u/Ikarian

I've been playing for about 5 months now, and while it's not my biggest problem, I sometimes get the 7th and 9th frets mixed up when just taking a quick look down, and sometimes I wish I had a little more visual distinction between them.

I'm considering a second bass, and a couple that I'm looking at have block inlays instead of dots, where the blocks are at least a bit different between 7 and 9. Haven't had a chance to play one yet. Does anyone else have this issue, and did this style of inlays help with it?

I bought a Sterling Ray34 HH knowing I’d probably be using the bridge pickup all the time as I play mostly punk/pop-punk. But I’ve found that the next switch position up, which is the bottom row of the bridge pickup and the top row of the neck pickup is “my tone”. It’s got a lot of those harmonic sparkles that make it stand out in the mix without pumping up the volume.

I’m considering a second bass, and I’m just trying to look for something with a similar tone, but maybe not a Stingray. The tone I like is not too different from a Mike Dirnt kinda thing, so I’m guessing a Grabber with both pickups on is an option, though I’m not a fan of the look. Any other suggestions?

I've been playing one instrument or another for about 35 years. But recently I picked up a bass guitar and started playing in a cover band. Took us a while to find a drummer (we still haven't but we've got two lined up and the first sit-in is this weekend), so in the meantime we've been playing along with my Songsterr app and I've been pretty dependent on the tab because it's a lot more detail than chords for a guitar or melody lines I could riff around and not have 100% accurate on wind instruments.

I'm worried that when we try to play without the backing tracks, I'm going to find myself no longer able to keep up with the more seasoned musicians in the band. Memorizing the tab is obviously one task and I'm working on it, but it's going pretty slow. But I'm also worried that if a song veers even slightly away from the album version, I'm going to get lost.

I'd love any tricks or tips you guys have. I'm super focused on not being the weakest link in the band, so I want to try to minimize these problems before they start.