Hi all - just a quick thought for you to ponder - what are the biggest non-musical influences on your music? what is it that inspires you to play, those events that make you want to pick up your bass? ever written instrumental stuff about specific events? tell all! :o)

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

good topic

back when i was working in factories during summer break from school, i used to get rhythmic ideas from the sounds of the machinery - lots of wierd polyrhythms happening. also, when i pull up behind another car and we are both taking a turn, the varying "tempo" of the turn singals sometimes makes a neat rhythmic pattern - they never line up.

Ah yes, the sound of indicators clashing is a great one - I quite often listen to those and try and work out what the template is - 7 against 13?????

i've often said that i want to sample the engine on my rather old and cranky diesel ford fiesta - 196,000 miles on the clock and more knocks, squeaks and generally odd background noise that you really feel comfortable with, and loads of polyrhythms going on - tape the car, transcribe the rhythms and see what comes out...

nice idea John, thanks :o)

any others, people? anything more esoteric? anyone inspired by love/hate/spirituality/injustice/comedy/nature/family/anything else? It does seem that the best music has some kind of higher purpose than showing off chops and impressing other musicians, so it seems sensible that if that's what we aspire to, that's where we should be looking! :o)

cheers

steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Well..I wrote a song about my roommate in my boarding school. I don´t want to post the lyrics here because I´d get banned if I´d do that! I know it´s not like an event or something, but I guess I could say he´s a non musical influence..
BTW...Steve, my friend Kjarri has your cd and I love it, although I haven´t been able to order it myself. I noticed that there are some really weird, but cool sounds on it, like in Pillow Mountain.

I think I am staying on topic when I ask have you guys ever seen the movie Tap with Gregory Hines?

I speaks a lot about using the grooves in every day life to get ideas.

Pretty cool flick.


As far as feelings go I try to bring Love/Hate/Comedy into my playing. Pretty much always have a bass available to me so its pretty easy. Another thing that helps to rile up the neighbors in my apartment building it to build a groove off of their banging on the wall. :D

Originally posted by phreaky
BTW...Steve, my friend Kjarri has your cd and I love it, although I haven´t been able to order it myself. I noticed that there are some really weird, but cool sounds on it, like in Pillow Mountain.

you DO know that those piano like sounds are piano, not bass, right? ;) heh..

anyway, I just try to bring whatever I feel around me into my playing...

I've been meaning to watch Tap for years, and will go and see if I can find it - thanks for the tip!

The sounds on Pillow Mountain just came out from an improv which I was lucky enough to be recording - I was just sitting being mellow, playing and experimenting with sounds, and with the E-Bow - there are some fairly out pitch shift effects on there, a tremelo on one of the lines and a few other things, but I wasn't really thinking about stuff like that while I was playing, it was more looking for a general feeling of relaxation, with a slightly darker undertone... :o)

and yes, the Piano on Bittersweet is a real piano - MIDI bass has never really appealed to me. I had the Yamaha system on my bass for a while when I demo'd it at a music show years ago, but was completely uninspired by it - if I need a piano sound, i'll get a pianist in... :o)

keep them thoughts coming...

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Every now and then I like to visit my local art museum and just walk around for a couple hours. Sometimes I'll come across a painting or sculpture that really speaks to me and I'll just stare at it for 10 or 15 minutes. I always leave there briming with possitive energy, it's a magical place. I espescially love the Pre Columbian and Medieval exhibits.

I think that it's a certain timeless element that really does it for me. To walk past all the rushing street traffic and tall industrial buildings to enter through the musuem doors and be confronted by a piece of ancient Incan ceramics, it just triggers something etheral in me.

One of my absolute favorite things to do is to take a long walk through a cemetery at dusk. It's so peaceful, it really helps to clear my mind of all the day to day hassles. I always feel like picking up the bass and letting it flow afterwards.

Books on Metaphysics really get my creative juices flowing as well. I'm not exactly sure why, but it works. Anything by Dean Radin. I think it helps to enhance the mathematical element in music. I write some of what I consider to be my more complex bass lines after reading up on Metaphysics, it's pretty interesting.


