wanting to do some solo stuff - Advice?

[Trey]

I've been wanting to do some instrumental stuff, but I never know what to record! I know This may sound like I'm asking you guys to give me the meaning of life, but where do I start? I don't have a cool song ready to record, and I don't even have a band to record with. how do you guys come up with material? I managed to kinda throw an improv together with an aebersold track at myspace.com/TreyFriend , but it's kinda suckish. Any thoughts on coming up with material?

 

[Pedro]

This is how i began to learn - and before anyone says anything i know that tab is bad and no substitute for real sheet music. And i know that Matt Freeman is not everyone's favourite bassest BUT he is better than a lot of other bass players and, most importantly, he has some damn fine bass lines!

So anyway I picked a few of my favourite Rancid songs and learnt them through tab, then I worked out what the actual notes were and began playing them in different places on the fretboard and in different keys, occasionally modifying them and - very bluntly - stealing very small parts of riffs to use in my own work.

If you wanna be a good writer you need to read, if you wanna be a good bass player you gotta listen.

EDIT: Forgot to mention, this is an invaluable tool if you are going to use Tab to aid your learning, especially if you're not overly familiar with notation:

https://www.studybass.com/lessons/reading-music/bass-clef-fretboard-notes/

(click the Bass Notes Clef on the Fretboard pdf)

It's worth having to hand at all times, especially if you are reading from tab so you can quickly cross reference the numbers on the tab to the actual notes you are playing

 

[Trey]

And all this time I've been trying to just pull something out of my butt hahaha. Soo it's just getting inspired and molding riffs you learn into songs of your own? I can do that! hahaha. I even did that when I was in a band, but it never occured to me that doing that was a practical strategy for solo stuff too.

Also,
Thanks for telling me that reading can be a big factor in writing. It's a good thing I already know how to read, because I can get right to work hehe.

Anyway,
Thanks for answering my question. Everything is so clear now.