Tactful corrections of band members

Tapping out some very low intensity, washy poly rhythms...

More of an 8ths or 16ths feel? Nothing I can steal, I'm guessing ... not being very good with polly [sic] rhythms ... ironically :) I need to iron out bumps in what I'm doing there too, but I'm aware of my bumbles.
 
This is a very interesting topic as it's a situation that I think a big share of musicians will stumble into one way or the other.

I just typed a big load of improvement ideas but then I thought about the situation and re-read everything I wrote and came to a not so nice conclusion.

I'd like to share a little story of a similar situation. Im in a Genesis tribute band and we had a drummer on the drumstool for 3 years that had no sense of timing and couldn't play his instrument. Now you might know genesis and if you do, then you might have an idea what it takes from a drummer to play the stuff Phil Collins came up with in his 30 years of Genesis. The guy just couldn't play a groove straight or play a fill without f*cking up the timing (or worse, just make it trough the fill without getting lost). I already lost my interest and sat in the keyboard department 1,5 years with little to no motivation because I knew that every rehearsal would be the same story.
Why not firing him? Well because of the same reason you guys have him in the band. The social part, the friendship part.

You are playing with someone that just doesn't match up with you guys and thats the problem. I know from experience that everything mentioned will not really help sort out everything because what he need is education and a change in attitude and insight. That's very difficult to accomplish.

I think that you should try out a few things and see if he's making progress (also, consider backing tracks, playing to a click and suggesting parts although you did try the latter one). But if he doesn't make good progress (get better timing, listen and not overplay) then I think it's really important to save the friendship. What that means is that you guys have to split up as a whole or fire him (but I think the first option is better for the friendship).
It's a very hard decision and very dramatic but I really believe that if you guys want to have everything sorted out and still keep the friendship the same, it is only option that looks manageable because other options just fail and will end in a negative spiral. What happens at the end of the spiral is that you guys loose the friendship and or the project. That would be a lose lose situation. I think putting the band on hold is a lose situation but also a win situation, especially if friendship is much more important.

If the band is just to make fun and do nothing serious, then I would suggest really leaving it for what it's worth, don't have expectations and just have fun togheter. If it's serious then really get rid of him (but that will cost you a friendship, unless you are VERY diplomatically skilled or if he just sees the light and understands that he needs to work hard himself to get somewhere and leaves by himself).

Btw, our story ended with the negative spiral, costing a friendship because he just couldn't understand the problem and always thought that we where just too hard for him. We had our round of auditions and have a drummer we could only dream of, but at the cost of a friendship.
 
Thanks for the salutary tale and wise words, Santi. I'm hearing you.

(BTW, thanks to all for pitching in).

Wow, a dodgy drummer trying to play Genesis. Do you feel the f/ship is retrievable in the future?


If the band is just to make fun and do nothing serious, then I would suggest really leaving it for what it's worth, don't have expectations and just have fun togheter. If it's serious then really get rid of him (but that will cost you a friendship, unless you are VERY diplomatically skilled or if he just sees the light and understands that he needs to work hard himself to get somewhere and leaves by himself).

We're not serious - the main ambition we have is to have fun and please our ears and those of others. If I aurally squint enough I can ignore his messier moments (most of the time) and we usually have a lot of fun. If we were serious I think he'd jump rather than wait to be pushed.

Our singer is excellent and he's more pained about it than I am, but then again Mr X is more my and the bassist's friend than his. Meanwhile the singer would be my best friend in the world so I'm caught right in the middle between two of my best pals. Haha it sounds like a daytime soap :)

There is a risk that our singer will jump if a better band makes the offer because of the situation. If he did I wouldn't blame him.

Come to think of it, when we did a demo in May this year Mr X really lifted his game and tidied up his lines. So he must be able to hear it. It's like he treats band practices like his lab, where he conducts experiments while the rest of us are trying to get things right. He should be doing most of his experimenting at home and bringing the results to the group effort IMO

I wouldn't mind if more of the experiments weren't fizzers ...
 
I'm not crazy, am I?? The ambient sound in the first ending is about 100x better than the dinky harpsichord in the second ending, yes???

I need some objective ears to say, yes Polly you are not mad and your ears aren't playing tricks on you.
Yes, ending 1 is a ton better than ending 2 (even if the harpsichord bit was well played).