All in all I'm not sure what feelings I bring to my music. I'm sort of a blank slate throughout the process of writting. I've never sat down and said this is the emotion or emotions I want to represent in this song, though I haven't been writting very long either. I like to think I touch on all ends of the human emotional experience in my music. Maybe someday I'll know for sure :)

Originally posted by Darrell Ginese

All in all I'm not sure what feelings I bring to my music. I'm sort of a blank slate throughout the process of writting. I've never sat down and said this is the emotion or emotions I want to represent in this song, though I haven't been writting very long either. I like to think I touch on all ends of the human emotional experience in my music. Maybe someday I'll know for sure :)

I think this is half the fun of writing/playing/improvising instrumentally - the inspiration is often not at all obvious, even to you as the writer. To that end, I find naming bits of music rather difficult - if you're writing program music (music with a definite story or narrative to it), then I Guess it's easier, and may fall into the 'that bit of slapping is meant to sound like morris dancer's feet' idea, but for me, especially when improvising, the thought process isn't that clear, though I am still aware of there being a journey through the piece...

sometimes I will write something and then on listening back to it, realise where it came from. Bereavement is one of the big inspirations for me - partly cos words are so inadequate to deal with a sense of loss. Music does it much better, and is also able to capture the good and the bad at the same time without needing to draw lines between them.

I guess it's the abstractness of music that makes it so appealing as an expressive form - it means what you want it to mean, and will mean something completely different to the listener. I really don't mind whether someone listens to my stuff and thinks 'yeah, cool fretless chops!', or whether they connect with it on a deeper level, or even don't connect with it at all - the music is what it is, means what it means to me, and everything else is out of my control, and rather gladly so... :o)

Two big inspirations for me are cats and the sea - watching a cat washing, or sleeping or playing is one of the most 'zen' things ever - total focus, total oblivion to all else, not distracted by TV, radio, or anything except food! :o)

And the sea - how can anything seem big when faced with the sea? if anything give one an overwhelming sense of tiny-ness, it's looking out to see and thinking about the sheer hugeness of it... all very inspiring stuff musically...

keep it coming!

steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Birds !
Birds' singing are so rich in harmony sometimes but it's quite difficult (for me) to catch.
I can't remember his name but a famous comtemporary composer based great pieces of work on birds' singing.

there are a few of them, but I think Oliver Messiaen is the most famous...

Steve

Nicely put Ed.


And I'd have to add the sea to my list as well Steve. It's just not often enough that I get out to the coast. I could stare out at the ocean for hours and have done so in the past. I really love the ocean during winter when there is a storm out at sea, such a powerful sight.


I guess it's the abstractness of music that makes it so appealing as an expressive form - it means what you want it to mean, and will mean something completely different to the listener. I really don't mind whether someone listens to my stuff and thinks 'yeah, cool fretless chops!', or whether they connect with it on a deeper level, or even don't connect with it at all - the music is what it is, means what it means to me, and everything else is out of my control, and rather gladly so...

I couldn't possibly agree more :)

Great replies, everyone. I often find myself influenced by things that the people around me say. I've started to write vocal music and I've found it very inspiring to free associate off of what other people say. I'm tempted to get a mini tape recorder and bring it to work to record the 1001 ridiculous things that get said in the course of a day. Then I could load the choice tidbits into a sampler and have some real fun.

I've also been influenced by people who have a good sense of style and proportion in their everyday lives-usually women. Anybody who can project their personality and emotions into preparing a tasty dinner for friends or making a room inviting has something I can learn from in developing my self-expression.

Working in a noisy bakery where the same tape loop gets replayed every 2 1/2 hours and living in a duplex next to a guy whose loud TV and stereo are just inches away (through a wall) from the headboard of my bed has given me an incredible appreciation for silence. When the noise ends the silence rushes in like a soothing balm and I can briefly feel it as an active presence of stillness and quietude as opposed to just being a lack of sound. This appreciation of silence has helped me to better realize what it is I want to do with sounds.

