New Years Day by U2 bass tab (text):

Song: New Year's Day
Artist: U2
Album: The Best of 1980-1990
Tabbed by: Jim Kinniburgh (taninivver@aol.com)

Fist off, this is my first-ever submission, but it illustrates a problem I see in a 
lot of tabs in the archive: Some tabbers do one-string versions that require a lot of 
jumping or sliding between multiple, widely separated frets.  

Example (from Alex Stroshane's version of New Year's Day):

"MAIN RIFF

G]-------------------------------------------------------------
D]-------10----------2----------5---------5--------------------
A]--12-12--12--12-12-0-3-3--3-3-37-7-7--7-7-7-0-7-7---7--7-7-
E]-------------------------------------------------------------"



After I nearly sawed my fingers off with all the fret-hopping and sliding, 
only to discover the tab was slightly off-key, I tried it like this:

New Year's Day by U2
Standard Tuning

Intro/Bridge
G]--------------------------------------------------------------------->
D]----6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6------------------------------------------------->
A]-----------------------6-----------6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6-6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6->     
E]--------------------7-7--7--7-7-7-7---------------------------------->

                                    
G]>---------------------------------|-----------------------------------
D]>--6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6---------------|-----------------------------------
A]>---------------------6-----------|-9-------7-------11------9------7--
E]>------------------7-7--7--7-7-7-7|-----------------------------------
                                     |Repeat each of these notes about 16 times|



Verse
G]---------------------------------------------------------------------
D]----6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6-------------------------------------------------
A]-----------------------6-----------6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6-6-6-9-6--6-6-6-6-  Repeat x6   
E]--------------------7-7--7--7-7-7-7----------------------------------


Chorus
G]-----------------------------------------------
D]----------------------------------------------- 
A]-9----------11-----------9-----------7--------- (repeat each note about 16 times)
E]-----------------------------------------------



That's it.  The order is: Intro, Verse, Chorus (once), Verse, Chorus (twice),
Bridge, Verse, Chorus (until song fades out).
A lot easier than hopping from the 10th & 12th frets to the 2nd & 3rd...


____________________________________________________________________________________
A HOPEFULLY HELPFUL NOTE:
If any of you want to avoid jumping multiple frets and would like to just play on
different strings while staying right around the same group of frets, it's easy to do.
Just add or subtract 5 to or from the fret (depending on which direction you want to go,
then move up or down one string.  For example, if you wanted to play U2's Unltraviolet 
(Light My Way), but found the tab looked like this (Roberto Cruz's excellent version):

G]----------------------------------------------------------------------
D]----------------------------------------------------------------------
A]---7-7-7-7-11-11-11-11-12-12-12-12--12--11-12--11-12--11-12---(repeat)
E]----------------------------------------------------------------------

you can move it all up to the 6th & 7th frets by subtracting five from the higher numbers
and moving up a string so it looks like this:

G]----------------------------------------------------------------------
D]-----------6-6-6-6-7-7-7-7--7--6-7--6-7--6-7-------------------------- (6=11-5, 7=12-5)
A]---7-7-7-7----------------------------------------------------(repeat)
E]----------------------------------------------------------------------

Or going the other way, add 5 and go down a string 
(also from Cruz's version of Ultraviolet):

G]------------------------------------------------------
D]------------------------------------------------------
A]-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-12-12-12-12-/-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-0-0-0-0
E]------------------------------------------------------

to make it look like this (unless you really want to keep the slide in there):

G]----------------------------------------------------
D]-----------------7-7-7-7---------------------------- (7=12-5)
A]-----------------------------------------0-0-0-0----
E]-9-9-9-9-7-7-7-7---------9-9-9-9-7-7-7-7------------ (9=4+5, 7=2+5)

This process simplifies the tab, while keeping the notes the same, and you use less arm
as you play.  Granted, the fingering will take practice if you aren't used
to playing on more than one string, but it never hurts to develop your dexterity.
This process will NOT correct tab that is off-key; you'll still have to go back and 
figure out the right notes.

Enjoy!
--Jim