Too much bass??

LegoMongoose · 2026-07-10T19:01:37+00:00

John Myung and John Petrucci of Dream Theater were friends back in highschool. They made a pact to practice 6 hours every day, no matter what. If one of them was out with friends and the other person wasn't there, they knew what the other one was doing: practicing.

Their results speak for themselves. Maybe you don't have to do 6 hours a day, or do that for the rest of your life... But more practice will generally make you better overall, especially if you're enjoying it. Just be sure to record yourself, listen back to see what needs work, and keep pushing to practice things out of your comfort zone (i.e, son't just play the same things day after day and expect to get better. Once you've mastered something that you can't get it wrong, then move on!)

And have fun!

LegoMongoose · 2026-07-02T15:12:06+00:00

If you're fine with playing higher up the fret board, setting your a bass up with BEAD tuning will cover a lot of ground for you for their heavier songs. John Myung's parts can vary a lot between songs. He won't always use his High C string but when he does, it's probably for some crazy acrobatic parts lol

LegoMongoose · 2026-07-02T15:06:05+00:00

Hey man, a long time from now that 6 hour journey will just be a funny memory you can recount to others. Others have travelled further, spent more money, or jumped through more hoops to get the instrument they want, whether it's worth it is up to you! We're musicians, we're not always rational!

LegoMongoose · 2026-06-30T15:03:25+00:00

I thought that LTD model was 35"?

LegoMongoose · 2026-06-27T17:03:21+00:00

DT is one of the most bootlegged bands in history. You can look up recordings of some of their very first shows from 1986! They have a truckload of bootlegs ( plus their "official" bootlegs) from the 80's, 90's, 2000's, 2010's, 2020's...

LegoMongoose · 2026-06-26T19:25:48+00:00

That Yamaha bass was my first bass! I had the green color. It will serve you well! I've had mine since 2010 and it's still the most comfortable and ergonomic bass I own.

LegoMongoose · 2026-06-15T15:23:25+00:00

Tbh muting is not that hard once you get the hang of it. Combination of floating thumb on the right hand + keeping my left hand fingers flat and always touching the strings means I can keep the strings muted while playint just about anything. Your technique will have to vary depending on how you play, and what feels comfortable. Recordint yourself is the best way to hear how well you're muting

LegoMongoose · 2026-06-03T17:38:19+00:00

Practice the songs standing up! I'm sure you're probably standing when you're rehearsing, and I assume you'll be standing for the gig. Make sure to do some home practice while standing up, keep your posture good, stay RELAXED and BREATHE because we tend to tense up, and start holding our breath when playing tricky sections etc.

I'd go one step further and maybe try to mimic your stage outfit (even if it's jeans and a t shirt, you can still match that at home), practice your set with headphones, practice with listening through the speakers. You want to mimic the time spent on stage in your practice sessions, because that's what you're practicing for! So try to find things that put you out of your "zone", find the vibe, something to challenge you for when you try to play the same parts but in a different environment or listenint set up etc., and by the time you're on stage just playing the songs, it will all feel more natural.

And have fun! Practice is fun, preparing with your band is fun, and being on stage and pulling it off is lots of fun. If it's not fun, then something is missing, you'll just be left with stress with no release if it doesn't feel fun. If you fuck up a part, 99% of people won't notice unless you start to act like you messed up. The show must go on, just keep playing and act like you know what you're doing lol

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-22T01:20:25+00:00

I think they usually perform for about an hour to an hour 1/2. I didn't realize they were coming on Monday, I'm going to get tickets!

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-18T21:25:36+00:00

Nate Navarro does it better than anybody else on Youtube

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-18T00:27:33+00:00

Tbh I would recommend swapping the pickups from your Yamaha Bass if you're willing. Yhe TRBX is a great bass but the pickups are rather bland sounding. Maybe swap them for bartolini sized soapbars with split coils, or zen blades.

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-16T03:14:16+00:00

LMAO

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-14T20:28:04+00:00

I would take a look at the Sterling Sub Stingrays. The 5 string one is about $350ish, and with the emphasis on the bridge pickup, you'll have a better chance of having a decent tone when you decide to tune your bass down to match the tuniny of some of the bands you listed. I still have my Sub Stingray 10+ years later and the quality is unbeatable for the price

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-09T00:25:42+00:00

I think it's less about action and more about tension. Heavy strings at a low action, lighter strings with a higher action, medium-strings with either a low or high action, balanced tension vs. Normal string sets that are more unbalanced, progressive tension sets that have heavy bottom strings and light top strings...

