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- What if you really can't hear the bass line in a song???
What if you really can't hear the bass line in a song???
I'm relatively new to playing bass, one year. With that being said, I've noticed in trying to learn some songs by ear once and awhile I can't really hear the bass that well because all the other instruments seem to drowned out the bass. (I even tried turning the bass all the way up on the stereo, still not much help) The song “You're In Love” by Ratt (please see the link below to hear the song) is a good example. What would you do in this case? Any tips would be appreciated, thank you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1sFCszjBoc
Totally depends on the song and how it was mixed. In the instance you've provided, yeah, I can barely make it out – which tells me that it was mixed way low in the studio (kind of typical of ‘80s hair metal, which mostly emphasized screeching guitars and snappy drums). From what I can make out, it sounds like he’s just banging out 8th notes in key. Have you tried looking up live performances of the song? A lot of musicians don't play live exactly as they played on original recordings but at least you may be able to get the general idea.
That said, just stick with it. Keep developing your ear. It's not an exact science; with time and practice, your ear will get better at isolating the bass and filtering out everything else. Again, if the bass isn't mixed too low.
Oh, and you can also run a search, see if there's an isolated bass master track on-line that you can learn from. I doubt there will be for this song, but you never know.
It's not uncommon, but when it happens, it's not your fault that you can't transcribe it, that's when BBT comes in handy, there are people on here who can tab just about anything, so don't let it put you off, it happens to us all
^^^ True dat. I recently had to ask Sid for help with a tab. The song's actually rather simple but there were parts I simply couldn't pick out. I like to think I have a great ear, but even with Sid's notes, I still couldn't resolve his corrections to what I was (or wasn't) hearing. Frustrated the piss out of me, so much that I decided screw it and gave up on it.
Thank You Mark1960 & LoudLon I greatly appreciate your advice!!
Another great resource is Youtube. Just type in {Song Name}Bass Cover, and your sure to find at least a few videos.
I use sound editor software for this. Audacity is one and is freeware. Transcribe! is another, but is not free; I think it works better than Audacity though. Sound editor software basically allows you to remix the recording so you can hear what you want to hear. You can bring a buried bass line to the front of the mix so you can better hear it. And both allow you to slow down the song without changing pitch so you can pick out what is being played in fast passages.
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