I also am really influenced by the feeling I get in a movie theater when I'm so into the film that I forget about everything else that's going on. It's amazing when film is well done-the thousands of hours of planning and sweat and microscopic attention to myriad production details all become transparent and it just feels like you're somehow a part of what's happening onscreen. I like this not so much for the escapism value as for how it makes me think how I could make a similar kind of impression on other people.

Looking at the stars every night gives me a sense of perspective that helps me feel more connected to the universe out there and the Earth. I get the feeling that I share the sky with not only the people alive now but also with everyone else who's ever looked up at the night sky and pondered their existence.

This is way cool - all the deep people come crawling out the woodwork now that the chat has moved from 'flea could kick fieldy's ass' to something a little more esoteric! :o)

winston's point about being inspired by people is a good one - I find that words, intentions, even the look on someone's face can make me feel more human, and as a result more creative, or at least legitimate my creative pursuits as being part of me and not part of some competitive nonsense where there's an expectation that you are trying to be biggerbetterfastermore than other people. There are a load of lyrics on the new Spearhead album, Stay Human, that just make me want to pick up my bass and play what's inside me - the hook line on the title track is 'all the freaky people make the beauty of the world' and is a celebration of diversity, as is the chorus of Ever Single Soul - 'whereever I may roam, every single soul is a poem, written on the back of God's hand' - that sort of affirmation of humanity, of diversity, of me is what I need to keep going, to not get into inane mental conflict with myself about who's better who's best, to avoid the need to live up to anything (the great thing about not having a record company is that i can do what i like when I like, and no-one's there to tell me otherwise)...

Even reading the creative ramblings from you guys makes me want to play! :o)

Any of you playing solo? if so, do you have any MP3s that we can all have a listen to, swap ideas, share inspiration!

Stay Human (and check out www.spearheadvibrations.com for some serious inspiration!)

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk (extensive read audio archive, reviews, interviews, news, gig dates 'n' all that stuff...)

Any of you playing solo? if so, do you have any MP3s that we can all have a listen to, swap ideas, share inspiration!

I really wish that I had something to share. I've heard alot a great music from different people here at TB but have yet to offer any in return. It's only been a few months since I've seriously started writting and all that I have are rough draft recordings on a 4 track casette recorder. A friend of mine has a decent studio though, so I'll be getting some better quality recordings to convert to mp3's, whenever he can make time for me.

When that time comes I'll definitely be sure to let evryone here at TB have a listen. Most definitely.

Originally posted by Darrell Ginese
One of my absolute favorite things to do is to take a long walk through a cemetery at dusk. It's so peaceful, it really helps to clear my mind of all the day to day hassles. I always feel like picking up the bass and letting it flow afterwards.


I, too, am influenced by a nice walk through the cemetery. And, yes, it is best at dusk...though..it's the most awesome experience at nighttime. (Yes, I'm bad...I like to sneak in there at night. Hehe.). I dunno. There's just something about it.

Another thing is when I'm traveling somewhere in the car I love to just watch the road and all the scenery I pass. Trees. Mountains. Farmlands.

And most of all I guess I'm influenced by all that's going on in my life. I base my writings on what I'm feeling. So I guess you can say that even if I'm in a bad or depressive mood something good can come out of it if I can just pick up that bass and turn that negative energy into something positive. :)

I know there's much more I'm sure I'm influenced by (can't think too well right now). Spirituality is one thing I can think of. I'll post more if I can think of it.

Cheers,

~Stephanie

I've experimented with putting samples of teachers (recorded in my last two years at school by a friend) over tracks- some of the results are on the "Mock Turtle Regulator" page on mp3.com linked below.
so I'd say mad physics teachers are among my influences............:D

re. "Pillow Mountain", I've been wanting to try getting that track to play during the mountain stages of PC game Carmageddon2 - it would fit really well with the mist-covered mountains ,and lone stranded cars wandering into exploding barrels......

re. birdsong, blackbirds seem to have a musical ear- they appear to compete with each other in the complexity of their singing- once when my brother and I were playing a Hendrix album loud with the window open one even picked up a guitar lick- bizarre....

