play that funky music bass solo which scale to use?

[roarman1]

i basically said it in my title does anyone know what scale i should use for a bass solo in play that funky music it just goes e e e d e a b d e.

[funkydanbass]

You could use many ideas as this is basically a dominant chord jam.
As a start:
E Penatonic (Min and Maj)
E Blues
E mixolydian

[onlyclave]

B Mixolydian.

[Dave Muscato]

Bah, scales. Use your ears Chromatic movement is what funk is all about. Root, minor second, major second, minor third, major third, P4, tritone, P5, minor sixth, major sixth, minor seventh, and major seventh all work. Emphasize the root, minor/major third, P4, P5, major sixth, and minor seventh and play around from there.

[Atomik Rooster]

Originally Posted by Dave Muscato

Bah, scales. Use your ears Chromatic movement is what funk is all about. Root, minor second, major second, minor third, major third, P4, tritone, P5, minor sixth, major sixth, minor seventh, and major seventh all work. Emphasize the root, minor/major third, P4, P5, major sixth, and minor seventh and play around from there.

Man... That's like looking at a beautiful woman as a collection of molecules. It hurts.

[Dave Muscato]

Haha... interesting way to look at it. I don't think in scale degrees anymore - with practice, you just play what works and don't think too much about it. When soloing over a funk line like that, I tend to do a lot of slides and chromatic things anyway - I was basically saying that it doesn't matter what scale degrees you play; as they all work in the context of different licks.

[peterpalmieri]

Originally Posted by Dave Muscato

I was basically saying that it doesn't matter what scale degrees you play; as they all work in the context of different licks.

E Mixolidian is a good start, you can certainly use neighboring tones, chromatics etc but I would never say it doesn't matter what scale degrees you play.

[cowsgomoo]

look... it's a cheezoid quazi-funk tune, so your solo ought not to take the whole thing even remotely seriously... E minor pentatonic all the way... any attempt to play more interesting notes than those will be giving the POS tune more respect than it deserves

if I had 16 bars on 'Play That Funky Music White Boy' i'd probably AVOID the temptation to do a monster 'slapstravaganza' or 32nd note frenzy, and just treat em to a nice simple bass & drums groove

or play the vocal melody.. that'd be unexpected

[Dave Muscato]

Ah, agreed; I didn't mean that it doesn't matter, just that if you're going to ask which scale to use, I'd say chromatic because lots of great funk licks use neighboring tones, switch from major to minor, etc. IMO, the "funk" note is the major sixth, but E Mixolydian is a good place to start, indeed. Don't be afraid to move outside those notes, though. For funk soloing, I tend to gravitate toward the root, minor & major thirds, perfect fourth, perfect fifth, major sixth, and minor seventh. YMMV. Bending through the tritone (fourth to fifth) is also fun.

[fretlessman71]

Here's a simple thought process:

1) Start with E Minor Pentatonic. E, G, A, B, D, E. Get used to that first. Simplistic, but gets the job done. It's a good "white bread" scale.

2) Now try incorporating a few "chromatic approach" notes from below. In other words, play the scale again, but before each scale tone, play the note one fret behind it (1/2 step). Now you get E(-1), E, G(-1), G, A(-1), A, and so on - or if you're a note wonk, D#, E, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B, C#, D, D#, and E.

Notice that the sharp notes don't all stand on their own very well - they want to be "justified" by motion to a scale tone. But the F# and C# stand well for me - they turn the pentatonic scale into E Dorian, which is my favorite funk soloing mode (thanks, Stanley Clarke!).

Hope this helps.

[GianGian]

Use the E minor pentatonic, add the occasional b5 and the #7 and there you are. A major third may not hurt too, but it will sound really bad if you don't know when to use it.

[MonetBass]

Originally Posted by GianGian

Use the E minor pentatonic, add the occasional b5 and the #7 and there you are.

+1 -- ya beat me to it. It's a funky dance song. Don't go all fancy-pants on it and you'll be fine.

[peterpalmieri]

Originally Posted by Dave Muscato

Ah, agreed; I didn't mean that it doesn't matter, just that if you're going to ask which scale to use, I'd say chromatic because lots of great funk licks use neighboring tones, switch from major to minor, etc. IMO, the "funk" note is the major sixth, but E Mixolydian is a good place to start, indeed. Don't be afraid to move outside those notes, though. For funk soloing, I tend to gravitate toward the root, minor & major thirds, perfect fourth, perfect fifth, major sixth, and minor seventh. YMMV. Bending through the tritone (fourth to fifth) is also fun.

I figured you didn't mean play anything, glad you clarified. That would be really confusing to guy just learning his way around.

[Scot]

Transcribe some Marcus Miller. That will give you everything you need.

[Alvaro Martín Gómez A.]

Maybe this will give you some ideas.

[Aged_Clayman]

Maybe this will give you some ideas.

Sweet. Jesus. I just can`t stop watching.