First up is a little “game” for bass players, called Around the World in Bass. The idea is to post things which somehow relate to the bass guitar – brands, amps, bass players, basses, specs, etc. – and the only rule is that you have to use the last letter of the previous post as the first letter of your current post. Check it out!

Of special interest to any drummers out there is the Great Drum Albums thread. As the topic title implies, it’s essentially a growing list of MX member’s favorite albums based on drumming quality. Not only is it a great way to share your drumming influences with other musicians, but it’s also a great way to learn of new drum music you might not have heard before.

Also popular of late are the Favorite Video Game Soundtrack thread (self-explanatory) and the MXTabs Testimonials thread, in which we asked MX members to post something nice about our site. Some of the testimonials are very sincere, while others are somewhat bizarre and quite humorous! Either way, it’s definitely worth a read.

To reply to any of the forum topics listed above, please login or take a moment to register a FREE account with MXTabs.net, then start posting! To view hundreds of other music & musicians topics, visit the MXTabs.net Forum. We hope to see you there!

That’s why we thought it would be helpful to share with you the Ultimate Bass Guitar Song List, found within the MXTabs.net Bass Guitar Forum. This ever growing list of bass tabs (extracted below) is divided into 5 different skill levels – Beginner, Easy, Intermediate, Advanced, and Expert – and is compiled and moderated by members of the MXTabs.net community to assist their fellow bass players.

Please help us expand this list by registering with MXTabs.net (it’ll take less than a minute!), hopping over to the aforementioned Ultimate Bass Guitar Song List, and posting your suggestion(s). Or, if you prefer, simply leave a reply in the comment fields below and we’ll be sure to pass along the message. And to further aid you in finding the right bass guitar tabs for your skill level, we’ll update this post whenever new songs are added, so feel free to bookmark this page!

(Special thanks to MXTabs.net Forum moderator mhylands for coming up with this idea, organizing it, and seeing it through. Yeah, he rocks like that.)

Beginner Bass Guitar Tabs

• Fight For Your Right Bass Tab by Beastie Boys
• Brain Stew Bass Tab by Green Day
• The Middle Bass Tab by Jimmy Eat World
• Closer Bass Tab by Kings Of Leon
• Creep Bass Tab by Radiohead

Easy Bass Guitar Tabs

• Down With The Sickness Bass Tab by Disturbed
• Basket Case Bass Tab by Green Day
• Unsung Bass Tab by Helmet
• Are You Gonna Be My Girl Bass Tab by Jet
• Money Bass Tab by Pink Floyd
• Chop Suey! Bass Tab by System Of A Down

Intermediate Bass Guitar Tabs

• Hotel California Bass Tab by The Eagles
• Freak On A Leash Bass Tab by Korn
• Black Dog Bass Tab by Led Zeppelin
• Re-Arranged Bass Tab by Limp Bizkit
• World So Cold Bass Tab by Mudvayne
• Hysteria Bass Tab by Muse
• Give It All Bass Tab by Rise Against
• Like The Angel Bass Tab by Rise Against

Advanced Bass Guitar Tabs

• Run To The Hills Bass Tab by Iron Maiden
• Not Falling Bass Tab by Mudvayne

Expert Bass Guitar Tabs

• In The Name Of God Bass Tab by Dream Theater
• YYZ Bass Tab by Rush

Not surprisingly, we get many questions from our members inquiring about the licensing availability of Band X or Song Y, particularly in the MXTabs.net Tab Central Forum, where our talented tabbers are known to congregate. Although we’re more than happy to do all of the copyright “dirty work” for them, some have expressed interest in knowing how we go about finding the publisher(s) to a particular song. What follows is a quick look at four of the Basic Music Copyright Resources that we use at MXTabs.net to help determine a song’s publisher.

Three of these four resources are associated with the three performance rights organizations in the United States: ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC. According to Wikipedia, performance rights organizations “provide intermediary functions, particularly royalty collection, between copyright holders and parties who wish to use copyrighted works publicly.” Luckily for our purposes, they also provide searchable databases that contain songwriter, performer, and publisher information on millions of copyrighted songs. Here are links directly to their databases:

ASCAP ACE Title Search
BMI Repertoire Search
SESAC Repertory Search

Once there, you have the option of searching by song title, songwriter, or artist/performer. One caveat: these searches are somewhat finicky. For example, I just did a title search on ASCAP for “Stairways To Heaven” and it returned no results, but of course “Stairway To Heaven” returned the famous Led Zeppelin song. Similarly, an ASCAP writer search for “Sarah MacLachlan” returned no results, but “Sarah McLachlan” did.

