BACKGROUND: I started playing bass when I was 14. Out of the blue one day the bass line to a song on Mtv struck me as very cool sounding and I wanted to learn. It was thick, warm and progressed in a mesmerizing rhythm. The song was "New Year's Day" by a band called U2. Weeks later on my 14th Birthday My dad took me to a music store in the mall in Mira Mesa CA and bought me a P-bass copy made by Electra. The year was 1982. It was a good copy but very ugly and not at all metal looking. It was a brown darkwood tone copy of the Same P-bass Peter Baltes of Accept used to record for and play the Balls to the walls tour, however I would not know this for a few years until it dawned on me. I also got an amp made by Rickenbacker with a 15 inch in it and 35 watts. I soon blew the speaker when I found that overdriven sound of distortion and could not stop playing that way. When I started I was not even into metal or music much. I had no dreams to become a rock star I just wanted to learn how to play and at first I did not even have any ambitions to be a great player just wanted to be able to play some lines. All that changed when I got into metal about a year later and I took to metal and playing bass guitar with a great passion that changed the course of my life. Whereas I had always thought about I would join the U.S. Army as a child, all my ambitions went into my new found ambitions in metal and this wonderful musical instrument called the Bass guitar. My only taste in metal prior to this was a passing interest in KISS in my pre teens. For the first five years I practiced every day for at least five hours and loved every minute of it. If I so much as made one little mistake even mis fretting I would play the entire song over again. My social life never blossomed of course but I was doing what I wanted to do..... By the way I finally got around to learning that U2 song in late 2003. Please Check out my youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMYTJbykkzzbkCLZeLISysQ/videos 20 Years Experience playing in metal, powermetal, thrash and death metal. Most recent experience in Black Metal. Have studio and much stage experience, radio play. Have Demo or video, will send upon request. GEAR: FOUR Hartke Bass cabs. 4X10/1X15, HARTKE LH 1000 Bass heads. Rack w/compressor/tuner/rack light and power strip/rack EQ in SKB Roto Rack case. Professional guitar cables. DOD pedal effects (EQ) MXR Metal Distortion Pedal . Rogue 50 watt practice amp. (I sold the Marshall Rig I had years ago. I used to run two full stacks of Marshall Bass cabs) Also play Ampeg SVT-8 pro and a SVT-450 with 6x10 and 4x10 cabs Basses Two Jackson neck through concert bass guitars, 1988 Fender P bass Standard/Japan in Blue Sparkle. 2016 MIM Fender P bass standard white maple neck. Bands: Local San Diego bands. Been in a few and played about 300 gigs my entire practicing musician career. Largest venue played was a sold out 800 seater. Mostly I played Clubs. Have played at house parties and barns on Indian Reservations. Craziest fans you will ever play for. True maniacs. Even did a USO show for the Navy. Pacific Northwest Music Scene, play black metal in clubs and basement venues. Instruction: I informally taught bass to local bass players at beginning and intermediate level. My rates were half that of the pro's and twice as long. An hour. I had maybe 4 students at different times. My most famous student/students I taught at the beginning level was James Waller Bass player for The Impossible Five, Red Eye Records Recording artists. I once showed a school buddy named Frank Mercurio a black Sabbath riff. He was hooked and bought a bass a few weeks later. In 2000 he ended up on Cypress Hill's live at the Fillmore. PHILOSOPHY: I don't care for distortion much but am open to using it, but very sparingly. Much like Cliff Burton did. To me as a bass player there is not much point in tuning below D. Four String basses will always be real bass guitars. I once owned a Jackson five string but generally the styles and playability of most the five strings on the market suck. But any bass player playing a bass with more then 5 strings should buy a guitar IMHO unless your less Claypool. The Pick vs. fingers debate; When the Fender Percission bass was invented the bass guitar went from stand up accoustic to an electric bass you could wear like a guitar. At that point finger playing was outdated and it only held on due to tradition. While Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden type metal still sounds good with fingers 99% of all modern Metal is not suited for anything but pick playing. Today's metal is tight and precisely executed and finger playing is not conducive to the execution of modern metal styles. The only metal i really enjoy playing with my fingers is when playing along to the older Iron Maiden Stuff. Basically I feel those who say real bass players play with their fingers are just full of hot air, and i can say that because I can play with either fingers or a pick. I like Punk and Metal but don't really mix the two. My sound is deep and punchy a lot like Paulo's sound on Arise. My strong points are my ability to know where I am in a song at all times. Excellent memory for song order. My picking hand is fast and I play triplets and fast passages with ease. I can play with my fingers or a pick but like the pick for thrashy fast stuff, all depends on the song. I work well with any Drummer who knows his music. If the Drums are tight and fast I am locked in as if of one mind. I work well with others and am very keen on details as to notes played and Drum time vs. bass time. Excellent time and solid grove ability. I've never been known to "overplay" preferring to keep the bass in it's role as a bass. But have the ability to play out front with excessive riffing if I want. I play for the song so that is rare and only when called for. I know the scale and fretboard (Example: 3rd Fret E-string G, 4th, a G sharp or A flat. ) and play by ear. Don't know much theory. I make very few errors playing the set list. I seem to write about 3 solid songs a year and can contribute riffs and ideas to songs by others. I work off the creativity of others very well. No touring experience but experience in playing nightly shows, in different venues, multi times a week/month. To the point it seemed like touring. Forgetting what day it was, losing sense of time, being dead tired Etc. Early influences were Judas Priest, Dio, Iron Maiden, Spinal Tap, Savatage, Armored Saint, Accept, Saxon, Slayer, Piledriver, SOD and Flotsam and Jetsam. Later influences include MegaDeth, kreator, Psychotic Waltz, Defiance, Deliverance, Death Angel, Testament, Sacred Reich, early Sepultura, Morbid Angel, Death, HEXX, Six Feet Under Etc. The bass players who influenced me the most would be 1. Jimmy Bain 2. Steve Harris 3. Ian Hill 4. Dave Ellefson. My personal style would lay somewhere between, David Ellefson, Troy Gregory, Paulo Jr and Mike Kaufmann Bass players I greatly admire but who did not influence me or the influence was indirect, coincidental or minimal for whatever reason. 