I agree with the above reviews. Having met Abe and seen his playing up close, he's VERY sincere about teaching and talking bass and I just didn't feel that here. I liked the fact that he did express to loosen up and play what ever it is you're playing with feeling. He explained his right-hand technique and how it differed from "the norm". He offered alternative suggestions to certain techniques that may be to difficult at first. In the video, he was loose to the point that he seemed almost unprepared to do a video. Kinda like someone said "Hey, let's do a funk video!" and they ran with it which doesn't seem like Abe to me. His playing is amazing and I wish the video could have been a little better content wise. For me it's fun to just watch Abe play and to try to play along with him, but anyone remotely familiar with funk probably wouldn't get much from this. It also quickly become abundantly clear that a drum machine would be a most excellent practice tool!!! As far as the video itself, the quality was fine; nothing special. Some people may have an issue understanding Abe's accent at first. The cutting out to the main menu after every segment was well beyond obnoxious. I don't know who's idea that was, but they ought to be beaten with an 18" driver. I got this for about $13 shipped and I don't feel cheated.

Tracy nailed this video.

Abraham Laboriel is obviously an extremely talented player and your jaw would rightfully hit the floor as he shows off some of his chops.

However, he comes across as a poor teacher in this video. He says, "You have to do this" but doesn't explain how to do it.

I prefer a teacher to say, "You need to learn to do this. Once you do that, it will make playing this line easier. And to get there, here is a drill to get you started."

I suppose I could figure out drills to do what he does, but to do so I have to rewind and replay certain parts of the DVD repeatedly often playing them at 1/4 speed.

Also as Tracy said, his presentation is unorganized.

Finally, the DVD is programmed in a most annoying way. After each segment, the DVD jumps back to the main menu and you have to manually select the next segment. Well, that would be OK, but they often cut poor Abraham off in mid-sentence.

It was very poorly organized and looked like Abe just showed up one day and did a "stream of consciousness" type lesson.

Buy a different video.

I have heard of Abe Laboriel before but had not heard or seen him play before.

He plays a very fun, basic funky style that was well-recorded both in the camera angle and in the audio recording.

He does not come across as a very good teacher. He seemed to be talking mostly off the top of his head. I thought the presentation could have been better organized.

He didn't break down his funk line by talking about the actual rhythmic values of the notes and the syncopations involved, but mentioned several times to "play with a lot of feeling" and emphasized playing with a drum machine to get that feeling. I don't think that's a useful way to describe funk style . . . feeling applies to all music. I think it would be more helpful to beginners to have a description of what constitutes a funk style beyond just a demonstration.

As a fairly new bass player trying to get the hang of slap and pop, I was a bit disappointed in this instruction. My learning style is start with the basics and add onto them one step at a time. This presentation was more freeform and Abe seemed to bring up topics as they occured to him instead of being organized in an outline form. However, a person who prefers to learn by watching a demonstration could probably get a lot from this video.

Overall, I did get some tips for rhythmic patterns to practice and how to play them which will be useful in my own practice. I do think there is a lot to slap/pop style that needs to be learned from a live person, who can show you directly not only how they do it but how you might be doing it wrong, as well as setting up your bass action to make it easier for you.

This would be a good video to rent for an evening, but for me it's not worth purchasing for my own use.

While I do think that this was an excellent video, I feel that he could have developed the teaching methods a bit more. Abe does focus a lot on playing what you feel, and stresses that if you cant really feel the music that you are playing, then why play? All in all Id recommend this for beginning players. He also shows some of his personal style of playing, which could be useful to beginners in trying to develop their own style.

This is a great video. Abraham inspires you to find the music in your playing. The lessons have improved my playing tremendously. He guides you through basic funk lines to very melodic and aggressive techniques and patterns.