Funk band (Rick)
I’ve got plans. A band, and animation and a video clip.
When the exams are over, I’m going to go wild. Not that there’s anything wrong with learning. Suddenly I’m enjoying the stuff I’m learning again. It’s just the moment that I have two assignments waiting to be completed involving concepts I don’t yet understand I get worried.
Back to the main point of this entry. For a new song I’m working on I want to record a video clip of heaps of people dancing. I hope to find some people interested from Locking classes, which I keep missing due to other commitments, and all get some groovy moves going. From my high school friends I’d like to try to get them to either do a bit of freestyle and also together in a group. I also want to try to recruit some friend’s sister’s friends who have a really unique dancing style.
After my success with Angry Man at the U-Film Festival, I want to try to get another 2D animation down for next year’s Sony Trop Fest. I have absolutely no idea what in the world I’m going to do, but if I’m lucky I’ll work it out after waking up at 3am one morning.
But the thing I’m most excited with right now is trying to start a funk band with some friends. I’ve had a few ideas for some songs that would be based around the bass line. Other members I have so far would be my brother on the drums, one of my best friends on clarinet and another guy from my old school on guitar. I think that next year I’ll be on the look out for people to play organ, violin, saxophone and another percussion instrument like conga’s. (I think I might hang around the African drumming club next year for this, if I don’t find someone else first.) I’m not going to bother finding too many people until at least I’ve got a few good things down with my brother. I’d like to eventually get an album down, get a few gigs and hopefully be able to hear ourselves on 106.7 PBS FM. Now this is going to be fun!
Sounds like you’ve got a plan for the holidays. Do you remember the scene from the movie ‘Predator’ when Arnie lured the Predator into a trap and he was just waiting for it to make that last step to trigger the trap. Do you remember what he was saying:
*arnie accent* “DO IT! C’MON WAD ARR YOO WAITING FARRGH!! DOOOO IT!!!
Hey man, why don’t you record a few of these bass lines and stick ’em in downloadable form on your website for guitarists like say, me, to have a little fun with?
Why don’t we three get together and do an album of easy dance/house tunes. Sell it to the record companies and make some money to fund our way through uni and beyond.
Those bass lines are currently too difficult to record. I’ve tried before, but I don’t presently have the right equipment. (Need a pre-amp, not the voice microphone that’s hopeless at picking up deep sounds.)
And Mothgod, I really don’t think it’s quite that easy. Exactly what do you play Mothgod?
Actually, doing dance/house is probably the easiest option out of most other musical genres.
You cannot make it as a rock/funk band without a full band of at least a bass, drums, guitar and a vocalist. Plus, you must gig and gain exposure this way over months or years. Chances are, you will have to start off doing covers to gain stage experience. You may or may not need an agent or manager to help you get gigs and IF you gain record company interest, that agent or manager of yours had better be a good negotiator.
You don’t need all that if you’re doing dance/house. Hell, you don’t even need a vocalist, although I would still recommend one.
I have ProTools/Garageband with a digidesign MBox for DI recording accompanied by firewire external HDD to facilitate live recording, a DBX mini pre-amp, a Mann M21 condensor microphone, basses (4 string fretted, 4 string fretless, 5 string fretted, 4 string acoustic, and a doublebass), a piano, guitars (electric & acoustic), a couple of pedals, mike stand with anti-vibration suspension and a pop filter, couple of studio synth/keyboards at home. And I have access to singers as well.
The only thing I don’t have is a drumkit. But that’s alright, I have sampled drumkits ready for sequencing.
What works for my guitar (not very well, but close enough) is grabbing a second lead, and a jack/connection from Dick Smith which converts the massive end of a guitar lead point into a small one the size of (you guessed it) the microphone point in the computer. Recording quality’s not great but you can pick something up no problems.
I’m really not sure what to call of what I’m thinking of, but the closest are those like Skeewiff, The Bamboos, Herbie Hancock (Head Hunters era), Eddie Mobley.
I’ve got a great drummer (my brother) and someone who I believe is a good guitarist (haven’t seen him for a while). At the moment I’ve got in mind a nine piece orchestra, (bass, kit, conga (or similar), guitar, keys, violin, sax, clarinet, trumpet), but that will develop as I find the right players and work out exactly what sound I’m going for. I’m lucky in that I’ve got people in mind for most of these instruments. As for vocals, we’ll probably end having none at all, or only for about half of the songs, since I find that vocals can sometimes take away from freedom in the actual music.
I’ve tried hooking my double bass into the computer, but it simply picks up nothing as the pickup just simply can’t get enough sound. I’ll get a pre-amp – one day.