TimR

I caught some if it. Will try to catch it on iPlayer later this week. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tkm9m It was all about rhythms. 4 part series.

There's always a balance to be had. Sitting in a pit sight reading tends to sharpen your skills. Good luck.

My two 2x10"s lie on their backs in the middle of the sitting room. I have a sheet of toughened glass that fits over the top to make a centre-piece coffee table that any bass player would kill to have in their house. Anyway back to the real world... No.

At the last gig I drank lager.

I've had a listen to some of that this morning and it's not very subtle. As an example of playing behind the beat I'm not sure it's a very good example as an introduction. Probably too 'jazz' for most people.

Have you setup a profile on Bandmix looking for other musicians or are you just trying to find bands looking for a bass player. In my experience bands don't always advertise, but they do look (no idea why) and bandmix used to notify you if someone had look at your profile, even if they went no further. You can use that info to 'reverse engineer' an audition with people who look.

[quote name='blue' timestamp='1428006675' post='2737066'] ... I don't know what it's like in the UK culturally when it comes to dancing, but over here most guys can't and won't dance, so it's mainly the ladies dancing with the ladies. Blue [/quote] Nope that's pretty much the observation. The girls dance and the guys watch the girls and the band. If the band isn't much to look at then they need to play the tunes that attract the girls. Then the girls will bring their guys with them. Classic rock isn't ever going to drag people away from xfactor. The secret is to play bang up to date songs. It can be done well with a three piece with enough imagination. Previously this was always seen as the territory of the function bands.

I tend to ignore most of the wording in an advert. Most of it will be dressed up to make the band sound more attractive. As you say established, committed, busy are all very general terms.

Can you send me your setlist? Do you have a demo mp3 or video, or are you playing a gig with your current bassist/dep so I can come see you? How often do you practice and when? When would you expect to be playing the first gig with me? If the band doesn't have a setlist that gives you an idea of what stage they're at. A good setlist also give you a pretty good idea of whether they're in demand for gigs. It will be rare that the actual tunes they play are important to me in terms of whether they're the type of music I listen to. If they practice every week you could be looking at a hobby band who are not particularly interested in gigs. If they want me gig ready for a booked gig in two weeks then they're the band for me.

In think you've pretty much made it if you can regularly draw a double figure crowd.

[quote name='DiceSociety' timestamp='1430916969' post='2765884'] This link of john paul jones talking about, and demonstrating playing ahead of, and behind the beat is quite interesting I think. Skip to 11:50 on the link. Picture quality is pretty poor though, and it's a shame that his bass isn't plugged in. Oh well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaa1axJ63Qg [/quote] Led Zep and The Who are superb examples of where it is done really well in Rock.

Although I might start agreeing with ubit when he complains about pretentiousness if we're talking about abstract and avant guarde jazz.

[quote name='stuckinthepod' timestamp='1430909610' post='2765755'] Exactly. We had it at the weekend. Booked to play a new pub venue. We turn-up and it’s very “Wetherspoons” - modern pub interior. 50% of the wooden railed stage area is taken over by a fixed all singing dancing DJ booth. Set up the drum kit (enormous rack style kit) an there is so little space I’m off down one side almost behind the drummer, lead guitarist the same on the other side and singer has to set up mic stand on floor level - two steps down from the stage.. We had the first “turn it down” after 3 songs and another 2 songs later. No applause from crowd and a bad night was had by all. Possibly our worst gig ever. If you are venue that usually only supports talking and the occasional quiet disco or bingo why book a full fat rock covers band playing GNR, Sabbath, Zep etc? You didn’t enjoy it, Your punters didn’t enjoy it and we certainly didn’t enjoy it. For christ sake we are called St0rm K!ngs- what were you expecting - acoustic Carpenters covers! [/quote] I think it works both ways. And as I said upthread bands are generally too loud. Loudness isn't an absolute, it's what is appropriate for the venue. We're very careful which venues we approach and agree to play because we are aware of what is appropriate for some venues is going to be difficult (but not impossible) to achieve as a lot of the time the sound levels are increased by the audience which is beyond our control. We have played some of our best gigs at relatively low volume in small pubs but that does require a certain amount of musicianship. Particularly from the guitarist and the drummer .

