Bass - To use a pick or not to use a pick that is the question

Well i found my self nerd raging on youtube again ( *sigh i really need a life *) on some for posting the following comment

praise be to jesus he walks, in the beggining i thought he was going for a pick and i was like god damn it fucking cant stand it, im a bassist and i refuse to use a pick the sound isnt as clean and the skill is higher withouta pick casue other wise a fucking guitarist can pick up a bass and be a great bassist no thats bullshit lets see a guitarist walk like cliff,flea,ROB ( my hero) yea i know rob uses a pick but VERY RARLEY , takes great skill to walk like a champ on a bass

now normally i wont say much but the arrogance of this comment had me raging especcialy given the song we were postiong on was written for a pick..

i responded with the following comment

then you really must not like this song cause its was written to be played with a pick come to think of it most songs dave has written use a pick and honestly you are pretty narrow minded there is alot more tones and techniques available if you both. and note to you the reason some bassists use picks is for a non clean sound, if all muscians shared your narrow mind what a boring world we would live in

also what the fuck is with the guitarist slam. fyi knowing how to use a pick and knowing how to play bass are 2 TOTALLY seperate things i can do almost any kind of picking with no more then a few minutes of practice am i a great bassist . fuck no

In my personal opinion a using a pick is just as acceptable as not .

Edit - Song was Dawn Patrol by Megadeth

do you agree or am i way off bass... heh

I personally like playing without pick because I learned how to play wihout, but I'm not playing metal or stuff, more the pop music so that's not really fast and a pick is not necessary. I tried with pick and.. Failed.

Well, personally i have no experience with a bass.
But a friend of mine who's in a band thats touring europe and soon to be in america switched from using a guitar to playing bass.

He didn't mention anything from using pick or not but did say that for recording an album in a studio its better to just use downstrokes unlike a guitar in a studio with you can use up and downstrokes.

He's quite a good musician so i believe him, but i never tested or tried this before.

Masuramea wrote:

Well, personally i have no experience with a bass.
But a friend of mine who's in a band thats touring europe and soon to be in america switched from using a guitar to playing bass.

He didn't mention anything from using pick or not but did say that for recording an album in a studio its better to just use downstrokes unlike a guitar in a studio with you can use up and downstrokes.

He's quite a good musician so i believe him, but i never tested or tried this before.

0.o thats new to me ive never heard of that and i would love to see it in execution lol some songs are hard enough to play fast enough without alternate picking lol

I've played bass for a very long time. Through most of them I have just used my fingers, because the material played NEVER called for 16th notes and NEVER a speed faster than 140 bpm. Now we have a guitar player and I have switched back to bass, I have a hard time playing many our new songs without a pick. Many have 16th notes and bpms from 160 to 200 bpm. I have seen bass players do it, but this is Kung Fu I do not have. So I decided to just use a pick, it is a HUGE adjustment for me, but I don't think many bass players will think any less of me (I will have to call my friend Trent who's an awsome bass player). I used to think it was fingers of nothing, then you start listening to other bass players and realize it is simply a personal choice, neither is bad.

Well unfortunately i never had the oportunity to play bass...although i'd really like to.
So I can't tell my opinion on that, but I agree with Machine's post!

I have a bass, and i have played it a bit, but it really comes down to the difficultly of the song for me, if its too fast, then i just stick to the pick.

Another of my favorate bass players is Chris Squire from (the very not metal) prog band Yes. You may dislike the song, but check out the bass playing in Heart of the Sunrise. Considered one of the best bass players from the 70's through to the 80's. And guess what, he uses a pick. Obviously Dave Ellefson does as well and I've always thought he was pretty good as well ... Then there is Geddy Lee another bass god who plays with his fingers but I noticed a interesting technique. When playing 16th notes (like in the song Animate) he sort of strums with his finger (very much like a big pick) and he is doing more of this on the newer albums (apparently he is starting to get a bit of arthritis in his fingers).