When you have found the song that you’re looking for, you will be able to view the publisher(s) who administer the rights to said song. MXTabs.net has literally thousands of signed contracts with music publishers, so we are unable to list them all here. However, I will say that if you see the words Alfred, Warner, WB, Sony, Bug, MGB, Z-tunes, or Z-songs then chances are that we have rights to display a tab of that particular song. If you have specific questions about what publishers have signed with MXTabs.net, feel free to ask in the comments below, or make a post in the License Availability Thread on the MXTabs.net Forum.

The fourth basic music copyright resource that we use is in many ways similar to the three performance rights organizations listed above. The Harry Fox Agency collects and distributes mechanical license fees on behalf of music publishers, and their website offers a very handy search that can provide you with songwriter, performer, publisher, and album info if you’re having problems finding a song on ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC. Here a link to the HFA database:

HFA Songfile Public Search

Although there are numerous other resources, these four basic music copyright resources should help you immensely in finding the publisher(s) of a particular song, whether you’re curious to see if MXTabs.net can display a certain tab, or whether you want to use a copyrighted song publicly for any reason. As I already mentioned, if you have any questions then please ask away. We’ll do our best to give you a timely and accurate response!

First off, our collection of guitar, bass & drum tabs has grown dramatically. Fueled in large part by new licensing agreements (with Universal Music Publishing Group, Domino Publishing, and Notting Hill Music Group just to name a few), MXTabs.net has added over 25,000 tabs to our database in the past year. Yep, you heard me right, over 25,000 new guitar, bass & drum tabs!

As far as usability and new features go, just a few of the more noticeable changes of the past year include the addition of the MXTab Auto-Scroll, notification of when a Guitar Guru session of a particular song is available, and the offering of ringtones of your favorite song tabs. Additionally, our search pages and user profile pages have undergone minor face lifts to help improve your MXTabs.net experience.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the MXTabs.net community itself has continued to grow and become a source of shared knowledge for other musicians. Be it the Taboo Drum Tab Editor, MXTabs Forum Music Competition, or the Legend of MXTabs RPG, our users seem more than happy to help each other out in their pursuit of musical knowledge and good times, which is why we’re here in the first place!

So, to help commemorate our one year anniversary, MXTabs.net would like to give away some free t-shirts, stickers & keychain bottle openers. We regret that we don’t have any Taylor Guitars to give away, such as when we launched, but free MXTabs.net merchandise is still pretty cool, no? To get your free MXTabs.net merchandise, simply leave a comment below and let us know your thoughts on year one of our existence.

Here’s to a successful 1st year, and looking forward to an even more successful 2nd!

I was hoping to read late breaking band news, find some tour dates, maybe listen to a few new tracks, watch a couple of videos… you know, the normal stuff that people visit MySpace for. What this exercise reinforced though (and this will come as no surprise to many of you) was that MySpace Musician Profiles are generally unattractive, cluttered places not conducive to quick, easy use.

As I continued searching, however, I began to notice that some Musician Profiles somehow bucked the tide and presented useful information in a clean, appealing manner. Here are some of my favorites that I came across:

• Theory of a Deadman
• Deftones
• Damien Rice
• Muse
• Funeral For a Friend
• Dimmu Borgir

In her MXTabs.net guest blog series, MySpace Diaries, Candy Bilyk walked you through why musicians should have a MySpace Music page, and how to go about starting one. I’d also suggest spending some time considering how you layout your MySpace Musician Profile. Take some cues from the profiles above and give your audience a clear, valuable resource to use.

Thoughts?

• Official Metallica YouTube Channel – In addition to official Metallica music videos, this channel also offers a playlist called YouTube Covers Metallica Takeover, which features Metallica’s favorite YouTube fans’ covers, including an 8 year old playing their hit song One (hey, if he can do it, so can you!), and an excellent piano arrangement of Nothing Else Matters. Also included are videos from www.missionmetallica.com featuring behind-the-scenes footage of the making of their most recent album, Death Magnetic – a definite must see for any Metallica fan.
• Official Radiohead YouTube Channel – The highlights of Radiohead’s YouTube Channel are, without doubt, the so-called “Scotch Mist” concert videos, filmed at Radiohead’s Oxford studio and featuring the entire In Rainbows album performed live. These “Scotch Mist” videos also include poetry readings and imagery created or selected by the band, giving further insight into Radiohead’s artistic milieu. Also worth viewing is the making-of the House of Cards music video, focusing on the various 3D technologies used to create it.
• Official Taylor Swift YouTube Channel – Here you can find all of Taylor Swift’s music videos, as well as video of several of her TV appearances. What I enjoyed viewing the most, however, were the 17 Taylor Swift video blogs made by the musician herself. These range in topic from a behind the scenes look at the 2008 CMA Music Festival, to a candid episode of Taylor at the orthodontist getting a new retainer, to an instructional video of Taylor showing everyone how to properly tie her famous leather Love Love Love bracelets. Very entertaining!
• Official Lynyrd Skynyrd YouTube Channel – Besides a few interviews shot during Lynyrd Skynyrd’s 2008 Simple Man Cruise, the bulk of this YouTube channel consists of video of live performances by the band… and let me tell you, there are some GREAT performances here. Check out the 10+ minute version of Free Bird or the slow rocker Tuesday’s Gone to see for yourself.
• Official Oasis YouTube Channel – The Oasis YouTube Channel, as expected, contains many of the band’s classic music videos: The Importance Of Being Idle, Wonderwall, and Supersonic just to name a few. There are also a few live performances and some interesting snippets from the 2007 DVD release Lord Don’t Slow Me Down. Best snippet? Liam’s birthday party with midgets. Check it out.

