Introducing the MakingBass web site.

First look at the Darkglass Ultimate fuzz pedal.

First look at the Darkglass Ultimate octave pedal.

What bass I'm using for the Darkglass Ultimate article & demo As you can see from my warm-up video, I'm using a 2026 Ibanez SR1320SB 4-string. When I was first writing material for this demo, I was using an Ibanez SR1350B. The SR1350 uses Nordstrand Big Single pickups. The SR1320SB uses Nordstrand Big Singles. There's definitely a difference. I have another video mapped out that demos the two pickups side-by-side. But I get ahead of myself. For the Darkglass Ultimate pedal de

A quick look at what's coming in my Darkglass Ultimate pedal article and demonstration.

How Should a Bass Player Plan for a YouTube & Social Media Journey I've been doing some form of social media for the last 6.5 years. Not always consistently, but I've published a fair amount of bass and related videos over that time. It's been interesting and fun. And frustrating. With the launch of the MakingBass.com site, I've been trying to find that balance between the time and effort it takes to create a video/blog post/YouTube Short/Instagram post/etc. and spending time

Announcing the availability of issue 0 of 16-BITOCRACY and FundMyComic.

My way and method of doing a bass guitar review with the Ibanez SRMS725.

My thoughts and review of the Ibanez SRMS725 5-string bass.

About the song "Ashen World" I've always been a big Kamelot fan, going way back to the initial era with Roy Khan to the current era with the amazing Tommy Karevik. The band is a perfect blend of songwriting and concept. I really like it when a band pays attention to everything, from the music (naturally) to the performances to the outfits to the artwork, it creates a whole aura around what they're expressing. This is Kamelot. Of course, it's all grounded in great music. And K

The Hercules Wrist Band of comic book ad fame.

It's an odd title, isn't it? Some of you computer geeks out there probably get it. Let me explain... Last year Kiko Loureiro released his Open Source album. A fantastic album from one of metal's best guitarists. He also made available all the song stems so anyone could download and create their own versions. Hence the name "Open Source." He also published a video playing a modified version of the song "Overflow," called "Overflow Jam." The concept was to allow another video t

This short piece came out better than I had hoped. Wasn't sure the final result was going to work given the busy, slap bass style used from start to finish. Listen, then read on! Practice Exercise to Derek Sherinian? I wrote the bassline about two years ago when I was spending a lot of time practicing my double-thumb slap technique. I remember Victor Wooten demonstrating how to do the double-thumb slap technique from his first instructional video many, many years ago. One of

After recording a bassline for Overflow Jam!, I decided to try another tune from Kiko Loureiro's Open Source album. I chose the second song I heard; the album's second track, Electronic Dependent Mind (EDM), Note: The YouTube and Instagram vids are exactly the same outside of one thing: the levels. After posting both to YT and IG, a few people commented the bass was lost in the mix. (Also, for some reason the whole piece doesn't play on IGTV. Not sure why, but that's a concer

Well, that took longer than expected. When I first became aware of Kiko Loureiro's "Overflow Jam" song, I thought it was a great idea and something I had to do. For those that don't know, Kiko put out a modified version of his song "Overflow" - from his 2020 solo album Open Source - that stripped away all the guitar solos and melodies. Left in its place were the rhythm guitars, drums, bass, and some keyboards (which didn't play a lead role). The concept was that you had the f

A guest post today and one that really speaks to this whole Radius80 project (the site, the stories, the music). The '80s were a good time. A fun time. Although I certainly love the technologies available today, it has taken some of the mystery out of the world. Back in the day, you had to actively pursue avenues of news and information. No instant gratification. But the effort back then was certainly worth it! Here's one example below. As I'm looking over the images, what a

Yeah, it's a silly topic, but hey, besides being a bass player, I've been a comic book fan and collector for a long time now. I thought it would be fun to write about how I view my basses as they relate to Marvel characters. Interestingly, out of the 4 basses I'm going to talk about, 3 are most closely aligned to Marvel villains. Hmmm...I wonder what that means? Part 1 of 4 - Task Master Starting off with my main bass, my Ibanez SR 1400E So this bass is most like the Marvel c

I remember writing "Eclipse." It was 30 years ago (give or take a year). It was an all bass piece with 3 tracks. Not very impressive by today's standards, but back in the day, it was still fairly uncommon. It was also pretty uncommon to record a multi-track tune out of your house. Luckily, we had the "DAW" of the day, a Tascam Porta One. High tech at the time, the Tascam Porta One was a 4-track tape recorder. You could bounce tracks, apply very simple EQ, adjust levels, do a

Part fretted. Part fretless. Why not? I've always loved the sound of a fretless bass. Not only do you get those unmistakable smooth tones, a fretless is a lot of fun to play. It can also open up your playing to new ideas and ways of approaching music. However, being mostly a metal player, and a bit of an old school metal player at that, I don't exactly have a huge need for a traditional fretless most of the time. Yet, I still wanted the flexibility of getting those fretless t