The Off-beat

[Serotonin]

There is a certain art to syncopation, where you try to make it as funky and unpredictable as possible.

One can use almost the whole of Led Zeppelin's oeuvre as an example, but listen to "The Wanton Song" in particular. Page and Jones assault their guitars in G for a few hits, and then silence, assault again, and then silence. Bonham's fills during the silent parts are the epitome of what I am talking about.

Something as simple as the drums in "People of the Sun" by RATM, with that powerful kick and snare is infectious.

Triplets are a favourite of drummers. You can hear them in the solo during "Comfortably Numb", also during "Remedy" by the Black Crows, where you can hear the singer exclaim excitedly afterwards. The one at the end of the bridge in Fuel's "Bittersweet" IMO is overdone.

Steely Dan have a term for funky drum fills. It's schneckability (http://www.steelydan.com/glossary.html). The drum fill at the end of the chorus of "King of the World" definitely has schneckability. It has the quality of almost being "behind the beat", as if the drummer was chewing on a Cuban and had a pina colada on the floor tom.

We owe a debt to Africa.

[Pugly]

I like strange catchy rhythms. I was teaching myself polyrhythms for a time, any time of the day you could see me tap out something trying to get a polyrythm done. Anything with 5s is tricky for me, 5 over 4s and 5 over 3s. I still tap out any sort of crazy rhythm on surfaces near my vicinity.

I also like quarter note triplets, or really breaking up any non 8th note in groups of 3.

When I played drums, I was never really great since I was always exploring a rhythm that was a tad beyond my means and would lose the beat. I've been thinking about picking it up again though, just to explore strange beats and off kilter time.

Now that I've been writing songs using a midi sequencer, I can make the drums as crazy as I want. But I try to make it fit the song. I like the drums to be an active part of the listening experience, where there is some semblence of time keeping but the drums are a strange and interesting part of the song that is worthy of your attention.

[last_caress]

Don't forget "The Crunge"

Syncopation is a lot of what I like about more inventive drum+bass and breakcore.

Also see Meshuggah, especially Destroy Erase Improve and Chaosphere.

[Serotonin]

Don't forget "The Crunge"



Doesn't count because the signature is 9/8. So you don't know whether a beat is an on or an off beat, or indeed if they even exist.

"Houses of the Holy" the song (off Physical Graffiti) is fiendishly and deceptively hard to pick the on/off beat in the first couple of seconds when Bonham comes in. A friend of mine plays drums and he broke his sticks in frustration trying to play the beat.

Inventive breakbeats can be ok once in a while, but for me I need the organic drums.

[kuranes]

A friend of mine believes it was Bonham who was the key catalyst/ingredient that made LZ what it was. Not Page or Plant. They certainly fizzled when he left, that's for sure. I always liked his drumming, but I must admit I never thought of him as the key player. ( Though I always knew how important Charlie Watts was. )

It's interesting to watch musicians using silence ( "Negative space" in art ) as a key ingredient of a song. LZ do it again with "Hots on For Nowhere" and "For Your Life" from Presence. Sero - I think I told you "The Wanton Song" is one of my all time faves of theirs.

The king of the use of silence in his music was Miles Davis. One time ( I think it was a Fillmore show ) he signaled "stop" to the band at an opportune rhythmic moment, and allowed the sounds of traffic from outside to come through a freight /garage type dock door that had been opened for that purpose. Then resumed. In addition to poignant slow pieces that use silence effectively, he liked to get a "stop/start" rhythm going on faster pieces too. Witness "Honky Tonk" on "Get Up With It." He instructed McLaughlin to play his guitar as though he was unfamiliar with it. It's the funkiest tune I ever heard for that kind of thing. I'd love to hear some of the versions of it on the box sets that are out now. Miles did use white guys like John in his band, even though there was occasionally protests about it from outsiders or whoever. He once said that whites had a propensity to play just behind the beat, while blacks were more likely to play right on top of it. Plenty of exceptions to that, I'm sure.

[Serotonin]

I know whitey Bill Evans played with Miles on "Kind of Blue". Miles' theory on the white/black thing I think holds for that album. The black-played drum and bass are.... right on top of it. No shadiness or leaving it until the last microsecond before they hit the spot, just right there. Bill's piano, however, especially on the intros to "So What" and "All Blues" explores the microenvironment of rhythm within each beat. As such, it works a treat. :)

[last_caress]

Doesn't count because the signature is 9/8. So you don't know whether a beat is an on or an off beat, or indeed if they even exist.