Method acting - you can pretend yourself into a mood that suits the performance. For example, trying play with taste doesn't always do it for me. Sometimes I pretend that I will get fired if I get caught playing anything fancy. In that mood when I want to do a special fill, I try to play it soft or when the vocals/soloist are not going on. Sneak it in!

If the part is aggressive you can think your self into feeling mad and then really dig in. Works for sad, happy, or whatever.

Otherwise I always look up to the abstract impressionist of earlier last centrury. Picasso, Dali, Serot. I must be butchering the spellings of those guys.

Really any other art form with an experimental nature has had an impact to my approach. Dance as in Twila Tharp or Independent and foreign films come to mind for me as well.

Nice question!

jc

The Method acting suggestion is spot on - well done! I've done this for years with music that isn't 'in' me, or part of my cultural makeup - you play a part, act a role, take on the persona of the music. It's a great way to learn to get deeper inside the music... it's what song interpreters do all the time - it's the only reason why someone as gross as Rod Stewart could sing People Get Ready with any conviction... :o)

very good suggestion, thanks

Steve

That's a very interesting thought, method acting. I can very much so relate to what both of you have said, I guess I just never really thought of it as method acting.

On occassion I'll play what I believe to be Renissance music on the bass, I'm not sure if it really is but it sounds like it to me. I like to try and place myself into that era when I do, to the best of my knowledge on that time period. Pretending to be in the Great Hall of a kings castle, surrounded by huge hanging tapestries while I perform for his majesty. ;)

I'm in the middle of reading a book "The Healing Drum - African Wisdom Teachings" by Yaya Diallo, a musical healer of the Minianka tribe from the Republic of Mali, West Africa. It's been very inspiring to read his words. So inspiring that I now intend on picking up a Djembe, (his instrument of choice) and experimenting with it. When that time does come I fully intend to imagine myself in a small West African village taking part in one of the Minianka's many healing ceremonies. Should be a lot of fun, as well as enlightening.

Sounds like a fascinating book. Anyone else got recommended inspiraitonal books?

My faves are 'Efortless Mastery' by Kenny Werner, 'The Inner Game Of Music' by ??? (can't remember!), 'Improvisation' by Derek Bailey, and then non-musical books like stuff by Douglas Coupland, Margaret Attwood, The Tao Of Pooh (was reading that one whilst writing and playing the stuff on my solo album) and the Bible...

So - books? movies? TV shows? favourite inspirational episode of Springer? :o)

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk (CD ordering, real audio, gig listings etc.)

I had just posted over at Dann Glenn's forum that "Amadeus" is a very inspiring movie to me. I watch it all the time! The tape's practically worn out! :D Another musically-related movie I enjoy is "Shine", based on the life of pianist David Helfgott (sp?). It's just very touching.

Hi Steph,

nice to hear from you again - cool films! Can you say now they influenced you? By making you think about music? inspiriing you to practice? shaping your thoughts about music?

Inspiration is such a difficult thing to quantify, but that shouldn't stop us trying... :o)

cheers

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Originally posted by Steve Lawson
Hi Steph,

nice to hear from you again - cool films! Can you say now they influenced you? By making you think about music? inspiriing you to practice? shaping your thoughts about music?

Inspiration is such a difficult thing to quantify, but that shouldn't stop us trying... :o)

cheers

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Hmm...well I guess (as usual for me..heh) it's hard to explain why they inspire me. Um...I'll give it a try...

"Amadeus": I love Mozart. I love his works. Watching the movie always inspires me. It was an excellent movie. I enjoy watching how he lived his life and what inspired him. (For example "Don Giovanni" was created after the death of his father as Mozart believed he was being haunted by the ghost of his father...One other thing I noticed was that scene in which he was talking to Costanze's mother as she babbled on how awful a husband he is or whatever but Mozart wasn't hearing her going on about that. They showed her in his mind singing and I believe that went on to show a scene of a new opera.....)

