The most uncorfortable bass line to play from DT

[The Silent Cody]

Well I was thinking while exercising yesterday to start with that kind of threat. Some bass players are obviously here, and I think they have got some bass line that is so uncomfortable to play that your fingers almost falling after playing it let's discuss them I always said this about DT music - it's great exercise, it has every element needed in good exercise, finger streching, some spiders, speed, picking everything.
Back to topic, my most unconfortable bass lines are:

As I Am - riff no.3 as I called him during the verse... With classic tuning which I use BEADG, I have note C on first fret...as we know As I Am is in C note in all so I have to use first fret behind quick picking on the A string...so uncomfortable...
The Root Of All Evil - again, song in D, I'm using classic tuning... after second verse my left hand starts to shake
The Ministry Of Lost Souls - egypt note just before the beginning of the instrumental part...so hard to play, especially second part of that little motive...
A Nightmare To Remember - same reason what As I Am, different tunings, have to use 1 fret all the time...
and that's it for now, other songs which I've learned since I play are very playable but now I'm working on The Shattered Fortress and I can see that the opening riff played in octave higher....will also find a place on that list

[Scard]

Whenever I play As I Am I tune my low B string up to a C.

[The Silent Cody]

Whenever I play As I Am I tune my low B string up to a C.

Yeah, I was doing the same when I was learning it for the first time, and Myung also does the same way. But now I'm finding more exercisive to play this song in B tuning.

[Banny]

Whenever I play As I Am I tune my low B string up to a C.

So does Myung. This is very obvious if you do any of the following:

1. Try to play the intro
2. Watch Myung do the same.

As for uncomfortable bass lines, I've always found playing the main riff to Home difficult for similar reasons. It's shit simple in drop D, but I believe Myung plays it in standard?

[The Silent Cody]

As far as I believe JM plays Home in standard

[Banny]

As far as I believe JM plays Home in standard

The bastard.
 

[Elaitch]

I'd guess The Dark Eternal Night is quite the stamina-tester (especially the intro before the verse, as well as the pre-chorus and the solo part)

[The Silent Cody]

I'd guess The Dark Eternal Night is quite the stamina-tester (especially the intro before the verse, as well as the pre-chorus and the solo part)

Well, whis of course, how could I forget  TDEN... Those notes seems like to be turned backwards so hard to play, not to remember, but to play the opening instrumental part technically good, it is pure madness 

[Banny]

A Nightmare To Remember - same reason what As I Am, different tunings, have to use 1 fret all the time...

Since this is actually played in standard tuning, the opening riff is an absolute BITCH.

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[(nothing)]

All these songs you've mentioned so far feel pretty comfortable for me. If you practice them enough you should get them in time.

The only one that I haven't totally figured out yet is the instrumental section of The Glass Prison, up to the unison before the riff that's used in The Shattered Fortress but as far as I know there's some sort of "stamina economy" technique that JM uses for his fretting hand so I have to work on finding that out.

p.s. first post on the forum, yay !

[The Silent Cody]

Well hello (nothing) !!!
About what you said - I've got this songs in time, I just have to work on left hand... Playing second verse of The Root Of All Evil makes my left hand sick of pain Myung uses Bb tuning in this one, I play it in classic tuning, so main starts at 6 fret...fingers moving all the time

[(nothing)]

Yeah I play this song on standard tuning too. If you work on your left hand strength it shouldn't be very bothering :-) Also, if you are self-taught like me, you need to somehow verify that your technique is right (compare with a pro from an instructional video for example) so that you avoid nasty injuries that may come up. Usually when your hand hurts when you play something that's mid-tempo, it's a bad sign. :/

The tapping part on TROAE is sick!

If you'd like to work on your left hand strength, try doing the exercises from JM's instructional video, they really help.

On another topic, if you'd like to learn how to play with 3 fingers, what I did about that was using tape to stick my ring finger with my middle, then played chromatic, major & minor scales (& modes) with index-(middle & ring)-index-(middle & ring)-etc for one week, then took the tape off. It's a pain to strengthen this finger in the beginning but you'll see how many more choices for fingerings you get if you have this finger available as well. Especially for triplet / sextuplet patterns, although your main goal should be to get able to play 16ths in a 4 notes per string fashion (as in the pentatonic scale exercise JM shows in his video).