"Houses of the Holy" the song (off Physical Graffiti) is fiendishly and deceptively hard to pick the on/off beat in the first couple of seconds when Bonham comes in. A friend of mine plays drums and he broke his sticks in frustration trying to play the beat.

Inventive breakbeats can be ok once in a while, but for me I need the organic drums.


I don't think all of it is, but I play by ear and studied little theory in the distant past so most of what little I did know about time signatures is long forgotten.

[Serotonin]

I don't think all of it is, but I play by ear and studied little theory in the distant past so most of what little I did know about time signatures is long forgotten.

Actually, you're right the chorus is 4/4, and funky and syncopated at that.

[kuranes]

I know whitey Bill Evans played with Miles on "Kind of Blue". Miles' theory on the white/black thing I think holds for that album. The black-played drum and bass are.... right on top of it. No shadiness or leaving it until the last microsecond before they hit the spot, just right there. Bill's piano, however, especially on the intros to "So What" and "All Blues" explores the microenvironment of rhythm within each beat. As such, it works a treat. :)

Yeah, that was a great album. Too bad Miles didn't do more modal pieces, and too bad Bill was only with us a short while. I always thought that Miles came up with that modal innovation from the vacuum ( or his own very original muse alone ) but recently found the guy who turned him on to that.

http://www.georgerussell.com/lc.html

We had some good threads on modal music in the creative theory area a while back.

Yusef Lateef has some interesting musical theories too. And Miles' old gtr. player here in Chicago is working on a big book about alternatives as well. The "unified field theory" of music ( vs. Physics ) !

There's a guy in Louisiana that you should check out. I tried to get Pan to do it but he's been too busy, I guess.

http://www.trumpetherald.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=20252&view=next&sid=fcfd0853022234057e4ae4813754b4b0

[cjs55]

Destroy the downbeat, and syncopation because a figment of the imagination (so clearly ideological, but yet, so ripe for interpretation)

Ahh, how I love death metal.

[Serotonin]

Destroy the downbeat, and syncopation because a figment of the imagination (so clearly ideological, but yet, so ripe for interpretation)

Ahh, how I love death metal.

lol

"Downbeat, what's a downbeat", he asked quizzically, wiping the gangrene from his mouth with his sleeve"

[azurwarrior]

I know whitey Bill Evans played with Miles on "Kind of Blue". Miles' theory on the white/black thing I think holds for that album. The black-played drum and bass are.... right on top of it. No shadiness or leaving it until the last microsecond before they hit the spot, just right there. Bill's piano, however, especially on the intros to "So What" and "All Blues" explores the microenvironment of rhythm within each beat. As such, it works a treat. :)
"Microenvironment." What a great word!
You can play before, in the center above and behind the beat, depending on what effect you want.
A good example of this is on the closing theme from the "Saturday Night Live" TV show.
A very long time ago, when I was a percussion principal at Berklee (am I allowed to say that)? I got to study with John LaPorta (who played with Charlie Parker AND Igor Stravinski). ........He could have been one of the greats, but he decided he wanted a family.
He wanted me to play like Jimmy Cobb, in Kind of Blue. Just straight time. (And however that guy decided to play on the snare. I still haven't quite figured that out and John never told me, either).
At the time, I was heavily into Tony Williams and,Elvin Jones.
also, fusion drummers. . Particularly the startling work Tony did with Miles. LaPorta immediately told me to stop playing like Tony Williams.
I never liked John. He told me that's ok and that Tony and Miles never got along either. And that gave the music a certain "edge, so it benefited them.
However, I just had to use "colors", bombastics, polyrhythms, etc.
I couldn't bring myself to "just" play mimimally. (Speaking of minimalists, how about John Cage. He just sat down at the piano, put up the score and played nothing. For a specified time. The cars outside, and coughs, etc, became very important.
I read an article in Modern Drummer mag. with a drummer who studied with Mr. LaPorta. He said John said that it was amazing to (John) how many drummers CANNOT play simply.
I actually had several nightmares that I was in Algebra class and John wouldn't let me get my colorlul paints out of the closet!

[kuranes]

So Azur - what do you do with your music these days ?

[cjs55]

lol

"Downbeat, what's a downbeat", he asked quizzically, wiping the gangrene from his mouth with his sleeve"

Hah! It's not my fault. I was drunk, And still am.

