JUST WHAT I NEEDED TO RE-CHARGE MY BATTERIES

geezer316 · #1 06-13-2003, 06:05 PM

i was on a plateau with my bass playing and i was getting frustrated, i've been playing for a little over a year and the last few months i had to stop my lessons due to unemployment

. a new friend of mine has been playing for off and on for 8 years so i jam with him to get some idea's but it still was'nt enuff to get me over the hump. then after a long conversation about spontanous jamming i asked him how did he learned bass-lines that he would actually be able to use(i know almost every scale known to man but dont know WHAT to do with them)i wanted to know HOW he knew what to put in as a bass-line for any given riff/song, i just dont know what to do when jamming in my room or with another person. and i could'nt believe what a simple solution he had "GET A DRUM MACHINE" A DUH !

,and the sad thing is i am a drummer and have been since i was 9(i'm 32 now

). what a simple answer to such a complex question(or stupid depending on how you look at it). so he was kind enuff to let me borrow one of his and all day i have been playing riffs and chops i had no idea that i knew how to play

,i guess sitting in ones room noodling around on a bass can only get you so far before you need to expand your horizons,this is just the motivation i needed to get me over that hump. its like how i felt that first month or so when i was able to play that cool song i've been trying to learn forever. thanks for listening, i know its probably old hat for some of you people but for me it was ground-breaking information that will help me immeasurably. PEACE

int · #2 06-13-2003, 11:54 PM

On some drum machines you can input little guitar or piano (or other instruments) riffs as well. Then you can run the song through a stereo while you play through your amp.

This helped me learn to solo, without embarrassing myself in front of people that were more talented than me, and I could still figure out what to do on chord and key changes.

Either that or start jamming with some other musicians that are either very understanding, or high.

But to stay on topic, has anyone found a drum machine that sounds good recorded?

Phil Smith · #3 06-16-2003, 01:24 PM

Playing with other people will also advance your playing especially if the people are playing at a higher level than you are.

ufo · #4 06-24-2003, 01:59 PM

Great Drum Machine: the Dr. Rhythym DR-5 rhythym section. In my opinion (I"m a weekend warrior, not a pro) sounds GREAT recorded. Very unique, intuitive set of features- great drum sounds, totally editable patterns, built in guitar tuner, midi tracker, 3 tracks of instruments (patterns built in plus you can make your own)- so it's not a drum machine, it's a whole band in a box!

The only drawback is that it came out in 1994, before the computer/internet thing really caught on- so there's no good way to download things from the web and import them into the machine. But other than that the thing is great! Even though it's old it's been a consistent 'top seller' in catalogs like musicians friends, etc.

I have many recordings I've done with Dr. Rhythym playing the drums. Check out the song links (and a video tour of my studio in wihch you can see the device briefly) at my web site:

http://www.angelfire.com/falcon/ufo14

I use a combination of live drums and Dr. Rhythym, but I used Dr. rhythym exclusively on these songs

http://www.mp3.com/original_fuzz
The song "Josh Pollack's got the funk" and "song96" were me playing all instruments and dr. rhythym doing all drums

http://www.mp3.com/efb
The song "shake it" was all Dr. Rhythym on drums because we didn't have a drummer when we made that recording.

Enjoy!
UFO