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Improperly Played Covers

#44
I was in a "purposely bad" band back in the early 90s. They called it 'garage psychedelic' and we weren't supposed to practice too much or sound too polished because somehow that would make the music less authentic or sincere or something. :meh:

We did about 85% originals and a small handful of 60's cover tunes, and often mangled them BADLY. I remember asking the BL - who was also a record (vinyl) collector - "Hey, can you play me a recording of that song we're trying to learn?" His reply "Nah, you don't need to hear it!" :meh: So I learned and played "Smokestack Lightning" and "2000 Light-years from Home" on organ without ever hearing a recording of the original tunes. The worst was "Gloria" and yes I was familiar with that song, but the end part where it goes to double time was always, always a sonic trainwreck. The guitars and drums never sync'd up together. We could have spent five or ten minutes working that out during a practice, but NOOOOO, the BL either didn't know how or didn't care. Being embarrassed on stage sucks.
 
#45
I got to hear several bands at a couple festivals over the weekend. Wrong bass playing on cover songs seemed to be prevalent with many bands. One band was so bad that the guy playing bass (I will not call him a bass player) hit clunker notes in every song and he thought he was playing well. I said he was hitting every note and hoped that some of the right ones were in the songs.

Another band was playing country songs and the bass player was clueless. Two songs in particular that stood out were Wagon Wheel where all he did was play root notes (not even roots and fifths) and Honkytonk Badonkadonk where all he played were root notes and there are bass riffs all through that song.
 
#46
I have never understood this phenomenon of just hacking through stuff. As someone once so eloquently put it there is no excuse the notes are right there on the tape. Either get it right or practice until you can. I can't tell you the times I've played with people and they've literally stopped the song and asked "what are you playing." My answer was "the song you asked me to learn" and it's either wow the old guy didn't play like that or oh we never really learned it right so we just do our own version which just makes me scratch my head.

I recently joined a pretty big-time tribute band who has a great reputation and first couple of rehearsals was the same thing. The old guy is a great bass player and I'm not knocking him there were several instances where he either never learned the songs properly or had got off the reservation at some point so me playing the"proper" parts through them off.

My thought is hey that's the part on the original recording, that's the part that several different players have played over this artist's three decade plus career so why would I do anything different.
 
#47
I am going to add in a simple song, but I haven't heard many bands play the correct bass line Keep your hands to yourself including me for awhile. Now an then i will play it like the recorded version, but mostly I play it like the rest who choose the last lead riff bass part, only because it seems like that is what he should have been playing along. But listen to it closely and with no bass guitar in your hands and you will hear he uses many different bass lines through out the song. When I first learned it was quick and dirty like most your brain says simple 3 chord throw away tune with the typical old style bass line to follow the guitar riff. others hear root note played straight through. Funny thing though he doesn't play it the studio version live himself so all is forgiven :)
 
#48
ant_riv said:
I'm not sure if irks me is the right word, but when a band covers "All Right Now" and the guitar player incorrectly plays the verse riff (chords) and then especially when the bass player incorrectly plays the main bass riff in the instrumental section.

These are such iconic parts and I expect there are tons of YouTube and other resources if one can't hear it to help get it right. It makes me wonder if it's lazy, can't hear it, or just don't care.
Click to expand...

I think it's the dozens of chord/tab websites out there which copy each other. Someone submits a tab with basic A/A/D/A and they just run with it. The difference between what Kossof played and what a million hacks are playing is HUGE.

I played in a cover band briefly which covered 'Pretty Woman.'
The bass part is actually quite pretty. It flows beautifully. Except, that is, when the band is rushing the chorus, and faking the chords (G for a G7 etc.). Made me cringe. There weren't any real rehearsals, everyone just learned their part and played. Well, some of us did.
 
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#49
Every once in a while, I will do a fill in gig with other bands. Now, I can't claim that I always play all the parts exactly like the records since many times, the bands have their own "diversions" of tunes.

Anyway, a few years ago, I was filling in with a local classic rock band. The bass player is a very good player even though he admits he does not like to play the parts on the records. After we played a few songs, one of the band members turned to me and said, "So, that's how those songs go!" I said that I learned the parts from the recordings.
 
#52
jmattbassplaya said:
Most bands leave out half of the second verse of Outshined by Soundgarden, but I kinda get that one as the music video does that, too.
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There were a handful of songs in that era where there was a radio/video version and LP version, we always tried to play the LP version.
Off the top of my head-

Possum Kingdom - The Toadies
You - Candlebox
My Own Prison - Creed
 
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#53
tlc1976 said:
It's one thing if they totally make it their own, it can be cool. Otherwise IMO just play the song correctly.

A couple common bar band covers that bugged me the most:

Brown Eyed Girl, where the E - F# - G go high, he just kept them low on the E string thru the song. Playing them high I always thought is what makes the song.

Knockin On Heaven's Door, instead of syncopated fills, he played this silly sounding fill of all 8th notes and did it exactly the same thru the whole song.
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Knocking on Heaven's Door is a song that begs for individual interpretation. He just happened to suck.
 
#54
Myself, when I go to a cover band show I want to hear what the bass player and other musicians do with familiar songs. I absolutely don't want to hear note for note renditions every song. If you're going to do that I'd rather the venue just put the radio on quietly and my wife and I will order some food and have a conversation. JMO.
 
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#55
I like to hear a band do their own thing with a song--so to me that is not playing a song improperly--they have intentionally changed it--but when they try to play it properly & fail that it can be awkward & not so much fun.

Case in point--these two videos illustrate changing it on purpose & not beign able to play what they wanted to:

 
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#57
I worked with a guy briefly who managed to reduce White Christmas down to C, F and G. It was horrid. When I played the song on guitar to demonstrate the correct chords, he told me I was one of those guys who ruins a good song with too many fancy chords. I guess I ruined it for him, since he didn't know how to play "fancy" chords.
 
#58
Hahaha said:
I worked with a guy briefly who managed to reduce White Christmas down to C, F and G. It was horrid. When I played the song on guitar to demonstrate the correct chords, he told me I was one of those guys who ruins a good song with too many fancy chords. I guess I ruined it for him, since he didn't know how to play "fancy" chords.
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All yur high falutin' book lernin!
 
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#59
Hahaha said:
I worked with a guy briefly who managed to reduce White Christmas down to C, F and G. It was horrid. When I played the song on guitar to demonstrate the correct chords, he told me I was one of those guys who ruins a good song with too many fancy chords. I guess I ruined it for him, since he didn't know how to play "fancy" chords.
Click to expand...

I got fired from a band once because they said "Bass players shouldn't play chords." to which I responded "I just figured someone should play the right one once in a while."

j
 
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