And that brings about a slightly sneaky idea. How about posting a selection of band recordings featuring the playing crimes you describe, but under the guise of inviting critique on your drumming prowess. We, of course, will do our duty and offer our thoughts on your drumming, but also make balanced observations from a rhythm section perspective. You can select the best, then copy them out & hand them around in your next band meeting. Of course, to show it's not a stitch up, we'll have to pull you apart too. But hey, you can take it on the chin, and unconditionally offer to up your game, like the accepting egoless band hero you are!

Cool plan huh? But can you take it, even if we're only commenting for the sake of pseudo balance?
 
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Let it be on him to say he if can or can't. If he says he can, that's when you stop the song when he reverts back to his old ways and call him on it. He will either change or quit. If he stays the same, then you have the option to say, "but you said you could do this.." Make him agree to it and hold him to it.
It depends on his personality, really. If he were anything like me, and per what I'm gathering about the scenario (I'd have a different approach in different scenarios), he might just keep playing the way that other folks in the band are not digging so much because (1) he doesn't agree with their views about what sounds better--he's probably playing what he's playing because it sounds good to him--and that's the case relative to what other folks are already playing, and (2) he's not of the opinion that player's parts should be up for vote--he already said he's not telling other folks how to play, so they shouldn't tell him how to play. In a situation like that, they'd probably have to either can me or adjust themselves to be able to accept what I'm doing.

There are situations that I'd handle differently, though. One is based on money. If the money is good, I'll play any crap you want me to play regardless of how bad I think it sounds, how much I dislike it, etc. The sole reason I'll do that is so that I can play what I do like on my own time instead, and then I don't have to worry about whether I'm going to make any money with it.

The other is if it's a band where we take turns writing out charts--I'll play whatever someone has written for me to play on their chart, and then when it's my turn, you'll play whatever I wrote for you to play on my chart.

But in a more casual situation, I'm not going to respond well to "gang pressure", people telling me what I should be playing, etc. What I'm more likely to do, if people keep pestering me about it, is play that way even more to annoy you, and I'd probably start complaining about the way you're playing as a bit of tit for tat, too. If you're shooting for "less is more", I'll keep telling you you're playing too simple, etc.--at least until you just let me play the way I want to play, and then I'll let you play the way you want to play.

What I'm most interested in musically, anyway, in a band situation, is when you've got a collection of people with very different styles and influences all working together to try to play something they each think sounds good (and by the way, because of that, I always think it's a bad idea when people are advertising for musicians for them to be looking for people into the same influences). I tend to think that the best bands are bands that have some tensions there--I think they tend to do the most interesting music, and the music that moves me emotionally the most . . . even if those tend to be the bands most difficult to keep together, at least without periodic arguments, screaming matches, maybe a few fists flying . . . lol.
 
Halfway through the recording of 'Thriller' the Sony Music execs realized they were sitting on a gold mine and started to ride Quincy Jones about the arrangements.
When one of them asked him why there was " all this empty space" in the opening groove of Billie Jean, Quincy replied " I'm leaving a little room for God" .
I once had a producer who was into the "less is more" idea use "Billie Jean" versus the 9/8 section of "Scatterbrain" as a hopeful example--I guess he was banking on me thinking that "Billie Jean" sounds better, so he played both and asked.

I said, "'Billie Jean' might be impressive in terms of production, but 'Scatterbrain' sounds far better to me overall--I mean, that's a monster groove, that whole song just kicks ass. It's your responsibility to make this 'Scatterbrain'-type stuff that we're playing sound as good production-wise as 'Billie Jean'". We didn't really get along that well with that producer, lol. I'm not sure how we ended up with him, because I don't think he was into the kind of music we were doing.
 
In another, a highly ethereal tune, he chose a staccato voice which he plays out of time.
I liked the second version guitar part better . . . just there was some dead space in the middle of it--what happened to the keyboard? (That's the part you overdubbed, I take it?) The second version could really use that, but not, in my opinion, at the expense of what the guitarist was doing--in addition to it instead.

I wouldn't say that he was out of time, but there are different senses of time going on--different people playing slightly ahead of or slightly behind the beat. I do not think that's necessarily a bad thing, but the way to iron it out is usually to just play with each other a lot more.
 
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Phew! Thanks Abe. Sometimes my grip on reality is tenuous :) not unusual that something I thought was totally obvious turns out to be wrong.
Just different tastes. It's not the kind of thing one can be wrong about.

One thing to think about is something I mentioned earlier. How about the possibility of folks in the band presenting more complete charts, or at least complete tunes with parts figured out for each musician in advance (in other words, this latter option being that they don't actually have to write the parts out (handy for players who can't read at all or can't read very well--they can just "dictate" the parts to others instead)), and then you guys take turns with that. That way, when you do a song like this, if it's your chart, then everyone plays whatever you wrote. But you play whatever they wrote when it's their turn. Would the other people in your band be up for that? It's kind of a "composers' collective" idea.
 