[Jamesman42]

I attempted TDEN once. I cannot do it.

I can do it on keyboard though!

[The Silent Cody]

Yeah I play this song on standard tuning too. If you work on your left hand strength it shouldn't be very bothering :-) Also, if you are self-taught like me, you need to somehow verify that your technique is right (compare with a pro from an instructional video for example) so that you avoid nasty injuries that may come up. Usually when your hand hurts when you play something that's mid-tempo, it's a bad sign. :/

The tapping part on TROAE is sick!

If you'd like to work on your left hand strength, try doing the exercises from JM's instructional video, they really help.

On another topic, if you'd like to learn how to play with 3 fingers, what I did about that was using tape to stick my ring finger with my middle, then played chromatic, major & minor scales (& modes) with index-(middle & ring)-index-(middle & ring)-etc for one week, then took the tape off. It's a pain to strengthen this finger in the beginning but you'll see how many more choices for fingerings you get if you have this finger available as well. Especially for triplet / sextuplet patterns, although your main goal should be to get able to play 16ths in a 4 notes per string fashion (as in the pentatonic scale exercise JM shows in his video).

Well, as I started plaiyng when having 16 years old, I was trying to use 3 fingers and I think that this one of the things that I am doing good but I have sometimes problems with my little finger right hand. Sometimes it's just not listening to me

[jonny108]

Was learning Dance of Eternity earlier.....I'm not anymore, I think my fingers are going to drop off.    I don't find Nightmare to be that hard to be honest.

[The Silent Cody]

Was learning Dance of Eternity earlier.....I'm not anymore, I think my fingers are going to drop off.    I don't find Nightmare to be that hard to be honest.

UUU I even not coming closer to TDEN for now   A Nightmare To Remember has one or two moments which need to spend more than 5 minutes to play them correctly. If you know the song, it's easy to play, I agree  

[Banny]

Having small hands makes a lot of JM lines uncomfortable if you don't spend the time to make sure you play them comfortably... Which is really the only way you can play. And the whole "spider fingers" thing actually seems to be common for his style of playing.

[jonny108]

Was learning Dance of Eternity earlier.....I'm not anymore, I think my fingers are going to drop off.    I don't find Nightmare to be that hard to be honest.

UUU I even not coming closer to TDEN for now   A Nightmare To Remember has one or two moments which need to spend more than 5 minutes to play them correctly. If you know the song, it's easy to play, I agree  

Haha yerp, I think Nightmare and Count are definitely the easier ones to play compared to older stuff though. 

[jonny108]

I also love playing TMOLS, especially during the intrumental section.  Great warm up for both hands! 

[The Silent Cody]

I also love playing TMOLS, especially during the intrumental section.  Great warm up for both hands! 

^This 

[(nothing)]

I was going to post this to the thread about the easiest song to play on guitar, where a guy was saying he was having trouble with the Wait For Sleep reprise in Learning To Live but I guess I'd be terribly off-topic so I came here:

If you play with a 6 string and have played for a decent amount of time (e.g. I've been playing for 4 years, practiced a lot):

- That Wait For Sleep reprise isn't that hard tbh, it just takes some practice because the time signature feel is weird (if I remember correctly it's mostly 5/8, which is an odd signature and should feel awkward if you're not familiar with it). Once you take it down then you have to concentrate to make it sound as groovy and smooth as you can.
- Well I can't say that the Metropolis section you're referring to was very hard to master either, all it took was just slowing it down a bit and then working my way up to the tempo it's normally played at. Nothing absolutely insane really (it's like 8ths at about 200 bpm, not that crazy), it's just hard because of the complex left hand movements.

