Joined a new band, harder than i thought!

JT1

JT1

Silver Member
Well i joined a new band a week ago and i've been having great fun, sleazy rock/metal. You know it's funny, even though this is the music that i listen to and love, it is music i find quite hard to play or should i say i find it harder to be creative in it. I can play in a metal band no problem and now it's come to straight forward rock it's harder than i thought especially at tempos that i'm not used to. Has anyone else found that as the music gets 'easier' or so to speak, being creative and playing 'easier stuff' gets harder?

I'd love to know your thoughts and experience on this.
 
Yes, I think it's harder. Piano is our keys player's fourth instrument - after gamelan, guitar and bass. But he always over-reaches and makes errors. I regularly suggest that it's best to play what you know in a band setting.

One time he said with a grin, "Yes, but when you play a lot of notes it's less obvious if you stuff up".

When we play simply there's all this space between the notes where a note can be misplaced. Playing up one note out of four imprecisely sounds worse than having two notes out of sixteen a bit off - they blend in more.

I'm dealing with this in the current band, which requires simpler and cleaner playing than my old groups. I can't hide behind cymbal washes, raw energy and lots of notes. The beat has to sit without a lot of notes to hold it up.
 
Playing what seems to be a simpler form always turns out to be more difficult that you think. Although metal & general rock draw from the same pallet, the feels are totally different. I don't think you're having an ability issue, it's more of a vibe challenge. I found the same thing when moving from jazz rock to classic rock. The urge to overplay was strong and the ability to maniplulate the naked form was weak. I managed that transition by hugely over simplifying my groove work and concentrating on practicing ultra slowly using expressive dynamics to add flavour. It's a journey I enjoyed very much.
 
Polly - totally valid point much more room for noticeable errors and i think i'm going to cut out things that are unnecessary to try and avoid that.

Keep it simple - thanks for the pointers on this, it sounds like that should be my action plan and it is one i fully intend to carry out.

Thanks both of you, really appreciate your thoughts!
 
Although KIS's advice pretty much sums it up, I would encourage you to check out Bobby Blotzer's work in the RATT classics (Dance, Lay It Down, You're In Love). I think his work was always on the spot and very underrated...

Cheers!
 
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