It's your responsibility to make this 'Scatterbrain'-type stuff that we're playing sound as good production-wise as 'Billie Jean'". We didn't really get along that well with that producer, lol. I'm not sure how we ended up with him, because I don't think he was into the kind of music we were doing.

Hey, I know for a fact that God always loved Jeff Beck more than the other two guys, so he can do no wrong.. and yup, thats a great example of wall to wall notes creating music magic. Its still not overplaying, though, is it? : )

Are you sure about the 9/8? ( kidding.. )

...
 
Hey, I know for a fact that God always loved Jeff Beck more than the other two guys, so he can do no wrong..
Yeah, I think that producer just didn't like prog and fusion, including Beck. I don't know if he was just thinking, "I know how I can get these guys to play some disco instead" or what.
and yup, thats a great example of wall to wall notes creating music magic. Its still not overplaying, though, is it? : )
I'm probably the wrong person to ask if anything is overplaying, lol. I wouldn't even say these guys are overplaying: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvEhyxZqtCk
Are you sure about the 9/8? ( kidding.. )
haha--I'm sure I think of it in 9/8. ;-)
 
Thanks for the latest gems of wisdom, gents :)

1. Larry, you have a way about you where you can get away with saying things that others can't. I can get away with things up to a point but there's no way I'd get away with Larry-esque brutal bluntness.


2. I certainly would NOT send that clip of the ex-Braindrill guy to our bass player. He is a friend and I'm not in the business of making my friends suffer :)


3. Brew, I agree. I was stoked with the flamenco-ish guitar in the unplugged (second) version. Yep, in the first version there's my ambient piece dubbed over the top (this is the ambient piece). I slowed it down, lay it over the top and voila! Total fluke ...

I feel the noodling harpsichord in the second version detracts rather than adds, but I agree that it is probably a matter of taste. I also suspect that he can't imagine getting another chance to use the harpsichord sound on the keyboard lol. I remember my period playing keys - you look for excuses to use different voices. He's been itching to use the occasionally-lifelike alto sax sound on the keyboard too ... lol ... *shudder*


4. Andy, you're a sly one ... fake a "My Playing" entry, eh? I reckon there'd be three comments ... you, Larry and Abe lol.

Brew's a renegade and I can't be sure he'd play ball :)

The danger is ... what if most decide the biggest problem is the drummer? lol
 
I feel the noodling harpsichord in the second version detracts.... He's been itching to use the occasionally-lifelike alto sax sound on the keyboard too ...

Thats when you dart him. A mild tranquilizer should do the trick. That or rubber bullets..


The danger is ... what if most decide the biggest problem is the drummer? lol

Does everybody in the band suffer from a lack of taste?

...
 
Thats when you dart him. A mild tranquilizer should do the trick. That or rubber bullets..

LOL sh** yeah! ... when we first played the song he used the harpsichord at the start AND shifted to the f*ing alto sax later on. Now it's just the Lurch impersonation. Small mercies. Hopefully another epiphany is on the way ...


Does everybody in the band suffer from a lack of taste?

Obviously none of us are perfect, even our wunderbar vocalist. One clear area where we could improve is there's too much tendency for the players to play ALL the time through every song. I'd like to see more dropping out at various times to give the band different flavours ... say, a guitar trio or a keys trio ... especially during verses. Then we can all come in for the chorus and there's instant impact and tonal variety.

Having said that, I think our keys boy would play at least twice as many notes as everyone else - he works damn hard for the (lack of) money.
 
One clear area where we could improve is there's too much tendency for the players to play ALL the time through every song.

To me, this is a huge, HUGE issue that a lot of bands seem to overlook. It is a sensibility that comes with many hours of playing in bands, playing with other people, and being comfortable with your instrument.

To be able to mesh your voice into the music rather than simply overlay it, comes with a lot of experience IMO.

...
 
To be able to mesh your voice into the music rather than simply overlay it, comes with a lot of experience IMO.

I like that - meshing rather than overlaying.

We've all been playing for yonks so it also comes down to ears and taste. Can old dogs learn new tricks? I think we are all learning new tricks as we go, or at least remembering long-forgotten old ones.

The hard part is getting past his insecurity, pride, preconceived ideas or whatever so he will consider taking my - a mere drummer's - ideas seriously.
 
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