I'm staying on roots most of the time when playing live?

[Jonithen]

Playing in my room with just me and drum machine I have the space to add fifths 7th's 9ths whatever's I want.

Playing live with band I find that I just stick to roots most of the time & adding much more than an occasional fifth to a root is about all I need, playing anything else often gets in the way or adds too much sound.

Is this 'normal'?

I know people say add chord tones, but for the stuff we play if often doesn't fit.

It seems like you just need to do some experimenting with the songs to find the places where your embellishments will fit within the over all structure. You know how to do the "whatevers" now you have to figure out where to fit them in and how to use them. Hard to tell you how and where from here. Can you just get a recording of everything else and play to that in addition to your drum machine work?

But yeah you can certainly thump along with root notes.

 

[ToneMonkey]

For years I felt that bass was 50% rhythm and 50% harmony (note choice, line structure, etc.). As I progressed further on my journey (which is now at ~44 year mark), I began to bump up the rhythm number. I now put it at around 75% (and rising). So yeah, nothing wrong with playing roots if the context demands it. Another poster mentioned lines as a way to connect chords together. I'd state it differently... not necessarily chords but bars and sections... thoughts. A descending bass line (at the right time) is sublime artistry, especially if it involves using other chord tunes than the root (as it often does). There's a lot science to good bass playing. Awareness of theory and chord construction is paramount for me.

 

[socialleper]

Playing in my room with just me and drum machine I have the space to add fifths 7th's 9ths whatever's I want.

Playing live with band I find that I just stick to roots most of the time & adding much more than an occasional fifth to a root is about all I need, playing anything else often gets in the way or adds too much sound.

Is this 'normal'?

I know people say add chord tones, but for the stuff we play if often doesn't fit.

"Fit" is what really matters. Although many jazz players will tell you there is no wrong notes as long as you play them right, what you feel comfortable with is up to you. Certain kinds of music call for riding the root more than others. Personally, that bores me to tears, but to each their own.
If you don't like the sound of notes in the chord, look at ghost notes, hammer ons, and walking a little between the roots as you progress through the song.
At the end of the day what really matters is if you enjoy what you are doing. Your pleasure with what you are playing will transfer to your audience.

 

[hrodbert696]

We play mainly 90's rock type sound I suppose would categorize it, nothing too complex, so the verse would be G D Em C for example.
I tried walking bass over it it just clashes with guitar in a not good way.
I read some people say "keep it simple" & others "simple sucks" its hard to find the happy medium ground.

It depends on the song, and on the group, and on the room. There's no one right or wrong way. I've been working on resisting the urge to fill just for the sake of filling. But even on many pretty straight-roots songs, often you can put a little more groove into it by going up to a fifth or down to a flatted seventh from time to time. You're saying 90s rock, but that doesn't tell us much. If you listen to, say, Green Day's "Basket Case," most of the time it's pounding along on the roots of the chords (at a furious pace), but Dirnt does throw in a lot of little accents and curlicues here and there which give the song a lot of its color. It just depends.

 

[Ric5]

Playing in my room with just me and drum machine I have the space to add fifths 7th's 9ths whatever's I want.

Playing live with band I find that I just stick to roots most of the time & adding much more than an occasional fifth to a root is about all I need, playing anything else often gets in the way or adds too much sound.

Is this 'normal'?

I know people say add chord tones, but for the stuff we play if often doesn't fit.

you are probably better at playing sitting down than standing up ...

 

[GKon]

Playing in my room with just me and drum machine I have the space to add fifths 7th's 9ths whatever's I want.

Playing live with band I find that I just stick to roots most of the time & adding much more than an occasional fifth to a root is about all I need, playing anything else often gets in the way or adds too much sound.

Is this 'normal'?

I know people say add chord tones, but for the stuff we play if often doesn't fit.

I'm "guilty" of doing the same a lot of times.

It can boil down to, when playing in your room, by yourself, there's less pressure and no one will hear you if you "screw up".
On stage, in a band setting, there's more at stake. So perhaps you're (Me, too) lacking some confidence in the "adding more notes when
playing live" department?

If that's the case, the suggestions of just working on it more, with recordings of the songs your band plays, and also playing some Jamerson,
McCartney and working with Ed Friedland's book, as mentioned by Joe Nerve, are the way to go, in my opinion.

 

[Rib 13]

Playing in my room with just me and drum machine I have the space to add fifths 7th's 9ths whatever's I want.

Playing live with band I find that I just stick to roots most of the time & adding much more than an occasional fifth to a root is about all I need, playing anything else often gets in the way or adds too much sound.

Is this 'normal'?

I know people say add chord tones, but for the stuff we play if often doesn't fit.

this depends on so many factors that there is no real answer.