I admired that he could write music in his head without needing to write it down and that when it was written it down it wasn't revised. It was written down perfect. (Remember that scene when Costanze brought all those writings to Salieri? Beautiful scene.)

Another thing is by watching certain scenes in the movie it looked like Mozart really lost himself in his music. Sometimes I feel that way myself...I can get lost in practice and lose all sense of time and place.

There's so much more....

"Shine": This movie just touches my heart. (And I usually cry too..Heehee). David Helfgott's such a sweet person. And he went through so much during his boyhood that made him the way he is today.

He's an incredible piano player...again someone who loses himself in the music. A scene that really inspires me is when he's at college and he's at a piano lesson and his teacher is going on about the piano being a monster or something and he must tame it. I think about that scene a lot of times when I'm practicing, replacing the piano with the bass. "Tame it or it'll swallow you whole."

And what about "learn the notes..then forget them?"

And "Don't you just love those big fat chords?!" (Hehe one of my fave lines :))

There's a lot of lines I like in the movie I guess that just make me think.

All in all, both movies inspire me, make me want to practice, make me want to write, make me want to go mad myself (halfway there-haha..hmmm..ok..that's not really funny, but oh well) and wish I was filled with such genius. LOL

Hope I haven't confused anyone. LOL

Cheers :)

~Stephanie

PS: I just realized this message has circled into musical-influence..being that Mozart is a musical influence..um..but oh well..it's about the movie I guess. :)

Steph,

that's great - thanks so much for that. You did an amazing job of outlining the influence of those films! I think it's sometimes good to try and quantify such things as it helps us to look at our musical progress and journey in a slightly more detatched way. A bit like how teaching is often the best practice cos you have to be very clear about the 'process' involved in a certain technique or chunk of theory, and unless you are pretty sure of where you're going with it, the student has no chance. I often find out things that I didn't know I knew by explaining them to a student! Same goes for talking through influences - I've realised ways that things have shaped my music and my life by talking or writing about them in ways that I previously hadn't acknowledged.

thanks again

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

I've never really been a "solo" player before so almost all my inspiration comes when I'm playing in a group.

The "free-est" time seems to be when I either am at church or at our worship teams rehearsal and all of us just get lost in worshipping through our music. This isn't meant to say that we aren't still keeping an ear out for everyone because all of us have at least 15-20 yrs or so of playing experience and can feed off each other and listen to each other and still keep the song going and in the midst of all of this just be worshipping.

I find that when I am by myself playing, it is more like "practicing and I don't seem to be as creative.

That said, my absolute favorite time to "practice" is when I am out running in the early morning. I usually do 4-6 miles on MWF about 5:30 am and I can play songs in my head and come up with lines and licks (especially for my fretless) that I can then take into one of my bands with me. (I'm in three) Even the one that is a country band.

Hi fretlesschris - playing in church is a perfect example of a non-musical influence raising the music to a new level (not always - a heck of a lot of church music is formulaic crap, but I digress).

It's amazing how much of the world's great music is inspired by faith of one sort or another - Bach's credo was 'every note to the glory of God', and a huge amount of 17/18/19 century music was written for church useage (though the whole issue of artistic patronage and control by the church is a area fraught with contradictions and is highly problematic in any discussion about inspiration...)

Most if not all traditional indian music originates in the temple as part of worship - the rags all have different meanings and purposes and the music reflects a sense of transcendance.

The incredible experience of a full on gospel choir is an attempt to reflect and experience the joy that is at the heart of the christian faith - rock 'n' roll was in part an attempt to secularise the incredible power that gospel music had to lift an audience.

A lot of eastern music is rooted in spiritual traditions, from tibetan and tuvan overtone chanting to tribal singing and playing on the pacific rim...

perhaps the biggest non-musical inspirations are those things that make life go on - love/faith/pain/hope and other art feeding back on itself. As Bono once quoted, 'every artist is a cannibal'... :o)

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

HI all,

have any of you tried Dale Titus' suggestion of 'spontaneous soundtracking'? I'm not sure if he came up with it originally, but it was in his old column in Bass Player - the idea is simply that you turn down the sound on your TV and play what you see, to try and come up with new ideas...