So, there you have it. Now get back to practicing! First though, I’d be interested in knowing some of your favorite official YouTube band and/or artist channels. List them below, if you’d like, and let me know. Till next time, toodaloo!

Anyway, without further ado and long-winded predications, here are some t-shirts that will amplify your cool factor just by wearing them. It’s a cheap way to establish your trademark performer or band image, so choose wisely. Don’t believe me? Yeah, well these t-shirts are so awesome they speak for themselves! (Not to mention, I picked ‘em out. HAH!)

For starters, why not play your band’s music on a t-shirt? You heard me right. Embedded in this cotton marvel is the ability to incorporate a playlist. How freaking cool is that? Not only are you aiding and abetting your music distribution, who wouldn’t stop you to ask you where you got that rockin’ tee from? And no, we didn’t post a picture because seriously? It’s cool to be legal.

T-shirts from webcomics that emphasis bands, like Questionable Content, can instantly increase your “kewl” factor because they are often a great conversation starter. This t-shirt featuring Pintsize (an anthropomorphic robot) might appeal to your wearing pleasure; if not you can always get a t-shirt that represents one of the fictional bands in the strip.

If you’re looking for 80s retro tees look no further than a site that specializes in everything eighties — including the infamous band tees that used to be every concert-goers badge of honor. From Led Zeppelin to Devo (oddly enough, wearing flower pots on their heads) you can find quite a few band tees that are a throwback to music that inspires. This store, dubbed Concert Tee offers quite a few more, including some contemporary bands. (For meself, I’m looking for ye olde Queen tee. If ye find one, let me know — would ya?)

‘Course, there’s always the obscure or funny tees like this Han Rockin Solo t-shirt. The nice thing about some of the “newer” sites is that they’re a bit more female-friendly for those of us of the female persuasion. I have started a t-shirt collection, but some of them are quite a bit boxy. My favorite t-shirts proudly display slogans like, “I’m not dead yet” (purchased at Spamalot) and “Zombies like a girl with brains.”

Last but not least, the worn tee — that’s right, your old stand-by lucky t-shirt that’s stood the test of time — can be cool. Just…make sure it doesn’t smell, okay? One of my well-loved tees are the ever-popular (and really affordable) MXTABS.NET t-shirts. In black because, well, that’s just me. Come on, you know you want one!

Inquiring minds want to know. What’s sitting in your closet? Where do you tee up for some great looks? Pictures? Do you even have a t-shirt collection?

Of course, our tabs are not a violation of copyright, as we actually have licenses in place for MXTabs. The only other site we are aware of that has licenses in place (at least that are recognized under U.S. law) is Guitar World Magazine’s tab site.

Anyway, it’s quite a lengthy read and definitely gets into some legalese, but it’s worth a read for anyone who’s been following the legality of guitar tabs online.

http://www.law.arizona.edu/Journals/ALR/AL…mon%20FINAL.pdf

Anyway, we thought you should know why certain tabs may no longer be available. Per our policy, any tabs that are under dispute from a publisher are removed from the site.

The new functionality is the MXTabs “friends” system. We call it Bandmates. Basically when you’re viewing someone’s profile (and you’re signed in), you can click the “Add Me” link below their image to add them as a friend.

Here’s how it works:
- When you add someone, you become their groupie and they become your idol.
- If they reciprocate the friendship (they add you too), then you become bandmates.

A word of warning though: bandmates can post on each other’s “stall” (comment section), an idol can post on a groupie’s stall, but a groupie cannot post on an idol’s stall. So before you go crazy adding everyone, keep in mind that they can talk about you on your stall but you can’t talk about them.

There are a few small known bugs with the system, and those are being addressed – but on our beta site. Everything should be working perfectly come July 1st.