Locking in with the bass drum - how/when ?

[craigb]

I've heard the expression "lock in with the bass drum" for a while (Al Kooper talks about teaching Lynyrd Skynyrd how to do it in his book). So does it mean playing only with the kick drum, hitting/accenting the beats with the kick drum or something else? Playing with the same timing as the kick drum could make for some pretty simple parts (not necessarily a bad thing).

 

I'm coming at things from a rock-centric point of view and on some of the "straighter" rock songs it would be easy to pump out eigths exactly with the bass drum (tried that on one song the other night). On ones with more intricate/syncopated beats I noticed I wasn't always "feeling" the same beats/accents as the drummer.

 

I come at things from having played sax for years and years so I think I'm a somewhat melodic player with probably some tendency to overplay. So how do you define "locking in with the kick drum"? Is it always appropriate? Is it the same or different than locking in with the drummer (which I think is always appropriate)?

 

PS Hey Ed, I wanted to get some action going in the forum but wanted to stay away from gear questions. Thanks for the help you gave me last year when I was looking at Carvins (I ended up with a G&L in the end).

[Ed Friedland]

Craig,

Glad you stopped in. Well, playing with the kick traditionally implies that you match whatever rhythm is being played down there.

 

For instance, think of an Earth Wind & Fire type half-time 16th note groove. The kick drum will typically play a short eighth note on beat 1, then a sixteenth note pickup on the "a" of 2 and another downbeat on 3, a sixteenth pickup on the "a" of 4 etc... In that situation, it sounds great when the bass player doubles that rhythm, it really tightens up the groove. Of course, that's not the only way to handle that situation, but it works great and many producers look for that in recording because it's clean. In live gigs you may have more leeway, but producers are funny about having their records sound together, and that is one thing that contributes to that result.

 

It's also possible to play around the kick with great effect. James Jamerson was a master of this as well as Larry Graham.

 

Even if you don't double the kick drum exactly, I think it's still important to be conscious of it's placement in a groove as it is the center of the universe (ask any soundman!)

[alexclaber]

Almost 4 years on, and only one reply to this post - shame on you all!

 

How do you do it?

 

Alex

[Rick Hoffman]

It is very important to remember your role is to serve the groove. Focus, don't overplay, and remember to use the spaces between the notes. In 4/4 time its pretty natural to count time but if you jam with a good drummer he will lay down the path for you and it should seem pretty clear what to play, but there is always more than one bassline for any given drum groove.

Practice counting time in 4/4 using ghost notes and triplets. You can also play triplets without actually playing 3 notes, the space in between 2 notes counts.

I'm not sure how I can explain this but throughout the course of the song my brain is counting the whole time all the way down to the 16th note. I could be playing 1/4 notes but I'm counting 16ths. When I go into a fill I just find its easier to lock in with the drummer and come back on beat.

And always practice with a metronome or drum machine.

[ClarkW]

Last night we were going over Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and since it's not a terribly technical song on the drums, I think my drummer was getting bored, so he was experimenting a bit.

 

Without fail, every time he tried to kick the same rhythm as the awesome, mechanical bassline, ALL of the band members scrunched their noses and shook their heads. It sounded terrible.

 

On the other side of the spectrum, we have a song where the bass pretty much never plays a note without the kick+snare playing it, too. Works well. (http://www.hourglassband.com/audio/index.html and listen to the first 20 seconds or so of Altered State)

 

And then you've got a song like Van Halen's "Jump," where the bass is locked in with...the high hat, I guess.

 

The hardest thing about locking in is remembering what you played in the last measure, and playing it again in this measure. There are a few spots on our album, and I won't tell you where, where we had a previously-agreed-upon sequence, and if you listen carefully, one of the musicians changes up his kic...err, "notes" all the time, leaving the other one playing the right part but making the whole thing sound a bit random.

 

I'm not pointing any fingers though! :

[The Bear Jew]

I think it primarily depends on what you want to do with the particular bit of music you're playing.

 

The way you deal with the kick will change the way the songs feel. You can drive things along and make the music sound very urgent by doubling up on the kick drum pattern or kind of loose and funky by playing only on the kick pattern. You can make it extra funky by playing behind the beat a bit... The bass has access to a lot of rhythmic colors and flavors.

 

Of course, A LOT depends on the drummer. It's hard to make a crappy kick groove sound good, but talented bassist often save shite drummers' bacon by virtue of working that kick groove the right way.

