Does your band use tracks? (Poll)

[turf3]

How much do you work and/or get paid in music?

I assume not much. So as a bit of an education, there is an expectation in the cover band scene to play like the recording. At least, 90%. Audiences only accept a small bit of change before you don't get hired back.

The market is driving playing with tracks. Some musicians like to eat.

But your comment also begs the question, if there's fifteen overdubs from your favorite musicians, how is playing to tracks any different?

To the concept that playing to tracks is cheating. Well, I guess a recording session shouldn't be allowed to overdub or edit tracks.

I work a lot, get paid little.

I quit doing the cover band rock and roll thing years ago. Too repetitious.

Have you heard of "blue ocean strategy"? When everyone is doing X, trying to be successful doing X better than everyone else who's also doing X is a high effort low profit strategy. You want to try to do the thing that fewer people are doing.

In a world with thousands of cover bands all trying to sound as much like the record as possible, there will always be someone who can do it a little better, or a little cheaper, or have one connection you don't have. Personally, I would choose not to compete in that crowded arena and try something different. For the amount of time people spend to try to reproduce the record exactly, just like all the other cover bands that think the same thing, you could do something different like developing your own sound and style and applying it to well known songs. It might be a failure in the marketplace, yes, but unless you're unusual, you probably aren't raking in the cash being a repeater pencil either.

So that's the business aspect of it.

As for the personal-satisfaction aspect of it, even when I was making the most I ever made as a gigging musician, I still had a day job, as I expect the vast majority of cover-band guys do. So if you are (being honest) doing this for fun and some spare cash, why not have some fun? Applying creativity to performing music is fun for me. If I wanted to just do the exact same thing over and over according to strict instructions, I might as well be playing last chair second violin in an orchestra somewhere. At least I wouldn't have drunks pouring beer on my instrument.

(By the way, the most successful bands I've been in, all had their own sound and style and applied these to their repertoire, not the other way round.)

 

[turf3]

You know, someone pointed out that there are compositional concepts involving pre-recorded tracks, that are not related to the cover-band world.

I don't really know where I stand on that. I'll have to think about it, but I also would need to check out some performances.

 

[beans-on-toast]

The bus sounds are prerecorded samples triggered by a keyboard, part of the song to give the full experience. Everything else is live, done meticulously well. Oddly enough, the Beatles used tracks for this effect as well on their original recording. As they did on many other recordings such as on Sgt. Pepper. The spanish guitar into to Bungalow Bill is a single key playing a loop on a Mellotron, not a Beatle playing it.

Now if the bus is acceptable in alive performance, where should the line be drawn. Background films and lighting should also be acceptable, the band isn't playing that. They're entertainers and are putting on a show. All that's important is that the audience loves the performance.

 

[QORC]

sorry, whether you actually CREATED a track of an instrument you're not playing live or not or bought it on the internet is irrelevant to the thread. A track is a track, no matter where you got it from. Anything not done "live" is the opposite of "live music".

 

[Gravedigger Dav]

But they don't write and produce them...

Doesn't matter to me. Using tracks is faking it. It takes the "live" out of the music.
If you disagree, that's okay, but I have never liked it.

 

[SteveCS]

Doesn't matter to me. Using tracks is faking it. It takes the "live" out of the music.
If you disagree, that's okay, but I have never liked it.

Yes, I disagree. I like creating tracks and showcasing the result with live performances. About 60% of my current setlist has tracks ranging from simple drums and drums/percussion to string quartet and full orchestration. If you don't like it that's fine, but there is no right or wrong here...

 

[SLO Surfer]

Sheez. Judgey much?

 

[Gravedigger Dav]

Yes, I disagree. I like creating tracks and showcasing the result with live performances. About 60% of my current setlist has tracks ranging from simple drums and drums/percussion to string quartet and full orchestration. If you don't like it that's fine, but there is no right or wrong here...

I agree there is no right or wrong. It is just a matter of preference.

 

[QORC]

I think you're changing your pretentious ideals to suit your own needs.

nope. it's my opinion. just like you have yours. but thanks for the personal feedback. lol. you can do whatever you wish with tracks. I personally just don't care for local bands that do. again, my opinion.

 

[Dr. Keebs]

I am in multiple groups of various genres. In my original hard rock project, as well as handling writing, bass and backup vox duties, I also play/program the keys parts. Could be bits of ambience, samples, strings/horns, pads, choirs, or piano. We don't have and don't really care to add a keys person live, and don't mind differing opinions on the subject of tracks, either. So, tracks for this group.

 

[Wood and Wire]

I've played in several electronic-rock bands, and generally we tried to strip it down to the key elements for gigs, chopping samples up into brief musical phrases, so that they could be triggered live, without being too reliant on the band playing at a precise tempo.

That's basically how I still do it today (though Ableton Live does make it possible to freely adjust tempo, without affecting pitch changes, and with minimal artefacts), with each of us responsible for some degree of sample triggering - either from keyboards, or drum pads - so I might be playing the verse of a song on the bass, and switching to keyboards for the chorus, or middle eight.