The other possibility is to give yourself a list of bizarre song titles which you then write music for - I collect strange track titles for future use. My next album may well have some very odd titles to some of the tracks... :o)

any stories to share?

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

I've been reading books on Zen and practicing zazen, or sitting meditation. Zen ponders the question of who we really are - the essence of our nature. When I meditate, I focus on clearing my mind and I try to develop a keen awareness of what is going through mind. If you try to meditate and clear your mind, many of you will find that it is nearly impossible. The mind is like a big satellite dish, constantly receiving signals. If you try to sit and just sit, a thought or a feeling will surface and that thought or emotion can grab a hold of you without your knowing. Sometimes when I meditate, I would just notice these things. Meditation can help us cultivate the powers of our mind and the power of concentration. Ultimately, it can lead us to mastering our own emotions. When we understand the true nature of things, we can become the master of all situations. It is true maturity and we can become all things compassion. It's not about developing thick skin, but it's about awareness.

I have found that meditation helps me to transform my negative emotions to something positive. It has helped me to see my way through conflicts and it helps me to not dwell on stupid things which might otherwise get the better of me. It has also given me more discipline. And this relates very closely to bass playing for me on many levels. I try to seek inspiration and ideas from everything and then I try to get really deep within myself when I play. And I know I'm light years from even scratching the surface.

Thanks guys for your great comments!

There are many similarities between Zen pursuits and the centering aims of an improvising musician - the creative tension between negating self, but doing it through meditation and control is in some ways similar to the tension between the whole notion of wanting to express that which is so deep inside you that you really need to play out all of the erroneous influences, sort of like meditating on your instrument...

There are many great musicians who seek a deeper connection with their music through Zen, Yoga, Tai-Chi, Meditation, Prayer... others who seek to find the root of their creative self through giving to others, through working with the homeless or whatever - there are many ways to connect deeper with music.

It seems to me that, in a Zen-like way, the pursuit of music for its own sake is often frustrating, whereas the pursuit of life in all it's fullness, and of welbeing for others can often lead to great music - the byproduct of being centred within yourself, of taking the focus off one's ego seems to be a greater self awareness, and perhaps a greater understanding of one's place in the grand scheme of things. I know that when I get an over-inflated sense of my own musical importance, I tend to play rubbish. When the music is part of a dialogue, or a reflection of something deeper, whether it be spiritual or a way of expressing internal tension, questioning, contentment etc etc...

woah, that's all a bit deep for a Saturday evening! :o)

any thoughts people? agree? disagree? i still haven't found what I'm looking for, and doubt I ever will, but it's all about the journey...

steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

This is a quote I got from a site on meditation.

"It is interesting to see how beliefs and attitudes influence people's perceptions of the shamatha process. The musician who sometimes experiences a light transient samadhi while performing will likely associate this state only with the art and, being unaware of its broader potentials, will not strive to deepen and maintain it. "

Here is the link for anyone interested:

http://here-and-now.org/VSI/Articles/TheoryMed/theoryHow.htm


"Samadhi" is referring to the deep levels of awareness and concentration that can be experienced in deep states of meditation.

I can see how this relates closely with improvisation. There are times when I am improvising and I will get a flash of inspiration. I have felt myself slip into a state of higher awareness and I will surprise myself. But in real Zen, one wouldn't really be reflecting on his/her playing, but would just "play" the moment, so there would be no temporary complacence or time for reflection.

This applies to all arts and not just music. It can be found in sports. I have experienced this when playing what we Americans call soccer ;) when I was younger. Sometimes when I was "in the zone" I would be tackled by five guys simultanieously, but I would somehow effortlessly keep the ball away from them with a grace which seemed to come from some source beyond myself. Afterwards, I would walk away from the playground feeling perplexed, yet calm in a very weird sort of way.