[azurwarrior]

So Azur - what do you do with your music these days ?
I don't. I played so much and so hard for awhile. Nothing else mattered. But, I burned out doing that. I'm an introvert and that is very difficult for a performer, to say the least!
In my next incarnation, I want to be a ENTP!
Now, I manage a video store. I play my "role." And that gets me through. I'm alone a lot. Which I love. I'm mostly in my own little world, and it's ok there.
I am Caucasion. I still feel indebted to Black music. I try to make black music, whether it's Hip-hop, Jazz (rarely) Soul, R&B, whatever, available to everyone.
Our store is in the "worst" part of town. People are willing to come from all over to hear the music.
They can find things they'd never even find in their own, sheltered. neighborhoods.
But priced so everyone can have access to it.
This is trying to achieve harmony on many levels. Not just empty theory or idealism from college textbooks and lectures.
Hopefully, I don't get shot!
I'm an introvert, yet am able to "network" in the sense that we're in this together. People really look out for each other. And I am forced to socialize. And I feel better for doing it.
The most recent thing I did musically was to play in a Classic Country band (something I swore I'd never do)!
We played the old style/bluegrass type. All the best of the old time music.
I really enjoyed that. I really liked the lyrics, especially.
It was one of the few times I played professionally in a band with singers.
Before, I was a hard core New York avant-garde type of player.
However, good music is good music, regardless of the particular style!
I try to keep an open ears and an open mind.
The country-western band is no longer, due to personalities and the usual b.s. of the music business. ..
I love music, but always hated the music business! I may or may not play again. I feel ok with that, though. Rather than get into a situation where I hate what I'm doing and am miserable.
When I went to Berklee, I knew I wanted to be a writer, primarily. . I just wanted to see if I could really make it in music, first. I met some incredible people. Skip Hadden (who played with Weather Report and others). Kenwood Dennard is a professor at Berklee who played with many names. (Sting comes to mind right now). I actually met Kenwood through a Buddhist organization (the SGI)
He was just phonomenal (sp). This was just last summer. I attended Berklee from 1981-1984. And, they are just like a second family, even now.
You might be interested to check them out on the web.
az

[kuranes]

We played the old style/bluegrass type. All the best of the old time music.
I really enjoyed that.

However, good music is good music, regardless of the particular style!
I try to keep an open ears and an open mind.

I actually met Kenwood through a Buddhist organization (the SGI)
He was just phonomenal (sp).

az



I enjoy some country. "Dead Flowers" by the Stones is great. I'm more into Bluegrass than I am Country, for that side of things.

Do you enjoy David Grisman ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Grisman

I've studied Buddhism a little, and have been making a few posts lately on www.comparative-religion.com, but have never heard of SGI.

It sounds like you're enjoying your new life. Thanks for making a contribution here - your posts have some substance to them.

[azurwarrior]

I enjoy some country. "Dead Flowers" by the Stones is great. I'm more into Bluegrass than I am Country, for that side of things.

Do you enjoy David Grisman ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Grisman

I've studied Buddhism a little, and have been making a few posts lately on www.comparative-religion.com, but have never heard of SGI.

It sounds like you're enjoying your new life. Thanks for making a contribution here - your posts have some substance to them.

This is a really great website-very interesting.
Thanks for being around.
(Although my first several posts got cybermisted.........AND, you see, I wrote the best poems that ever, ever, ever, ever existed on this Earth, then.
And they're GONE! All GONE!
I'll bet I'll never be able to write another one.....
And here I was, guaranteed immortality......
I'll probably have to settle for immorality, now.
Not my fault!
I prefer Bluegrass, myself.
You mentioned David Grisman.....there's a story there. ...
I had a beloved uncle (now deceased) who was an artist and college professor and "illegally" held photography classes at Kent State during the time of the shootings, and was blackballed for it.
He had some recordings of David Grisman at that time that were (and are) truly unique.
I can just hear them, now.
The greats have their own signature, regardless of medium, don't they?
BTW, at that time, my uncle also had an "interesting, new" invention that had cost him $1,000.00.
It was a digital watch...this was in the 60's.
Thank you for bringing back the memories.
Also, I have a huge box of old lp's, but no working turntable.
I don't want to get rid of them just because of the associations I can make with them, just as they are.. ..
Also, if anyone is curious, the SGI (Soka Gakkai International) has its own website:
http://www.sgi-org/ (or, for the United States, is: http://www.sgi-usa.org).
There is a Nichiren Buddhist club at Berklee, now, if there's any Berklee-ites reading this..

