Check out these four bass videos for some musical inspiration. I like to watch these videos every once in again in order to keep myself motivated to improve!
Fingers Moran – “Phat Duck”
Marcus Miller – “Bounce”
Marcus Miller vs. Victor Wooten
John Entwistle Bass Solo
John Entwistle was an inspiration for my bass playing very early on in my career. He’s from the band The Who, if you are curious where you may have heard him before.
Share some other inspirational videos below! Or just let me know what you think about the videos above?
Benedictus (Song of Zechariah) by the band For Today is an extremely fun riff to play and is much easier than it appears. Check out the video of me playing it (quality isn’t great).
Here is the tab for the intro riff-
The tab is pretty easy to understand, the “/” means a slide. A slide is when you literally slide your hand up or down some frets, without taking pressure off the notes.
This song will help you work on timing as well. If you count it out, it’s based in 3/4. Thats three quarter notes per measure, compared to the most popular time signature, 4/4, having 4 quarter notes per measure.
Practice the jump and pretty soon you’ll be playing this riff way to often! If you have any comments or criticisms let me know below, or leave a comment on the youtube video.
Every once in a while it’s healthy to watch videos about different instruments. These three videos are really awesome and I find myself watching them fairly often.
Stay Crunchy – Ronald Jenkees
Ronald is an incredible musician and just listening to the different melodies he comes up with just blows my mind. It should push you to think harder about you writing and how you can put more emotion into it.
Soothsayer (Live) – Buckethead
Buckethead remains one of my favorite artists to listen to. He has an incredible way of combining emotional and technical lines to create jaw-dropping songs.
Neil Peart Drum Solo
Neil Peart (of the band Rush) is an incredible musician. BE warned: if you watch this video you may switch to drums!
Hopefully those 3 videos inspired you and kept you motivated to become a better musician overall.
I created a short list of these videos that I’ve watched over the years. I think they will be a great motivation to beginner bass players, and they can always look for more on youtube.
1. Stu Hamm – Flow My Tears (The Policemen Says)
I always play this song when I’m struggling to come up with anything innovative, and it always helps. If you are getting into two hand tapping, I suggest you check out this riff.
2. Ernie by FingersMoran
This song has a bunch of great examples of slap technique, strange riffing, and showcases the power of playing with a real drummer. The pedal he uses at the end is a looper.
3. Amazing Grace – Victor Wooten
Incredible video that really shows Victor incredible ears and hands (a strange, but true compliment). I will write an article later about using natural harmonics, as you can hear during the beginning of the video.
4. Helios by Michael Manring
Incredible show of musicianship. He plays a custom bass called the hyperbass, there are lots of great videos on youtube about it. Check out the tuning peg part at 20 seconds.
5. Birdland by Weather Report (Jaco Pastorius)
I played in my high school jazz band for 3 years. I wish we would have been able to come anywhere close to the awesomeness in this video. RIP Jaco.
BONUS: Drifting by Andy McKee
This simply rocks, so I had to include it. Later on I will do non-bass videos that have inspired me!