This also heavily applies to martial arts. I have read accounts of swordsmen who talk about necessity to achieve this state of true awareness in order to achieve real mastery. Although I had always heard that martial arts really aren't about violence at all, after reading these accounts, I was really able to see the "art" in martial arts.

I guess the point that I'm really trying to get to is that (and this is beyond my realization) true awareness transcends introspection. What may seem to be a solitary practice can eventually lead to the embracing of all life. So I suppose if I try to intellectualize it (these concepts are not supposed to be understandable through intellect though) and relate it to music, even though playing music in this mindset may seem like focusing solely on the music, a truly aware mindset will allow a musician to go beyond focusing "just on the music" and allow the musician to embrace and express "everything" through music. Well, I guess I'm basically agreeing with everything Steve was saying.:)

John Coltrane said, "the music is the whole question of life itself."

What is the question of life?

Well, why not music?

Salvadore Dali!!!
Can't get enough of him!

Originally posted by Lazy
Salvadore Dali!!!
Can't get enough of him!

Oh! Yes! Dali!!!!!! :D

I collect books of his paintings and stories of his life. I look through these books a lot for inspiration. Can't you just get lost in the surrealism?

Transforming a piece of art into music is a very interesting thing, and I think it's quite meditative.

How could I have forgotten about Dali?? Thanks for refreshing my memory. :)

Cheers,

~Stephanie

My biggest non-musical influence happens to be one of my biggest influences.

At the time me and my drummer went to go see our old band play (he was kicked out and later on I quit) and when we heard they were throwing a show we knew we had to go see them play and see how badly they sucked (ok, so maybe we didn't leave on the best terms).

well near the end after having some good mosh pits storm up. Some dude about 3x bigger than me starts actually tackling me and talking mess in the pits. He totally threatened to beat me up and all that good stuff. My drummer friend was there and saw the whole thing.

Then the show ended and we left without a fight, but me and my drummer friend had to wait nearly 2 hours for us to get a ride back home. While we were waiting, we were talking about that dude I almost got in a fight with and how they were good friends with the band, and for some reason I got this huge inspiration to start playing smarter and better. I don't know how that all came to me, but it was a huge driving force to make me want to play.

the roaring sound of my motorbike's engine without the silencer.

Hope it's OK to jump in at this late point in the thread here;
I too find Art a vast area of inspiration. Surrealism and Abstract seem especially appealing to me. If you like Dali, Yves Tanguy is interesting too. Max Ernst and Paul Klee envigorate me. And how about Kandinsky, who's whole technique often centered around depicting musical composition thru his painting. That seems a natural connection.

Meditation for me is a bit different. My practice is to actually focus on something, rather than nothing, and to ruminate on a specific topic is more of a 'muse' to me... I know that's kind of the opposite of the typical concept of 'meditation'.
I always liked the term 'lucubration', working/studying/meditating at night or by lamplight... as it seems for me that creativity flows better late at night. Don't always have that luxury though...But I seem to write better in the wee hours.

I think Gary Willis is quite the mountain-biker, from what I hear. I've found this activity and the endorphins it releases to be pretty motivating.
Plus it's hard to speed thru the forest without some sort of internal soundtrack going...

mark

Originally posted by xush
Meditation for me is a bit different. My practice is to actually focus on something, rather than nothing, and to ruminate on a specific topic is more of a 'muse' to me... I know that's kind of the opposite of the typical concept of 'meditation'.
I always liked the term 'lucubration', working/studying/meditating at night or by lamplight... as it seems for me that creativity flows better late at night. Don't always have that luxury though...But I seem to write better in the wee hours.

the word Meditation, if I'm not mistaken, actually means 'centering', so there's certainly nothing inconguous in centering on something rather than nothing. To empty one's mind is a particular kind of spiritual practice with a particular motive and direction. There are a lot of spiritual traditions that meditate on things as well... Most of the mystical christian traditions use meditation as a way of connecting with God, either through meditating on a particular bible passage, or on a perceived aspect of God's character, or a chant of some kind (check out the monastic retreat centre as Taize as an example...) Same with certain forms of Buddhism, where chanting is used, either as a way of emptying the mind, or a way of focusing on a particular principle. For example, the mantra 'Om Mani Padme Hung' means, roughly 'peace and happiness to all living things' - in chanting that, I'm sure you would have a focal point for condsidering the implications of adopting such a statement as a reason for being.