1. Cliff Burton 2. Markus Crosskopf 3. Alex Webster 4. Troy Gregory 5. Paulo Jr. 6. Joey Vera 7. Mike Kaufmann 8. Andy Taylor 9. Steve Digiorgio 10. Greg Christian 11. Derek Smalls REVIEWS of My Work: 1. Bassist, Mike William is a meticulous team player. His bass lines are fluid and masterfully aggressive simultaneously, with great tone and sound quality. Whether he's hammering out fast lines or laying down some pounding metal grooves, you can hear that he puts everything he has into what he does. Impeccable timing and top-notch metal bass playing is his forte'. -Guitar-2001- Michael Knight for, www.guitar2001.com 2. I finally got a chance to listen to the CD. I thought the bass playing was good! I'm not a huge fan of that genre of metal the band was playing, but it was tight. If I had to make one criticism, it would be that the bass tone blends in too much with the guitars and drums so that it gets a little lost in the tones of the rest of the band. I'm not being a dick, this is a problem that I've been struggling with for years! I did like it though, and think Michael William a good bass player. Obviously my opinion matters nothing in what he's trying to do to achieve his own identity as a bass player. Jon Necromancer-USURPER www.usurper.us Some assorted bass tabs of a few of my riff's that demonstraight my style. (All Riff's below are copyrighted.) (Note the tabs were typed up backwards. It's been years since I looked at tabs, I jelled ok?? Just turn it around. ) Riff #1. (Good excersises I based a few riffs on) E_5____7_________________________________________________ A___6____6______________________8________________________ D____________5_________7_________________________________ G_________________6______________________________________ Repeat/loop the riff and play over a few times. Riff #2. Bass Intro E_0_0_0_0_0_0_3________________3___________________________ A_______________2______3____2______________________________ D_________________1__2____1________________________________ G___________________1______________________________________ E_0_0_0_0_0_0_3________________3___________________________ A_______________2______3____2______________________________ D_________________1__2____1________________________________ G___________________1______________________________________ E_0_0_0_0_0_0_3________________3___________________________ A_______________2______3____2______________________________ D_________________1__2____1________________________________ G___________________1______________________________________ E_0_0_0_0_0_0_3___________________________________________ A_______________2______3_____7______11________15___________ D_________________1__2_____6_____10_______14______________ G___________________1____5_____9_______13__________________ Loop and repeat. Riff #3 E_0__2__3________5______3________________________________ A__________5__4_____2____________________________________ D________________________________________________________ G_______________________________________________________ Loop 4 to 8 times. (This riff was used in a song I recorded for. ) Riff #4 (Thrash Riff) E_1_1_1__0_1_1_1_1______1_1_1___0_1_1_____________1_____ A______2__________2_3_________2______2_3____3__2________ D_____________________2___________________2_____________ G_______________________________________________________ Play above riff fast and constant in a loop. Riff #5 E0_3_2__2_3____0__3_2__2_3_____0__3_2__2_3____0__3_2___3_2 A_2____3_____2____2____3_____2___2____3_____2____2___3_2 D____________________________________________________ G______________________________________________________ Loop above riff 4 times and play fast. Use index and ring finger to fret or it will be hard to play it to proper speed. FAST Continued..... I am into all the new stuff now like Incantation, Nile, From the Depths, Disgorge, Serberus, The Haunted, Iced Earth, Imagika, older In Flames, Immortal, Kabbal, ThroCult, Usurper Etc. And I have gone back into metal history and now appreciate bands I passed up like Celtic Frost, Possessed, Vio-lence, Cannibal Corpse, Sadistic Intent and Hirax/Phantasm, Carcass, Sadus Etc. I always have and always will love Bay Area Thrash! Top 15 All Time great Albums in my view are (In Random order) (** Marks albums that changed me as a musician or set me on a new road in metal and song writing. ) 1. ARISE - Sepultura ** 2. RUST IN PEACE - Megadeth 3. HUMAN - Death ** 4. PIECE OF MIND - Iron Maiden ** 5. THE NEW ORDER - Testament 6. VOID TERRA FIRMA - Defiance 7. THE INFERNAL STORM - Incantation 8. METAL CHURCH - Metal Church 9. BALLS TO THE WALL - Accept 10. CRUSADER - Saxon 11. SPINAL TAP - Spinal Tap 12. COVENANT - Morbid Angel 13. A SOCIAL GRACE - Psychotic Waltz 14. HOLY DIVER - Dio 15. NO PLACE FOR DISGRACE - Flotsam and Jetsam ** 16. REIGN IN BLOOD - Slayer I do not tolerate nu metal influence in Metal Music. I like to keep it pure metal, heavy and that's it. I'am a metal purist. Morbidly mellow guitar is great but no Korn'ish riffs please. In shorts no Korn, no nu metal, no Slipknot/slipkorn Mallcore, baggy pants and wigger rap core. I am not at all interested in playing in any band with even a hint of nu metal, and I don't care how much it pays. Currently an active member of a band but looking for a second project. I am in the market for band offers and will relocate for the right band and the right sound and people. The project should be cutting edge and have a vision. Must have at least an indy record deal. Must have a consensus style of inner management. I am 50 years old so I have been around. I am looking to hook up with musicians that know the more brutal and contemporary styles.