Bass Lesson 4 - More Slapping & Popping

Today we will get a little more advanced, here you will develop your thumb's speed and accuracy, and also master slapping octaves - an important aspect of slapping.

Few important things you should take care of:
While slapping, hold your right hand thumb parallel with strings, don't hold your hand like you want to stop a car alongside the road :)

When plucking the strings, you can use your index or middle finger, or you can use both when plucking two strings at once, also when I play some lines with a lots of slap, I use my index finger to pluck notes on D string and middle finger for plucking notes on G string, notes on E and A strings I slap with my thumb.

Important thing when slapping is that you have correct set action on your bass guitar. The strings should be low, and you should be able to slap the strings without to much power.
Try to make very short moves of your thumb when you're playing, that way you will achieve greater speed in future.

For better slap sound on your amp you should raise Treble and Bass a bit, and also turn down Middle a bit. If you have graphic Equalizer you can try to do something like this: Set everything flat, then raise freqs between 30-60Hz by 3-5dB, lower the freqs between 250-800Hz by 3-5dB, and raise 1.2-2.5kHz by 3-6dB, That's the way I do it, maybe it should work for you, also don't forget to turn on the Tone pot on your bass, we don't want muddy sound for slap.

About this lesson, look this main vid and try to memorize things I play. Don't bother to play exact same as me, than Watch slow vids, you have every part from this main video played slow and tabed, that's where you should begin.

Here's a entire tab, look at it, no need to play it yet, wait for slower vids, all parts are the same and when you learn all the slow parts you should have no problems to play this main video same or even better than I!

Tab:

s- slap with your thumb
p- pluck with your index or middle finger

s s s s s s s p s s s s s s s s s p s
G|-----------------9------------------------7----|
D|-----------5--------------------5--------------|
A|-7-----5h7---7-x---5--7-----5h7---7-0h5-5---5--|
E|---x-x------------------x-x--------------------|


s s s s s s s p s s s s s p s s p s
G|-----------------9------------9-------7---|
D|-----------5----------7-6-5---------------|
A|-7-----5h7---7-x---5--------7---7-0h5---5-|
E|---x-x------------------------------------|

s s s s s s s p s s s s s s s s s p s
G|-----------------9------------------------7----|
D|-----------5--------------------5--------------|
A|-7-----5h7---7-x---5--7-----5h7---7-0h5-5---5--|
E|---x-x------------------x-x--------------------|


s s s s s s s p s s s s s p s s p s
G|-----------------9------------7-------9---|
D|-----------5----------7-6-5---------------|
A|-7-----5h7---7-x---5--------5---5-0h7---7-|
E|---x-x------------------------------------|

s s s s p s s s p s s s p s s s p s s s p p s p p s
G|---------9-------9-------9-------9-------7-7---8-8----|
D|-7-6-5-----6-5-----6-5-----6-5-----6-5----------------|
A|-------7-------7-------7-------7-------5-----6-----7--|
E|------------------------------------------------------|