I often find song lyrics that become like a mantra for a certain time. There's a repeated line at the end of 'Lemon' by U2 where Bono sings 'Midnight is where the day begins', which is a gorgeous metaphor in times of darkness... that often ends up going round my head and serving to centre my thoughts on something other than my immediate situation...

From a musical point of view, I will often pull out a quotes from musicians that make me think about the whole process of music making in a new way and ruminate on them, mulling them over, working through the ramifications, trying not to impose too much meaning that isn't there, but to get to the heart of what the implications are for the way that I relate to music.

Good stuff, thanks for your thoughts!

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk

Originally posted by Steve Lawson
I often find song lyrics that become like a mantra for a certain time. There's a repeated line at the end of 'Lemon' by U2 where Bono sings 'Midnight is where the day begins', which is a gorgeous metaphor in times of darkness... that often ends up going round my head and serving to centre my thoughts on something other than my immediate situation...



Ah, yes, I can think of a lot of lyrics that can serve as mantras. But yeah that lyric in "Lemon" is a great one....I like that video too. It's rather hypnotizing.

Oh, and as for meditation, I've been brought up with the words "If you call it meditation, it ceases to be mediation." Hmmm...I guess that's food for thought. :D

Cheers,

~Stephanie

hello Steve and fellow bassists.
this is a great topic. I find that my greatest non musical infuence is nature.beauty is something we can easily take for granted.Go out into the woods and take it all in.be a tourist.there is so much we miss in life by rushing through it.listen to the symphony of life that silence allows us to hear.peace and blessings to you all.

well, i am often inspired by things similar to ones some of you already mentioned. when i am sitting in a train, there's a certain rhythm to the train hitting some bumps on the track and from time to time there is noise during the curves which sounds like feedback, or how the sound 'dampens' when the train enters a tunnel.
or when after playing i put my bass away and before turning down the volume i hit the strings once again, brushing them lightly with my elbow.
that sound can be a great foundation for a musical idea that i develop.

but not only actual sound is inspiring. i love rain for example, it implies so many different instruments:
piano, percussion, strings for the slow movements of grey clouds in the sky.

i also like watching tv without sound, composing the soundtrack 'on the fly' in my mind. of course, not only for movies: eg. people arguing in a talk show or a landscape presented in a car ad.
another valuable source of inspiration are my dreams. i often wake up with some images of my dreams still in my head and the fitting music will just come out of my hands...

as you see, composing/musical inspiration is often combined with some sort of imagery, be it real or "imagined" ;) ... in my case. when i play piano or bass, i can close my eyes and see a movie that i would create - my personal music video, if you like.

then there is the "creatively listening to music", when i hear a classical piece for example and pick up a certain rhythm played by strings and transfer it to the drum track, or add your own harmonic/melodic ideas on top of the existing ones, etc.

as you see, i believe inspiration for music is everywhere, and that's why everyone answering this threads has so many different answers to offer.

and what about the therapeutic side of writing?
I'm sure some of you feel the need to express certain feelings in order to vent it? Catharsis, as it were...
I've written quite a few 'Migraine' inspired songs, it just seemed therapeutic to hash it out, since I don't really have any other recourse...

Do any of you have links to tracks you've recorded? Might be interesting to hear things with some knowledge if what inspired them...

Or is that frowned on, linking to our own mp3's here?
mark

Guys,

feel free to link to your MP3s with the stories attached - no problem from me at all... I'd love to hear them.

For my part, have a listen to Bittersweet from my album 'And Nothing But The Bass' - there's a real audio version on my website. It was partly inspired by the death of my uncle - to get the full story, you'll have to come and see me play sometime... :o)

I'm Definitely one for finding catharsis in composing...

cheers

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk