A
afromoose
Guest
In my experience creativity has two parts - 1. Feed the subconscious. 2. Zone out (or trip out or whatever you want to call it).
The subconscious is creative. In my opinion, the conscious mind is not creative. But I do think that the conscious mind is essential and this is where theory comes in, because a bit like the subconscious provides the clay or the material you're going to use, the conscious mind allows you to sculpt it. So I think that as well as feeding the sub-conscious with new sounds, feelings and inspiration (which you can any way you want whether it's painting yourself blue and smoking peyote or whatever) it's a good idea to establish motor skills, ear training, rhythmic and harmonic awareness and other theoretical knowledge that will make your creative efforts more eloquent and focussed.
I have tried the following but depending on what you like about music (for me it's colourism and groove) you might look for other stuff
1. Listening to music from different cultures or that has different grooves (very good for getting out of common pockets) Examples: tuvan throat singing, taiko drumming from japan, tropicalia, african styles (e.g. sunny ade, zimbabwean music like mapfumo, extra golden, soweto township music) - In my case this made me really aware of what principles I liked in bass playing and also opened my ears to hearing different rhythms instinctively.
2. Take inspiration from other instruments. Examples would be piano basslines (think The Doors and how their basslines are different, typically way more arpeggiated lines than usual), tuba, etc... Also if you do something like learn your favourite jazz sax solo on bass, your bound to put some interesting qualities into your playing.
3. Learn about harmony - there's a great book called '20th century harmony' by vincent persicetti. I've used this quite a lot because the harmonic ideas are very interesting, and are taken from a whole range of idioms, not just jazz and funk or even electric music. Stuff like quintile harmony I've been able to apply - and polychords and that kind of thing. You can really start to get outside the realms of 'if the guitar player is playing this, then you play this' sort of mentality. Also it helps to bounce ideas back because you can explain possibilities of what can be played over your own basslines.
4. Use chords and inversions. Nothing quite like switching between an inverted power chord and a regular one - i got that from listening to Namibian accordian music. It grooves great because you can use chords around the same area, but get this very subtle variation due to the inversion.
5. Experiment with texture - muddiness, sparseness, range between notes.
6. Learn percussion instruments. I learned african drumming patterns on 12/8 grooves for ages, including bell patterns and practiced displacing the standard pattern like a mode. If you do this, you will discover new groove pockets ALL OVER THE PLACE. I also studied cross rhythms a lot - both neat little tight ones and big ones that spanned many bars. If you take a drum pattern and can read it, a lot of the time it's quite easy to substitute the drums for notes. This means you can start using anything - djembe music, kit patterns, whatever, as a basis.
I do think that funk is overplayed and hasn't been played very very well for about 40 years. I think the main reason for this is that originally it was innovation, and now it's emulation. Emulators never do things the same as innovators, because they're not being creative. There was a post I read once by a funk drummer who was explaining how much funk drummers in the 60s used to doctor their drums to the extreme to search for the particular sound they were after. That's the passion that comes from being creative. Western musicians are not typically very rhythmically aware - I think personally that the funk trap is one that most bass players don't emerge from, because they get stuck in a rut of trying to make it MORE FUNKY, EVEN MORE FUNKY... But that's just one groove, and quite a boring one as it goes. Not much push and pull in a funk groove. Anyway rant over.
The subconscious is creative. In my opinion, the conscious mind is not creative. But I do think that the conscious mind is essential and this is where theory comes in, because a bit like the subconscious provides the clay or the material you're going to use, the conscious mind allows you to sculpt it. So I think that as well as feeding the sub-conscious with new sounds, feelings and inspiration (which you can any way you want whether it's painting yourself blue and smoking peyote or whatever) it's a good idea to establish motor skills, ear training, rhythmic and harmonic awareness and other theoretical knowledge that will make your creative efforts more eloquent and focussed.
I have tried the following but depending on what you like about music (for me it's colourism and groove) you might look for other stuff
1. Listening to music from different cultures or that has different grooves (very good for getting out of common pockets) Examples: tuvan throat singing, taiko drumming from japan, tropicalia, african styles (e.g. sunny ade, zimbabwean music like mapfumo, extra golden, soweto township music) - In my case this made me really aware of what principles I liked in bass playing and also opened my ears to hearing different rhythms instinctively.
2. Take inspiration from other instruments. Examples would be piano basslines (think The Doors and how their basslines are different, typically way more arpeggiated lines than usual), tuba, etc... Also if you do something like learn your favourite jazz sax solo on bass, your bound to put some interesting qualities into your playing.
3. Learn about harmony - there's a great book called '20th century harmony' by vincent persicetti. I've used this quite a lot because the harmonic ideas are very interesting, and are taken from a whole range of idioms, not just jazz and funk or even electric music. Stuff like quintile harmony I've been able to apply - and polychords and that kind of thing. You can really start to get outside the realms of 'if the guitar player is playing this, then you play this' sort of mentality. Also it helps to bounce ideas back because you can explain possibilities of what can be played over your own basslines.
4. Use chords and inversions. Nothing quite like switching between an inverted power chord and a regular one - i got that from listening to Namibian accordian music. It grooves great because you can use chords around the same area, but get this very subtle variation due to the inversion.
5. Experiment with texture - muddiness, sparseness, range between notes.
6. Learn percussion instruments. I learned african drumming patterns on 12/8 grooves for ages, including bell patterns and practiced displacing the standard pattern like a mode. If you do this, you will discover new groove pockets ALL OVER THE PLACE. I also studied cross rhythms a lot - both neat little tight ones and big ones that spanned many bars. If you take a drum pattern and can read it, a lot of the time it's quite easy to substitute the drums for notes. This means you can start using anything - djembe music, kit patterns, whatever, as a basis.
I do think that funk is overplayed and hasn't been played very very well for about 40 years. I think the main reason for this is that originally it was innovation, and now it's emulation. Emulators never do things the same as innovators, because they're not being creative. There was a post I read once by a funk drummer who was explaining how much funk drummers in the 60s used to doctor their drums to the extreme to search for the particular sound they were after. That's the passion that comes from being creative. Western musicians are not typically very rhythmically aware - I think personally that the funk trap is one that most bass players don't emerge from, because they get stuck in a rut of trying to make it MORE FUNKY, EVEN MORE FUNKY... But that's just one groove, and quite a boring one as it goes. Not much push and pull in a funk groove. Anyway rant over.
