I decided to pick up playing again. I gave up like ten years ago after having barely started, and I've just been lugging instruments around since. This time, rather than guitar, I decided I would learn bass because I've been listening to a lot of post punk lately.
I'm currently using Rocksmith 2014 (I bought it in like 2015), and it's been pretty good so far, but I would like to know where to go after I get the basics down.
- What kind of music theory should I be looking into?
- Are there any pitfalls to avoid?
- What bad habits should I avoid ingraining in myself with self study?
- At what point should I look into lessons?
I have a beautiful fretless bass that my partner got off of one of their relatives, and I know that's starting on hard mode, but it's what I have and I like it now that I know I pretty have to play on the "fret" lines.
I am extremely out of practice, but here are some thoughts.
Learn how scales work, and how chords are composed by selecting notes from those scales. They make sets of scale flashcards (or you can print some). Get these and use them to practice different scales and arpegios. This will be even more important on a fretless instrument. You will need to work that much harder to develop muscle memory without the tactile feedback from the frets. It's also a good fundamental building block of music theory.
Watch a lot of videos.