I've always been the type to learn better when teaching myself, so when I decided to pick up electric bass, I tried a number of self teaching guides. However, the Hal Leonard guides have been the only ones that I can truly say amount to an accurate self teaching guide. The books as well as the dvd walk you through everything right down to the finger positions. If you want to teach yourself bass, hal leonard guides are the only ones you should use. I definitely will go back to hal when I want to learn guitar next.