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Jackson or Music Man?
Hey, I've played both Jackson AND Music Man basses, and they're both great. I highly recommend the music man (if you can get a sub one with a 5 string), or stuff by rondo music/agile/brice. Anything with a low B for metal.
http://www.rondomusic.com/bassguitars5.html
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Hey, I've played both Jackson AND Music Man basses, and they're both great. I highly recommend the music man (if you can get a sub one with a 5 string), or stuff by rondo music/agile/brice. Anything with a low B for metal.http://www.rondomusic.com/bassguitars5.html
Or you could always re-string your 4 string to B-E-A-D tuning, who uses their G string anyway?
You don't use your g string. I find that a little strange. I am all over the neck and would never not include any string in a solo or any form of writing. Or even suggest any beginner never use there g string because nobody uses it…
You dont have to stick with standard tuning, try experimenting
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You dont have to stick with standard tuning, try experimenting
But also remember this - “standard” is standard for a reason. Having one string out of relative tune to the others (EbADG, for example) causes the patterns for chords to change based on what string the root is on. It's not impossible to deal with, but it does add additional things you need to think about as you play, so it might be something to avoid starting out.
Go as crazy as you want, but make sure you have a strong base in standard tuning. You never know (no, not me):
B-E-A-D isn't that crazy actually, it's just a small change and not a lot of people like playing open notes because of the distinct change in tone, with bead you start in the fifth position and if you need to play any G string lead guitar notes you just go up the dusty end. Standard tuning comes from the violin and what that has to do with heavy metal is beyond me
…and didn't The Eagles make a huge career out of Nashville tuning? and has anybody ever tried to decipher the tunings the Goo Goo Dolls use?! The Presidents of the United States used two strings, (bass) and three strings, (lead) ffs, wake up people
I'm not saying there aren't reasons to use alternate tunings. What I'm saying is that if you are starting out I think you should stick to standard 4th interval tuning (and BEAD is in 4ths) so you can focus on technique and theory. If what you're playing is tuned down a half step do it, but keep the interval at 4ths to keep the patterns the same.
John Taylor, Graham Maby, Tina Weymouth, Benjamin Orr, Bernard Edwards, Cliff Burton, John McVie, Lee Skler, Gene Simmons, John Deacon, Flea - most, if not all, of their material is done tuned EADG.
There's no reason I can't tune to EGEAb - normal for the E, down a full step for the ‘A’ string, up a full step on the ‘D’ string, down a half step on the ‘G’ string. I can play anything I can in EADG (in fact I have one more note at the highest fret of the ‘G’ string), so it's functional. But when I play some 12 bar blues in G, my pattern for the I IV and V major chords are all different. I have to focus on the different chord shapes rather than what I can do within them.
Plus I would have to translate every tab written, rather than being able to just play it. And anything I post in that tuning would have to be translated by anyone else to play it.
Hence my feeling that everyone should have the basics of playing in standard tuning before they branch out, and should maintain the ability to play standard tuning.
I wasn't suggesting everyone abandon standard tuning, it all started with a reference to using a five string for metal and I pointed out that a four string could be used for metal, albeit the more hardcore of the genre, by swapping the G for a B, it would be a bit of a pain for your basic everyday stuff, the opening bass part for ‘Sweet Child of Mine’ for instance would have you starting at the 17th fret and going up to the 21st!! but for a bit of Sepultura it would be very usable, low down and dirty. Incidentally, Steinberger do some basses with a DB bridge where you can drop the E string to D or B at the flick of a switch
I know about the Hipshot tuners where you can drop a whole or half step with a lever. Doing that at the bridge would be even easier - and you could do all four strings at once.
I had to play one song this last Sunday where I needed the low Eb. Had to do a fast drop-tune between songs, and only had time to do the one string. Every Root-Octave-walk down I did took extra thinking because of the half step difference. If I could have dropped all 4 strings a half step it would have been so much easier!
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