In addition to that, I might as well write a mini-commentary on how difficult playing DT songs on bass is, based on my experience:
- For the solo on Ytse Jam you can just improvise over the scale he plays (I don't recall what it is now, C mixolydian? something like that) and that's okay, I think JM does that on "Live In Tokyo", except for the tapping section and the first notes of course ... The other sections are relatively easy.
- For Images And Words, the bass is a lot easier than in other albums (like 6DOIT) but I think Take The Time and Metropolis are very interesting and challenging to play.
- 6:00 is very fun to play but not that hard, the Caught In A Web instrumental section is very good practice material (chromatic patterns all over the place).
- There are two bars on ACOS which are a bit hard to get down, I think one of them is at 17/16 and the other one at 9/8. Other than that, the song is relatively easy to play (and very fun).
- Overture 1928 & Beyond This Life are interesting and relatively hard at times (like, you've got sextuplets and stuff there). Apparently TDOE is a real nightmare to master. Really hard stuff but not impossible, all it takes is practice. Took me like 3 months of daily practice to be able to play it comfortably (except for the solo, which is another story).
- The Glass Prison instumental section requires SUPER HIGH stamina even with "economy fretting" (16ths at a speed around 140 bpm). THAT is what I'd think of as "insane". I mean, being able to play that whole thing smoothly requires A LOT of practice. Some parts of "The Great Debate" (namely, the intro where JM plays the same 4-bar riff for about 3 mins or something and the breakdown in the middle) require really high stamina as well. I don't know, it might be that my hands are somewhat small. If you play that with your B string tuned to D though (like DEADGC), they come way easier. And you can use that tuning for the whole song, the lowest note JM plays on this one is a low D after all. There are bars with 16ths at The Test That Stumped Them All (like at the outro) that are a bit hard to play, you have to have mastered playing scales at a high tempo.
- Train of Thought is one of the albums where the bass kinda gets more interesting both mixwise and playingwise. As I Am is easy (well, if you tune your B string to C like JM does), This Dying Soul has some interesting parts but not that hard, Endless Sacrifice has some hard parts (spider fingers hehe) including one of the hardest, these fast descending patterns in the end. Honor Thy Father gets hard at the "crooked step bridge", it has probably the fastest pattern in their discography I think (it's something like 16ths at above 180 bpm if I remember correctly, kinda hard to play, you know?). Stream of Consciousness is surprisingly easy and so is In The Name of God except for the beginning of the instrumental section (got some nice triplets in there).
- I can't figure out by ear what he's doing on the tapping section of TROAE although it doesn't sound very hard. Panic Attack is so and so, not that easy, not that hard.  To play the intro to Never Enough you have to be fast and precise. Not that easy in my book. That bar that brings you from "Full Circle" to "Intervals" on Octavarium is hard to play. Like, HARD.
- TDEN is hard when they get out of control with speed (after all, JM falls down from his chair when he's recording that in the studio, remember? hahah). Very tiring and hard to keep up with the speed. The instrumental to TMOLS is challenging but not that hard. "The Reckoning" is a bit hard, the tempo is very fast at times and there are weird time signatures you'll have to deal with although if you've listened to the song a thousand times, this shouldn't be a trouble.
- The only hard part on BC&SL is the bridge on TCOT, the one that leads to the quiet Floydesque section.
- On ADTOE there is a lot of hard material coming up, so bassists, get ready to practice !

In general, apart from just playing the songs, I think it's more important that you "take home" their "messages". Like, when you are trying to pull something off, focus to one piece of technique and perfect it. You might have to work on tapping or playing 16ths at a high speed or playing complex rhythmic patterns at high speeds, even musical memory. To me it's very important to understand something you play, maybe even more important than actually playing it. Only then will you actually learn something as a bass/guitar/keyboardist/drummer by learning a song.

[Icebear]

Yeah, Dance of Eternity is a handfull... The thing is, the time needed to master a song like that has to come out of the time I need to make my own music. So it's not the most practical use of my time right now. But I do wish I could spend my retirement years in a nice cottage, with my 6-string, a practice amp and DT's entire back catalogue... That'd be perfect!

[The Silent Cody]

I have to admit that I even practice DT songs more than my own music...which is simple to play for me, even when I try to make my own bass lines as more interesting as they can be... Things that I created, even if they are tough to play are easier for me, because they're mine. But, on ADTOE are some really hard bas lines to play It will be a nice challenge 

[Icebear]

I bet. I guess I'll find out in the weeks to come. At least now we can hear Mr.Myung!

[The Silent Cody]

Yeah, bass is sounding really nice now. I will defintily not trying to learn Lost Not Forgotten opening instrumental section from 1:55 to 2:34