[kuranes]

You mentioned David Grisman.....there's a story there. ...
I had a beloved uncle (now deceased) who was an artist and college professor and "illegally" held photography classes at Kent State during the time of the shootings, and was blackballed for it.
He had some recordings of David Grisman at that time that were (and are) truly unique.

.

I grew up just a little ways away from Kent State . I remember all that. CSNY came out with

"Tin Soldiers and Nixon coming,
we're finally on our own . . . .

Locals at the time were Phil Keagy and Joe Walsh.

[azurwarrior]

I was born in the early 60's. I think it has been a collective idea of my generation that we were cheated-the 60's were so phenomenal (sp.) for popular music- but we ended up with Rick Dees and Disco Duck...

[kuranes]

I was born in the early 60's. I think it has been a collective idea of my generation that we were cheated-the 60's were so phenomenal (sp.) for popular music- but we ended up with Rick Dees and Disco Duck...

Ha Ha. Yeah. Well, you can still listen to the good old stuff, even if some people want to call you "retro".

[azurwarrior]

Ha Ha. Yeah. Well, you can still listen to the good old stuff, even if some people want to call you "retro".

I have to admit, I watched "Saturday Night Fever" 9 times........................ When I hear Disco now, I enjoy it. Now, everyone's doing "The Hustle" again. I suppose maybe it's only the best that survives the test of time. That and not having to listen to the same song on the radio 15 times a day 7 days a week.
What came after Disco was worse, yet, I thought at the time. Punk. And you don't really hear that much play for Sid Viscous or the Ramones now, although they were great in what they did.
I am also reminded of my pitiful adolescence when I hear either one.
There were a lot of racial overtones to the "end" of Disco.

[kuranes]

There were a lot of racial overtones to the "end" of Disco.

Interesting thought. Deserves its own thread.

When Disco first came out ( I remember KC and the Sunshine Band ) me and my friends hated it at first. Our favorite bands ( Floyd, Led, Stones etc. ) were producing less and less stuff, though, and just in-fighting with one another mostly , or "riding the gravy train", as Roger Waters once put it. We soon discovered that there was one thing about Disco we liked . . .since it was dance music, we met a lot more ladies at clubs playing this stuff, than we did at the alternative places. After a while I begin to associate songs like "That's the Way . . I Like it" with good times, and then it became ( sorta ) a "good" song. You'd tap the steering wheel of your car to the beat, if it came on the radio.

The first days of punk were kinda fun. There was a place here in Chicago called "La Mere Vipere" that was the first place outside NYC to be a punk bar, I'm told. ( It got fire bombed eventually . ) Quite a crowd there. Biker types mixed with gays and suburban disco types. Your usual "we're not just here on the weekends" "in-crowd" too, with the Mohawks and piercings. I thought the Ramones-type music was fun to dance to Live, even if I couldn't see buying a disc for my living room activities as being of much use, unless I threw a lot of parties. ( I didn't throw a lot of parties. ) I liked some of The Cramps' tunes, like "The Garbageman."

Then Punk became just another label and more and more people were getting into it, with the inevitable "rules" associated with that. "If you're punk, you do this, and you like that." The original spirit of it was more just "do what you want" . which I liked better. Although things came along later called "New Wave" and "Alternative" I didn't see too much that "new" about them. They had managed to mix Punk with some of the older forms. During their years of ascendancy, the use of electronics in dance music started to become much more popular, and so eventually "house" music came along, which was fun again. Rap music was also becoming popular.

I enjoyed Furious Five's "The Message" but after a while, it seemed like Rap was kind of stuck in a groove - where the actual rhythms sounded mostly the same, and it was the LYRICS that were important to their fans. Different. For me, the music's gotta come first. I prefer groups like "War" and "Sly and the Family Stone" to any rap artist. "Slippin' Into Darkness" - yeahh.

I remember buying the first Wailers album ( which opened and looked just like a big Zippo cigarette lighter ) around 1972. "What's Reggae" I asked people who recommended it. "You know that song ' I can See Clearly Now ' and Paul Simon's ' Mother and Child Reunion ' Kuranes ? It's like that." Later I found about Dub and more World Music, in general.

I started getting away from Pop music as much as Jazz, and begin to discover Classical, too. And then . . .( ah, save it for another thread. )