writing songs with bass

[RonChase]

I have been having a ton of fun with tracking guitar and drum machine and just thudding my bass to my own songs,I have even written a few songs on bass instead of the usual guitar or piano riff,has anyone out there written songs on bass

[benjammin420]

I just started playing bass a few months ago, after playing guitar for 10+ years, I've found the bass to be very inspirational for writing, and have been coming up with some really interesting stuff (in my opinion) In other cases where I have a peice of music that Ive been developing on guitar, I find that putting bass to it can make all the difference between a "ho hum" idea and a really great song. Also with guitar I tend to come up with little peices that I later put together into a formal structure, but on the bass, if I come up with as little idea, it tends to work itself into a song more natural, one part evolves into the next, and ends up being a more cohesive song rather than the guitar riffs that I arrange into a "frankenstein" peice

[OPBASSMAN1994]

I always do. That's probably a significant reason that my band sounds so Prog-ish. Unless I intend it to be an acoustic ballad, I write lyrics, a bass part, a temporary vocal melody, and practice and edit the crap out of it. It's a good approach. Making a melodic or lead oriented bass line is one of those things that you can hear in the Police, Rush, a lot of funk groups, etc. It challenges you as a bassist to keep the whole train a rollin' and it challenges your guitarists creativity by making him work around an assertive bass. It's probably one of our signature things as a band. It works quite well I think.

[OPBASSMAN1994]

Plus, it's just plain fun, and a kind of unique approach.

[Thunderthumbs73]

Originally Posted by RonChase

I have been having a ton of fun with tracking guitar and drum machine and just thudding my bass to my own songs,I have even written a few songs on bass instead of the usual guitar or piano riff,has anyone out there written songs on bass

I don't, and I can't say there has ever been one song which wasn't a solo bass piece or bass ensemble piece of music that I wrote exclusively via bass. I always write using a keyboard and/or guitar.

[jpTron]

I usually always write on bass. Writing songs on bass just sounds better to me than when I do it on guitar. I'll program a beat and then start writing bass lines over it