 

[engedi1]

If you are playing 90's pop-rock, then I would suggest listening to bass players from that era. Gin Blossoms are a good example of jangley guitars and pop hook being supported by bass. REM is another good example. In REM's case the guitars are high up and make room for the bass. If your guitar players strum power chords the whole time there is little else you can do but play roots. Listen to how the Foo Fighter's bass player does it with such a band.

 

[Pumpkin]

I think the key to this is the style of 90's music you're playing. I've done my fair share of 90's alt, and some of it just doesn't have room for bass embellishment. I would start by asking you two questions: what rhythm are you playing the root notes in and how greasy is your playing style? In my experience with 90's rock, it's far less helpful to think about walking chord tones and much more about knowing what's going on and picking your spots. If you're playing straight xth's think about working in some variations in your rhythm (your drummer probably has some different things you can accent off of). If you've already got a good rhythm but you feel like the only note you're hitting is the root, and some grease. Instead of doing the root, ghost the note every now and then. Throw in an octave. There's a lot you can do without really muddy-ing the melodic waters by trying to walk chord tones over a lead-style guitar. The link below is to a lesson on grease by Nathan East that I think is wholly worth the 5 or 6 minutes it take to watch it.

 

[engedi1]

Counting Crows is another example of a 90's pop-rock band with a great bass players. They have 3 guitar players and he writes cool bass parts that work in a dense mix.

 

[cchorney]

You need to be honest with yourself. If it sounds right when alone but not on stage, then either you're not serving the music when you're alone (by playing too much) or you're not serving the music when you're performing (by playing too little). Maybe record yourself playing alone and experiment a bit. Do the same song just roots, then again roots and fifths, then again with all the chord tones, then once more as expressively as possible. Hopefully this will give you some perspective of what works, at least in that song, section by section. I tend to play simpler at the beginnings of songs, adding more once we're past the chorus, and I try to compliment the guitar solos by playing more expressively in those sections.

 

[Spin Doctor]

Play music, not notes. What that means is, play in the style of the music you are doing and don't overthink it. If you are playing 90's covers, play the bassline provided by the song. As you learn more, you can decide what to do and what not to do. But if you are asking this question, looking for places to stuff more notes in, you are not there yet.

 

[DavC]

put on some Grand Funk ... learn it , ... Mel is cool

pentatonics ..? good to know in all positions

do you know exactly what chords are being played ..? or , exactly how is the guitarist playing them .?

is he just playing root/5th/oct . ?

the melody gives you some good note hints .?

 

[jamro217]

If everything you play zips along at 240 BPM you don't have time to do anything but hit the root, if your repertoire is paced a little slower it gives you the opportunity to be more adventurous. Try slowing the tempo slightly.

 

[Madhouse27]

I think you're just too low in the mix. Turn that thing up and get busy...guitar players love it!

 

[Herbal]

For me it's not so much adding chord tones, but connecting one chord to the next.
The bar that precedes a chord change is usually where you can let go of the basic pattern and do something adventurous/imaginative/interesting. Depending on style obviously.

yes that

do you know exactly what chords are being played ..? or , exactly how is the guitarist playing them .?

The guitarist just plays first position cowboy chords and they take up a lot of the sonic room on their own.!

 

[Spin Doctor]

I think you're just too low in the mix. Turn that thing up and get busy...guitar players love it!

LOL... Wanna be startin' somethink...

 

[Spin Doctor]

The guitarist just plays first position cowboy chords and they take up a lot of the sonic room on their own.!

You pretty much answered your own question in your original post. And yes it's normal to have too much stuff going on when there's too much stuff going on. There's nothing you can do with this situation except what you've been doing.

 

[Herbal]

I can see you are still wanting to make something happen. What are you ultimately trying to accomplish?

To make the best sounds/play the best as I can, as cheesy as that might come across..

 

[Spin Doctor]

To make the best sounds/play the best as I can, as cheesy as that might come across..

I edited my original post because I thought it came off kinda heavy. Just play what sounds good FOR THE SONG. You already figured that all those notes sound like crap in that band setting. What else do you need to know? there's no magic formula for jamming in a bunch of notes where they don't belong. Playing random chord tones even if they fit the chords is gonna get u a bunch of side eye looks.

I think what you need to work on is styles. Learn basslines you like, that are in the different styles of the music that you play. So for 90's rock you have Foofighters, Counting crows, Dishwalla, Harvey Danger, Stone Temple Pilots... It goes on and on. You probably know way more than I do, but there are some great basslines there...

Then figure out ways to add that stuff (slowly) into your playing. I think you are not doing enough transcribing. I don't mean writing down lines (Which I see as a monumental waste of time). I mean just learning them, whether they are songs your band plays or not. You don't even have to learn the whole thing if you don't want to. Just learn the parts you really dig.

Eventually that stuff you worked on, will just start showing up in your playing, all on it's own... Unfortunately, it takes awhile for that to happen. Go figure. But you don't want to try to force some stuff into a song. That's just bad business...