[g.]

There are occasions when that is a good approach. But for some reason most post-Jamerson players don't ALWAYS want to ALWAYS be used just as an extension of the kick drum ALWAYS, just to add a little bit more tuning to the kick's resonance - ALWAYS.

 

That approach to production became endemic in the mid-eighties when it was routine to gate the bass part using the kick drum as the trigger, and even to replace all the bass sounds on the scratch track with sampled ones hooked to that trigger. Wow, how musically inspiring to be a bassist in those circumstances : {

 

There isn't one right way. But there certainly is a wrong way. That's probably why this thread deflated back then. Not that many of us aspire to being the tuning of a drum.

[bc_dup1]

Without fail, every time he tried to kick the same rhythm as the awesome, mechanical bassline, ALL of the band members scrunched their noses and shook their heads. It sounded terrible.

Not easy for a drummer to play that and be tight, I wouldn't have thought - your guy did well if he managed!(Not that I'm think it would sound good even if it was).

 

One thing that doesn't seem to get mentioned in this context is the difficulty of hearing the bass drum sometimes when the onstage sound isn't great. I sometimes feel I'm playing by hearing the snare and cymbals, watching the kick pedal, and "feeling" the bass drum. This was an even bigger problem when I first switched from guitar to bass, as a bass player I've gradually got better and better at hearing the bass drum clearly, but I still struggle on some boomy stages.

[dcr]

Bass & drums should play like two halves of the same instrument. They should always be locked in.

 

Of course, there are many ways of locking in, as people have pointed out. You can lock in with the bass drum by playing on the kicks, or in between the kicks, or whatever. It depends on what overall rhythmic structure you're going for. And it's possible to (attempt to) do either without the whole thing sounding locked in. So although locking comes in many flavors, a good lock is what you always want.

 

And there's more to a kit than a kick drum. There's a lot of stuff there to lock into. Most of the time I'm focused on the kick, but for some parts I can have better results by focusing on the hat, or even the snare, etc. A good drummer will use all the possibilities to create a whole rhythmic feeling, & it's important to tune into that. Which means hearing the whole kit.

[Rick Hoffman]

In situations where I can't hear the kick drum I watch the drummer's high hat and top of his knee on the kick drum, and get in sync with that and try to anticipate the beat.

Sometimes I'll lay down a good bassline while there are other times where I'm thankful for the next measure so I can start over and try again.

[BenLoy]

I try not to think about it. I just listen to the drummer and make my part sound like it's another part of the kit.

[jeremy c]

Torgo and Ben have said the closest to what I've been thinking.

 

You want to lock to the drummer, not just one drum. Sometimes it's as simple as locking to the drummer's feel. Every drummer puts the beat in a slightly different place and subdivides the beat slightly differently. It doesn't really seem possible, but it certainly feels true to me.

 

A good bassist will find the drummer's feel immediately and lock to it.

 

Sometime the kick drum gives an outline for the accents you will put in your line. Sometimes you will fill in the holes in the kick drum part.

 

Sometimes the bass part is simple and the drum part is complex and sometimes the drum part is simple and the bass part is complex.

 

It would be nice if there was a rule, but there isn't.

 

The only rule is that if it feels good and sounds good then it is right.

[dohhhhh6]

Today at band practice, I paid extra attention to when/where my drummer was hitting the snare and kick. I really noticed no extra groove factor. I think I'm generally really good at locking in with my normal drummer.

 

What's kinda funny is we were taking a break, and the guitarist (former drummer) hops on some drums and tells me to play the new song I wrote (it's an awesome song by the way). I tell him what I want, he nails it, and we just have such a strong groove together. He then teaches the part (because the drummer liked it) to the drummer, and I started to notice that my drummer is kinda like a metronome. He hits hard and keeps time. Compared to the guitarist, he doesn't have too much finesse.

 

Interesting discovery as a whole, in my opinion. I just have a feeling that if my guitarist bumped over to drums, we could have a decent little band. However, he sings and plays a mean rhythm guitar (actually... he doesn't mind playing rhythm guitar which is a good thing).

 

Case closed.

[zachg]

the main issue is to keep time with the bass drum. more in the sense of feel, especially with lating style beats. for straight rock n' roll beats, it's not as neccessary. it applies more with keeping the "feel" of the music which is what the bass drums' purpose is musically.