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Okie folks, as I guess most of you know, I've only just started out.
What I would love to learn is how to play by ear, and I was just wondering what it takes to learn such a skill.

Im thinking that if I say the name of the note in my head every time I hit it, that might help me remeber where all the notes are.

So what does it take?
What should I try and practice doing?
When could hear something and start playing it?
Any other usefull tips?

Actually it was the first song I learnt, I got the tabs for myself as the day I got the guitar. Tabs said to play it on E and A. O_o
I'll try it on A and D though...hmmz.

What I want to do is I want to learn how to play the funk I have on my PC by ear. Some of the basslines seem pretty simple. So Im resisting the urge to get tabs for that.
Thanks for the tips smile

Yeah, many people think it's played on A and D, it's really on E and A, actually drop E and drop A.
And really, you should try to find the bass lines to tunes b4 you go searching for the tabs. it really helps.
And funk is pretty easy, but I would also suggest to better yourself with walking bass lines. Also, get pretty fast at them. Try to learn 3-finger fingering style. I'm currently working on that and it's helping quite a bit!

how do you learn to play by ear? easy, iv'e been playing for a year now, and I just picked it up more and more over the time, basically you just learn to play the bass part to good, musical classic rock songs (dont learn punk stuff, because it's too simple; no offense, it's just not musical).

Walking bass line is a lot of what jazz and blues is centered around...
Basically it is defined as chord progressions and then some.
To construct good bass lines, or to take a look at some walking bass lines, go to either of these sites:
http://www.malletjazz.com/lessons/bassline.html
or
http://musicians.about.com/library/experts/bass_plus/bl_092402_walkinglines.htm

This in essance should be first nature to you as you start to play bass. You should also invest time in learing music theory, or at least have some sort of background in it. Because if you're going to play in a major band, and your band mate says "we're going to play this in am7," You need to know what kind of note progression is used. of course a am7 is different than a AM7. (am7= a minor seventh; AM7= A Major seventh) If your school offers a course in Music Theory take it! Or if they don't get instructional books and teach yourself. It really helps.

As for ear training, it's best to start out by using a piano. A piano will help you to easily notice the differences in flats to normal to sharps and vica versa better than if you do that on a bass guitar, especially electric. Though no matter what, you should be able to hear the differences with either instrument.

I didn't think I would ever be able to play by ear, but I'm starting to get the hang of it now. Still not perfect. Just practice it, works for me.

Playing by ear takes a lot of practice, but someone who doesn't have the talent to do so, can try forever and never get it. I think the stat is every one in a hundred musicians has the talent to recognize almost every note without seeing it on paper. There are even some people with perfect pitch, which means they regognize every note. All I can say is practice, especially by just listening to a song, and try and guess what key its in, or a certian note, then check to see if you were right.

ive been playing bass for a little ova a year now..and ive been learning song bye ear when i was about 2 months into my bass....i take after my dad(he plays guitar)...i have no idea what a single note is or octave....i just have a really good technique...the thing is, is that the more u keep playing..the more used u get to hearing what note u play on each fret, so then u can hear what the note sounds like on each song u wanna play