So I ve booked a bass player to come in on January 6th and play the grooves for me so I can film them and complete this project! The release date is going to be January 29th for full details and to keep up with the project I recommend signing up to the notification list here: 52 First Bass And Beyond Issue December 2012 how-to-play-bass.com