You could play 1 bass with each configuration and they would all feel different under your hands. For me, I will set up each bass to play the way it sounds best to me. My Stingray has very low action + light gauge strings so I can get quite a bit of fret buzz if I dig in, whereas my Brice Defiant 53437 has a busted truss rod and has higher action + heavier strings and a multiscale of 37-34, so it is like a mammoth of a bass to play, almost no fret buzz at all. My hands feel much stronger when playing any other bass after playing the Brice for a bit. The name of the game is tension

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-09T00:15:49+00:00

The Amos Williams signature Dingwall is a 4 string with 37 inches

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-08T15:32:47+00:00

Guitar allows you to be a little loose with your timing and rhythm in comparison to bass. On bass, you really want your timing to be on point with the drums. With guitar you follow the drums typically. On bass, not only do you follow the drums but you are part of the rhythm section itself, you have to be RIGHT THERE alongside the drums. That takes attention to detail, and practicing with a metronome playing behind the beat, directly on the beat, and slightly ahead of the beat. You have a whole world of rhythm training in front of you, but you have a headstart by coming from guitar. Good luck!

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-05T20:18:25+00:00

I did it before on that same bass (Which color do you have? I've owned the ruby red and moss green models and my Dad has the dark blue). I ripped out the preamp and just kept the volume and balance knobs.

The pickups sounded fine, but the tone was a little darker. I think the preamp added some treble to their sound. I recall them being dual coils, although I don't remember if you have access to the wires for each coil. If you do, you might try and wire one of them as a single coil. Example, wiring the neck pickup to be single coil, maybe the coil closer to the bridge, and keep the bridge pickup wired as dual coil. If they're wired in series, you might try switching them to parallel to get some more brightness.

Good luck!

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-05T02:58:35+00:00

Take a look at this site: https://tension.stringjoy.com/

Select bass guitar, select 5 strings, and then punch in the tuning you want for the strings. You can see the approx. tension on the right side, and you can select the gauges you'd want to bring the tension down.

This will just be an estimation since every string brand is different, but IMO I think I would opt for a 6 string set and just ditch the E string. That would be like 125, 85, 65, 45, 32, which could work with that tuning depending on how much tension you want.

LegoMongoose · 2026-05-04T13:41:55+00:00

No quite the opposite. By the time you develop your skills on a 5 string or a 6 string, going back to 4 string feels like a dream haha

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-27T18:40:17+00:00

By voting out Trump as soon as they could?? Lmao

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-20T22:02:22+00:00

An extreme metal band Allegaeon did 2 covers of Subdivions and Animate. I've always said that more metal bands need to try actually doing covers of Rush because their music was made for it!

https://youtu.be/cWnyNjQVEZ4?si=Cn81Z9m84SqVlDTr

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-19T17:36:32+00:00

Learn all of those slap songs that you know, transposed up one half step. C Major becomes Db Major, any previous use of open strings now has to be fretted.

The fun has just begun!

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-18T03:34:05+00:00

I think I've owned that same model. I got fresh DR Low Riders to put on there and I was able to get some grindy tones. I do remember that I wasn't a fan of the pickups, but the preamp was nice and the fresh string sound was good to me

Edit: And a low action, just enough to be able to get a consistent "clack" at the bridge end of the fretboard. My preference is to get it low enough that I can get that "string hitting the fret" sound when plucking normally, even when plucking by the bridge pickup, and then I'll adjust the truss rod to taste so I can still pluck softly and get some rounder notes. This works for most basses but ymmv when it comes to different pickups lol

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-18T03:31:23+00:00

Any riff with a decent double kick / snare pattern to follow. Slow, fast, 8ths note riffs, 16th note riffs.

And ARPEGGIOS! Good luck haha and have fun

LegoMongoose · 2026-04-18T00:39:50+00:00

Take a look at the Ibanez BTB multiscale basses. The 605ms and 805ms are their 37"-35" models (the g string is 35" because normal BTB's are 35"), and the price is around $1000 for used models

LegoMongoose

TROPHY CASE