Simple electronic bass theory?

[Rusty Shackleford]

quite inebriated myself! all i can really say is get the bassline down before you write the rest of the music!

For example, you've said that your music sounds more laid back than you'd like. For techno in particular, the shorter your bassline loop is, the more energy it'll have because the looping gives your drums + bass that 'chug' that you're looking for. Of course, this is a broad generalization and rules are made to be broken....

If you like richie hawtin, try to copy his basslines- it's a good exercise in listening. Remember- for techno, the more involved the bass is, the less busy everything else needs to be. This is why you typically have just an offbeat bassline for most 4-on-the-floor styles.

[deastman]

You can also learn a lot by listening to the basslines in late 70's-early 80's funk/r&b/disco. They tended to use the bass as more of an expressive, noodling element, rather than just a root-note anchor.

I actually just spent the last hour coming up with the bassline for one of my songs... something rather minimal, Yazoo-style 80's synthpop. All I can say is, keep trying!

[Toxikator]

thanks for all the replies! espeically toxik! altho that F# seems out of place. my basslines would put an F instead of F#. the groove is good, tho. i really think the problem i've been having is that i start a track thinkin i want it to be uptempo, but i use a downtempo or melodic bass, and... eh.. yet again. i'm lost for words. please continue the discussion~ it's really helpful

If you would use the F that's totally okay too. I do that all the time... it's just moving from the minor mode to the Phrygian mode. It's down to taste in cases like that, the m2 often works very well.

[afreshcupofjoe]

I checked out some Richie Hawtin and I think maybe I can see where you are coming form. This is not really my style of music, but I think I can offer a little advice. Excuse me if my recomendations are too simple. I don't mean to be insulting or anything. His basslines seem very simple and straightforward, but I can see how it may be difficult if you just have the approach all wrong.

First of all, if you are trying to play this stuff on a keyboard then you are fighting yourself right off the bat. This style of music is heavily programmed and sequenced, and it is hard to get those combinations of rhythms and notes by playing them on a keyboard. It's just stuff that's not intuitive to play, but really easy to program. A lot of the movement in Hawtin's basslines seems to come more from tweaking sounds or parameters on a synth than actual notes played on a keyboard. He also seems to incorporate a lot of syncopated rhythms and accents in strange places that might be hard to play on a keyboard, but can be achieved easily on a sequencer.

Here are some quick examples I cooked up:

http://www.speedyshare.com/968775169.html

The first clip is just repeating 4 note pattern created using an arpeggiator similar to something I heard in a hawtin song. It's a very simple technique, but I could see someone being lost if they didn't know to use an arppegiator to get that effect.

The second clip is a simple syncopated pattern. While the drum pattern falls on every four beats, the bass line falls on every third beat creating this out-of-step mechanical feel. This is probably the most important example, because Hawtin uses this technique everywhere! In almost every song I listened to he used some sort of obvious syncopation on one of the instruments. Once again, not intuitive to play, but very easy to program.

The third clip is just a syncopated version of the bassline from the first example.

The fourth clip is just a 303 type bass synth set to generate a random pattern. I heard a 303 on some of the stuff that I listened to, and it's worth mentioning that if you want to get that particular sound it's much easier to use a 303 or one of the software recreations of that synth. I would even argue that what is more important than the synth itself is the sequencer that is built into it. The 303 sequencer limits you to programming basslines in a particular way that is essential to that 303 bass sound. Luckily a lot of the software recreations also include the sequencer part.

Anyway, I hope at least some of that was helpful. Good luck.

[NewSc2]

yes that was very helpful! i couldn't hear the examples too well (except for 3 and 4) -- i'm on my laptop right now -- but i got the jist of what you said.

could you briefly address the arpeggiator? did you just use a simple up-down pattern and held a few random bass notes? do arpeggiators get any more complex than that (i.e. can i program it to hold notes, syncopate, etc.)?

also is there anything else i could use to get mechanical sequences out? i don't know how to program a 303 but if it's that simple i'll reinstall ReBirth on my pc.

my first question wasn't specifically about hawtin but his style is what i've been having the most trouble with. more musical stuff (kraftwerk, underworld) gives me problems with basslines too but i have written out a few basslines that happened to sound pretty good.

edit: oh yeah adn if anybody wants to listen to samples of hawtin just go onto his site -- www.richiehawtin.com

[afreshcupofjoe]

could you briefly address the arpeggiator? did you just use a simple up-down pattern and held a few random bass notes? do arpeggiators get any more complex than that (i.e. can i program it to hold notes, syncopate, etc.)?

There are many varieties of arpeggiators available, from ones that do simple up/down patterns to ones that can do very complex repeating patterns. Some synths have them built in, but there are many midi based vst arpeggiators that can be placed in front of any vst synth. Just make sure that your host supports sending midi data from a vst. If not there are workarounds like EnergyXT, which also contains it's own poerful arpeggiator.

also is there anything else i could use to get mechanical sequences out? i don't know how to program a 303 but if it's that simple i'll reinstall ReBirth on my pc.

A piano roll, step sequencer, tracker, anything that can program midi really.

[peejunk]

You don't really need 303 or a really good emu for most Hawtin sounds as he uses the 303 as a basic subtractive and for pattern programming, rather than for azieed squelching that's the "hard to emulate" bit in a 303. So any synth will do, it just has to have glide/legato, saw and lowpass and you must limit yourself to these features.

[Kasualty]

Otherwise, do what everyone else does (and loves (to hate)) and put a single note repeating every second half beat, or with the hard kick lolol.

and that's why electronic music from thirty years ago still sounds way more interesting than all the untalented shit out today.

[markroom]

heres a few stop gap solutions-

get a virtual bass plugin like
steinberg virtual bassist or broomstick bass - these are geared more toward real bass but could be adapted

get a plugin such as maxx clasters toxic3 and use the onboard sequencer - i.e. change of interface( this is included in the Fl 7 demo)


convert a drum sound in to the bass- e.g add a tom sample to beat then use that patern as the bass metre

or live with having a minimal bass sound and concentrate on other strenghts and stop letting it be your excuse for never finishing anything