In the past, I've had to use backing tapes etc, because either a sequenced synth bass part / sample based rhythm track required absolute synch, and was physically impossible to play live, or because a part was so densely layered, it was again, physically impossible to play live.

But most of the times I've used backing in the past was either because samplers had a maximum of 8 megabytes / 32 megabytes / 64 megabytes of memory, and simply couldn't hold the amount of data required for the set (not an issue with computers nowadays), or it was because visuals were time code synchronised to certain sounds.


But even I have to admit, I'd be less than thrilled to see, for example, a 3 piece Madness / Dexy's / God Speed tribute band, with all the horns, strings, and piano etc on a backing track.

 

[TBird1958]

It's okay to disagree on the subject Gentlemen, let's just keep it respectful.

 

[Wood and Wire]

Vocal harmonizers - now THAT'S cheating. There's a pretty decent 4-piece new country band locally we saw awhile back that was just killing the 3-part harmonies. Outdoor BBQ contest event, we were sitting behind the staging area. Finally had to walk around to check them out cause the vocals were so good. One mic stand, one guy singing, had a TC Helicon on the floor in front of him. Cheating?

But if he hits a bum note, that's a whole lot of bad harmony coming at you...

You've got to have the skill to pull it off in the first place.

For me, I'd file that under a talented musician using a tool - certainly not cheating.

I'm assuming everyone is aware of "Hide and Seek" by Imogen Heap.

That's a highly creative person, creating magic with a new toy, in a live take.


Likewise, KT Tunstall's use of a loop pedal on "Cherry Tree" was not just innovative, but a game changer - and vastly more exhilarating to see done that way, live, than with a 4 or 5 piece band covering the parts.

 

[Wood and Wire]

Of course, Steve Reich has done performance using tape loops, but that's a bit different.

But he also has several compositions, such as 2x5, and Electric Counterpoint, where the musicians are performing to tracks that they have previously recorded.

It's very much a live affair.

 

[-Asdfgh-]

But he also has several compositions, such as 2x5, and Electric Counterpoint, where the musicians are performing to tracks that they have previously recorded.

It's very much a live affair.

I meant more that the use of tape or recordings is about exploring live versus recorded, rather than tracks in a standard band which doesn't tend to be the same artistic endeavour in which the tracks themselves are under the microscope as part of the artistic act. If that makes sense. It's like the difference between making an awful cacophany because you are a bad musician and being Captain Beefheart in which the intention is to sound awful. In theory it's the same for some modern art, apparently, although sometimes I'm less convinced by that

 

[Wood and Wire]

I meant more that the use of tape or recordings is about exploring live versus recorded, rather than tracks in a standard band which doesn't tend to be the same artistic endeavour in which the tracks themselves are under the microscope as part of the artistic act. If that makes sense. It's like the difference between making an awful cacophany because you are a bad musician and being Captain Beefheart in which the intention is to sound awful. In theory it's the same for some modern art, apparently, although sometimes I'm less convinced by that

And the phase / counterpoint interaction between the live, and recorded parts.

I have seen Electric Counterpoint played by an ensemble - but the most insane performance is some young kid playing both parts of Piano Phase, simultaneously ; a piano for each hand (it's on YouTube).

 

[-Asdfgh-]

And the phase / counterpoint interaction between the live, and recorded parts.

I have seen Electric Counterpoint played by an ensemble - but the most insane performance is some young kid playing both parts of Piano Phase, simultaneously ; a piano for each hand (it's on YouTube).

True - Mr. Reich is all about phasing! Wonderful stuff. I try to play with it myself sometimes, but I don't get anywhere near to his level of genius.

 

[EdO.]

How much do you work and/or get paid in music?

I assume not much. So as a bit of an education, there is an expectation in the cover band scene to play like the recording. At least, 90%. Audiences only accept a small bit of change before you don't get hired back.

The market is driving playing with tracks. Some musicians like to eat.

But your comment also begs the question, if there's fifteen overdubs from your favorite musicians, how is playing to tracks any different?

To the concept that playing to tracks is cheating. Well, I guess a recording session shouldn't be allowed to overdub or edit tracks.

ummm...difference between recording and live music? the difference between being a famous band, playing big places where people are paying big money to see you and a cover band playing covers in a bar??

kind of important distinctions, don't you think?

Again... For those who fail to understand (or refuse to) no explanation will suffice. To those who DO understand, no explanation is required. Wear it however it fits.

 

[lfmn16]

I agree there is no right or wrong. It is just a matter of preference.

+1

I agree there is no right or wrong about this. I don't get why people try to obfuscate what they are doing. As you point out, if it's pre-recorded, it's not live. I don't know why people can't just man up about what they are doing. You can call a chicken a duck but it won't quack.

 

[QORC]

Again... For those who fail to understand (or refuse to) no explanation will suffice. To those who DO understand, no explanation is required. Wear it however it fits.

no, on the contrary - I completely understand. Things recorded are not live. Because either the band either doesn't have instrumentation or talent to do it themselves. Believe me, I get it