anti-pick prejudice

[OldManC]

Let me just add that the new avatar has raised the bar. So to speak...

[Chaser001]

Paul McCartney and Carol Kaye are two bassists that are way up there for me, but I play with a pick just because it has always seemed natural to me.  

[exiledarchangel]

I remember that clip you posted of some fingerstyle kind of jazz on your Epi, Nice!

If by jazzy you mean sloppy, then yes, guilty as charged.

[Pilgrim]

I learned fingerstyle planing upright.  I'm still learning how to use a pick but I'm making progress.  For surf music, the sharp attack and ability to play repetitive patterns fast do make a pick an appropriate tool.

[Basvarken]

I play fingerstyle 80% of our repertoire. But the other 20% I use the pick.
Just depends on the song really.

I learned to play the bass with fingers style. Coming from a classical scholing on the Spanish guitar with boring stuff (for an early teenager) like Bourree etc.

When I started a Thin Lizzy cover band (way before the tribute bands flooded the market) I had to learn to play with a plectrum.
Songs like "Waiting for an Alibi" and "Are You Ready" can't be played fingerstyle, imho.

I'm glad I learned to play both styles.

Don't think I'll ever take the time to learn how to slap though... 

[Denis]

I was talkin' 'bout picks and fingers stuff, not the other thingie, your Hornyness...

I first looked at that sentence and swore I saw the word "nose" in there somewhere. 

[hieronymous]

I don't really know what I expected when I started this thread - I expected there to be at least a little bit of anti-pick sentiment. I think it is still alive and well elsewhere, but good to see that the Last Bass Outposters are much more open-minded and realistic!

Personally, I play differently depending on the technique I am using, and I consider that a good thing. My favorite right now is pick with flats on my Alembic. Other pick/flatwounds players that I like are early Phil Lesh & current Mike Gordon, though of course there are others (Joe Osborn for example, though I don't consider him an influence). Anthony Jackson is a player who switches between pick and fingers depending on what the song calls for, which I found influential at one point (Al DiMeola's Casino & Electric Rendezvous being my favorites).

For a while I experimented with different materials - I have a pick made from bone, some wooden ones, and my favorite: woolly mammoth tusk! Usually now I use really heavy Dunlop Alligator picks (usually 2.00 mm+).

This has been fun - loved Dave's insight into the possible origins of anti-pick prejudice in the early days of the electric bass. But I'm glad that it's fading away.

[Basvarken]

Dutch Bass player Herman Deinum is great pick player.

[Bargeon]

I dunno. It seems that I see a lot more threads about people complainging about people who don't like picks than I do from people who actually don't like picks.
Seems the anti-anti-pickers out number the anti-pickers.

And just because you're an anti-anti-picker doesn't seem to mean you're a pro-picker. Most seem to be pick-neutral.  That leads me to observe that I see very few exclusively pro-picker threads and even these don't seem to attract a lot of anti-picker nit-picking, just a lot of anti-anti-picders talking in pick-neutral tones about anti-pickers.

I guess you can take your pick.

[exiledarchangel]

No reason to be picky!

[Dave W]

I dunno. It seems that I see a lot more threads about people complainging about people who don't like picks than I do from people who actually don't like picks.
Seems the anti-anti-pickers out number the anti-pickers.
...

I don't see any threads like that, then again I don't hang out at any other bass-specific forum like TB. What I do see is the occasional thread from a newbie wanting to know about it because some local yokel has told him "bass is meant to be played fingerstyle" and/or that bassists who use picks aren't "real" bassists. The prejudice is out there even if we don't see it here.

[uwe]

If someone told me today that I'm not a bassist because I play with a pick, I'd just shrug and be alittle bewildered. 99% of all non-bass-playing musicians wouldn't be able to tell from a recording whether a bass is played with a pick or not. We're not even talking non-musicians here. And even in this bass playing crowd here, I'm sure all of us would have more misses than hits secondguessing whether an electric  bass in a finished production is pick or finger, Chris Squire radical sounds and techniques like slapping ignored. It just doesn't matter to the music.

[Lightyear]

...............your Hornyness...

Fraulien Hornyness   It has a nice ring to it....

[ramone57]

I don't see any threads like that, then again I don't hang out at any other bass-specific forum like TB. What I do see is the occasional thread from a newbie wanting to know about it because some local yokel has told him "bass is meant to be played fingerstyle" and/or that bassists who use picks aren't "real" bassists. The prejudice is out there even if we don't see it here.

regarding real bassists, I was once asked what instrument I played and naturally said electric bass.  I was then informed that electric bass was not a real instrument.     who knew?

[Basvarken]

Probably they were not real humans, but cyborgs from the planet Electrophobia.