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430913481' post='2765829'] I appreciate what you are saying now and think I am probably doing this subconsciously anyway as when I'm playing with a drummer in say a slow number, I will obviously try to lock in with him, but there's no way that I will be consciously listening to every drum hit to make sure I'm in time. Some of the swing will be supplied by me. I am also the singer which further proves I can't listen to the drummer all the time. Any bass hits will be "felt" and any that are slightly behind the drum hit will be so undescernable that you wouldn't notice this obviously. I get what you mean about the "feel" of a piece of music rather than just playing on auto, it's just the whole explanation that you are playing before or after the bass drum beat,that sounds like tosh to me as that would be clearly out of time. I think it's an understanding rather than dismissal that was needed and I apologise for any offence. I still think the crazy little thing videos are not the best example as the first one is clearly slower and not so "urgent" [/quote] Exacty. But the bass drum isn't the beat. The beat is the pulse is in your (and all the other musician's) head. The bass drum may well usually be on that beat but not always. Hence you're not actually listening for the drum beat to mark your time. You will be listening to it for other clues though. I thought if you listen to the two crazy little thing tunes in isolation from each other I was hoping you'd pick up in the amount of swing in the first one and the amount of drive in the second. I may strip the sound out of the videos and speed the first one up to the same speed as the original and see if it demonstrates it better. It may be that there is more room to add swing and feel it more if the song is slower but I don't think that is what is happening there. The bass players are two different people.

Same song. Different bass player. http://youtu.be/GqWObKeoET8 http://youtu.be/zO6D_BAuYCI

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430892838' post='2765550'] See this is what I'm talking about. There have been occasions when a drummer might have started a piece slightly too slow or quickly. You as a bass player will obviously follow to a certain point , but you will try and influence the way you want it to go by edging slightly one way or the other. The thing that gets me is, you would be wanting the drummer to , say, slow down, so once he has done this, you would be back on the beat. [/quote] Almost. The drummer doesn't change tempo and the difference between you is almost imperceptible so it feels like you're pulling the drummer along. If the drummer actually sped up you would lose that feel and the tune would sound boring. Often inexperienced musicians will speed up a song because it feels slow, even though they're playing it at the same speed as the original. A close analagy would be if you were driving a car at 40mph and it feels slow. You put your foot down and can feel the acceleration which is exciting but when you reach 70mph you stop accelerating and it soon starts to feel slow again. Obviously you can't keep accelerating as the tune/car would just end up going stupidly fast. It's the tension that gives the effect of urgency.

[quote name='Weststarx' timestamp='1430855518' post='2765345'] I think I get it now... If I were to record myself say playing Smoke on The Water on Guitar against a metronome, and then zoomed in massively on the waveforms I would see whether I am ahead or behind the beat because as humans we all have a sense of rhythm and interpret it differently onto an instrument. It sounds on time in person but on a computer you can see exactly where you are in relation to the beat. Is that about right? If so that was completely pointless spending time trying to work it out because it hasn't helped me in the slightest knowing what I do. [/quote] That is exactly right. Apart from the last bit. In the (patronising?) video I posted earlier, the guy goes into detail about how, and why, we should spend a lot of time getting our internal metronome as close as possible to the metronome. How we should put our timing under the microscope. That even though we think we're pretty good and have been playing for many years, we may be just following the drummer (or other musicians) and not actually influencing the feel of the tune ourselves.

[quote name='fretmeister' timestamp='1430845948' post='2765157'] ... I wonder if the problem is that in rock / pop etc the Mood of the music is dumbed down to Ahead Of the Beat / on The Beat / Behind The Beat rather than the huge amount of terms used to describe the mood that appear in classical music. ... [/quote] I think most of the problem is that in most bands you get a rock drummer who just bangs out a basic 'four to the floor' rhythm and expects everyone to be in time with him. Anyone not in time is 'wrong'. I've played with drummers like that. It's ok for out and out rock or marching bands. But it's no good if you want to dance to the music. It's a revolution when you play with a drummer who has great feel and once you've been spoiled you become very particular with which drummers you play with.

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430845171' post='2765142'] I didn't mean that he was patronising. I thought you were being patronising by posting a video of a guy explaining how to play in time to someone who has been playing in bands for a very long time. I've got no problem with playing in time. It's this playing out of time that I can't handle [/quote] Did you watch the first 10minutes of it? How he explained that no one is controlling the time during a piece of music and that is down to how the individual players rub off on each other?

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430843711' post='2765124'] Very patronising, cheers! [/quote] I thought he explained it wry well. Particularly when he talks about looking at where you place the note, in relation to the pulse, under a microscope. And how playing ahead and behind the beat gives a different feel. If you're finding all this patronising then you are missing out on one of the most important parts of being a musician. Playing in the groove.

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430841173' post='2765082'] I agree that when you have music digitalised and you can actually see the music in front of you, say on a computer screen, then you can move the bass swell to the left or right of the drum swell, which would make the bass behind or in front of the beat, and could alter the feel of the piece,but what I'm saying is a human playing live would struggle to play constantly behind or in front of the beat without sounding out of time. As shown by the clips that have been added to this thread. I agree that it could be done subconsciously I.e. you can get the feel of the piece and drag or rush without thinking. I will carry on playing in time with my drummer and I promise never to delve into the world of jazz to spoil anyone's behind the beat experience! [/quote] It's not jazz. It's all music. This guy explains what playing in a group is all about. http://youtu.be/cYVCfb5Ou88

[quote name='Weststarx' timestamp='1430827611' post='2764901'] Or is it a way of explaining whether a bassist really drives a song forward or whether they sit back and let someone else do it? [/quote] Yes. You can call it drive. Sometimes it's the drummer.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1430820982' post='2764791'] So where do the fairies come in exactly? [/quote] Just after the bass in the fourth bar.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1430820626' post='2764784'] I'm going to treasure that sentence. [/quote] If you work with Digital Audio Workstations, there's lots of talk about getting the Latency down. That's the difference between when you play a note, when it's recorded and when you hear it fed back to you from the workstation along with the guide track. In some cases (particularly vocalists and guitarists) it can be pretty big before the musician has a problem with it. In other cases (particularly drummers and bass players) it gets noticed a lot sooner and causes a lot of problems. Particularly because of what we are talking about here.

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430818939' post='2764766'] Yes it's a choice. If you want to sound like you've picked up the instrument for the first time! I think in a studio where you can alter the attack of notes, you could minutely bring the note forward or back, but to consciously play ahead or behind will make it sound out of time. Every example I've heard either sound right on the beat or so far out that it's laughable! [/quote] Think of the beat as a hole where you play a note. That hole is fairy big in terms of time on a millisecond scale. Think of the note you play as a snooker ball. The ball can drop into that pocket a number of ways, from slightly to the left, through dead centre to slightly to the right. All of these are 'in time' to our ears because our brain pulls them into where they should be. If the ball is too far left or too far right, it misses the pocket. Our brain can't pull that in and flags up as 'wrong'. However. If you fire enough balls in, one after the other in a regular pattern, you start to get a feel for where the balls are going. They're all 'in time' but have a different feel and give a different sense to the player. If you're playing behind the beat, your brain will want to push the bass forward and it'll feel lazy, if you play in front of the beat the brain will want to put the brakes on and it'll feel pushy or fast. That has nothing to do with tempo slow or fast and everything to do with how the musicians are playing. .