Members Main Offender Posted April 17, 2009 Members Share Posted April 17, 2009 Okay, my first post on this forum. I apoloize for it being a little lengthy.... I'm the singer/guitarist/songwriter for a power trio. We're basically a garage rock/'70s hard rock kind of band--we're aiming to sound like bands like The Who, The Hives, Raconteurs, The Clash, etc. The songs are, for the most part, 3 minute, straight ahead rock songs with overdriven guitar. However, recently, I've felt like there's a side of my influences I've never really let out, and I've been really drawn to, first as a listener, and then in my songwriting, to take what I see as a sonic left turn into them. Stuff like The Strokes, Bruce Springsteen, Lindsey Buckingham, Buddy Holly--what I would define as upbeat pop/rock, with clean-toned guitars and melodies at the forefront. (Which is not to say I wasn't concerned with melody before, but you get my drift.) So, I wrote a couple songs like this and brought them to my band without word one of what (I feel) is a 180 degree turn from my normal output. The other band members liked them a lot, and we all agreed that they bring a different vibe to the set, help change the pace for us, and help us stretch out sonically. They seemed to fit in alright with our aim for our sound, even if at first I thought they would stick out like a sore thumb. And no one complained, maybe because there were so many other "harder" rock songs with distorted guitar, that one or two cleaner-sounding ones wouldn't be an issue. But, now comes the problem: I can't get off this "kick" to write stuff in that vein. Partly, I feel it's because my voice sounds "better" over clean guitars than distorted--although this should make no sense, right? Partly I feel it's because the songs I write from this side of my influences sounds more "personal", more like "me"--but if I write all the damn songs, how can they sound like anything but me, no matter if they're clean or distorted? I can't figure out if I'm having some 11th hour crisis where I change direction, but I worry that this split in styles is going to ruin our band having an "identity"--a style of songwriting that people can expect, rather being thrown a mishmash of influences at them willy-nilly. I'm not having much luck with finding artists who have a virtual 50/50 split in their material with dynamics and guitar tone. It seems that for anyone who does, the guitar sound is at best secondary to the melodic line and "expectation" of what the songwriters are going to bring to the table. I haven't told the other guys about this. I'm due to bring in more songs to work on for practice next week--and only one (of four candidates to play) isn't in my "new", "cleaner" style. The thing is, I still love playing the other songs we have, and it lets me go loose on the guitar in a way that I find very liberating. Am I overreacting/overthinking this? Or should I ask them to go along with a total change in our direction? Or can I have my cake and eat it too? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted April 17, 2009 Members Share Posted April 17, 2009 Welcome to my world. I'm eclectic to the point of skittishness. Combine my longtime love of roots, blues, and country with my longtime fascination with synthesizers, drum machines, samplers, and funk, dance, and chill/downtempo and you have... a mess. For a while I was starting 'side' projects (but the other guys in my one man band were giving me a hard time about the time spent elsewhere )... I had my main band, one blue nine, doing downtempo electronica and mutant roots pop. I had a house 'band' (Li'l Alien). I had a latin project (Lim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bodyguard2112 Posted April 17, 2009 Members Share Posted April 17, 2009 Hey man, it's okay to grow. Will it hurt the band? Depends. Can they grow too? What does your establish audience expect? Did the Beatles not grow? Mac? Areosmith? Stones? Any act that has been around for a while? I think it is band to become "stuck" in one kind of music. For crying out loud, I'm a psychadelic rock/classic rock guy and I've now written folk rock, metal, urban, R&B, and a couple rudimentary country songs. Just in a couple years. Just keep bringing the stuff in, play it. Talk about it. Maybe they'll like it. Maybe they won't, and they are stuck. You shouldn't do music if it isn't satisfying to you, unless it pays really really well! Follow your heart. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rhino55 Posted April 17, 2009 Members Share Posted April 17, 2009 Talk to the band about what you are experiencing. They will either be cool or they wont. If they are, you win. If they are not, then you can still play the old stuff with them, but they need to know that you have some other stuff you are going to be working on. Then you can work on your new stylings and not feel bad cause you have already told them whats up. Communication is the most important part of any project. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Stackabones Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 Just present the new tunes and see what the band thinks. If they like them, use them. If they don't, throw a hissy fit and quit. Or just save those tunes for other projects. One other thing ... you've mentioned the band's response. What about your audience's response? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members kennychaffin Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 Well, just don't write any songs about mufflers and you'll be fine. Where's that tongue-in-cheek smiley..... Good advice above. It may just be a phase as well, you may need to write enough of these new types of songs to get it out of your system and then WHAM the other ones will come out. I think you may also be putting pressure on yourself to come up with more of your older style songs and that might be making it worse.......heck your still writing songs.....that's a good thing! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Etienne Rambert Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 "...my voice sounds "better" over clean guitars than distorted--although this should make no sense, right?" LOL I love it! This is great! Why should a voice sound better over a distorted guitar? Congratulations! It sounds like you're longing to make some real music. ---- It's gonna be a sad day. But one of these days, a lot of folks are going to wake up and realize, we wuz robbed. And then we wuz abandoned. The world has made great music for 30 years. While a lot of Anglo-American & European musicians have been obsessing about electric guitars and amp tones. My day of reckoning came a long time ago, when I was listening to the Jobim-Ogermann collaborations in the early 70's. I understood at once. We wuz robbed.Then I heard a Nino Rota score to a Fellini flick, and that confirmed it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sentry68 Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 +1 stackabones. And, play music that makes you happy, fulfills your needs. If it gets to be too strange with the current line up, find some guys who fit better. Life's too short, and there's not enough music jobs to go around, so you better make sure you enjoy it, that's probably gonna be your only measurable reward. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 2732 Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 If your band grows with it and lets you do what you need to, then great. If they can't handle it, {censored} 'em and go solo, you'll be much happier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Chicken Monkey Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 I left quite a few bands back in the day when my writing style changed. Now I've got enough of a backlog in my "styles" that I can bring in material for whatever kind of group I get into. The stuff that gets set aside, I'll come back to later. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members justmusicamps Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 I agree with everybody; if you feel more comfortable writing more of a clean sound, than do it! If the band doesn't understand, get another band! You must always trust your instincts; they will lead you in the right direction... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tbry Posted April 18, 2009 Members Share Posted April 18, 2009 You sound like your the leader of the band. You write all the songs. What choice do they have? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members LeonardScaper Posted April 19, 2009 Members Share Posted April 19, 2009 Excellent advise above. Listen.....you must listen to your muse. She alone can guide you as a songwriter. Read all the posts in the many threads about writers who are having trouble coming up with any stuff at all and then ask yourself, again, if you should go in this new direction. Writing new and interesting songs is all about going you have not yet gone. And sometimes when you change direction like this it takes a while to get what's in you out. This new stuff, along with all of your old stuff, will become who you are.....that is until something else comes along. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members kurdy Posted April 19, 2009 Members Share Posted April 19, 2009 I don't know what your band sounds like, but based on the influences you've listed, it doesn't look like you are making that big a left turn. It isn't like you've decided to go country all of a sudden. Are the Hives really that far off from the Strokes? Could it be possible that fans of the Who might also be fans of Bruce Springsteen? It's like saying you used to be in a U2 kind of a band, but decided to go in a more Radiohead kind of direction. As far as the majority of your audience will likely be concerned, it's just rock 'n roll. And it doesn't sound as if the rest of your band is objecting so far. Give it a chance to become a real issue before jumping the gun. You may find that you're making a bigger deal out of it than it is. It's good for a band to have a musical identity, but it'll get boring both for you and the audience if you never try anything new. It's natural as a songwriter to grow and change, otherwise you become stagnant. If the main issue is clean vs. distorted guitar, try it both ways and see what works best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Main Offender Posted April 19, 2009 Author Members Share Posted April 19, 2009 Okay, thanks a lot for all the responses guys. All of this has been really helpful and thought-provoking to me. I'll play them the new songs at next practice and see what they think. If, hopefully, they take to the new songs without any comment, maybe I can just breeze past all this for the time being. Maybe I am overthinking this. And maybe I'll have to follow my muse and change this band's whole direction. And even if I am leading the band, I still think it's only fair to acknowledge the other band members signed on to play something different. I suppose it's all just rock and roll--but songs styled like "Hate to Say I told You So" by The Hives are a big switch from "Hungry Heart" by Bruce Springsteen, imo. Maybe, I'll just start writing songs like I used to for the band again soon enough, and it won't matter anyway. But, if it comes down to being between a muse and a happy bandmate....call me arrogant or pushy, but I'll start looking for a new drummer. Thanks again for all the responses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tbry Posted April 19, 2009 Members Share Posted April 19, 2009 Okay, thanks a lot for all the responses guys. All of this has been really helpful and thought-provoking to me. I'll play them the new songs at next practice and see what they think. If, hopefully, they take to the new songs without any comment, maybe I can just breeze past all this for the time being. Maybe I am overthinking this. And maybe I'll have to follow my muse and change this band's whole direction. And even if I am leading the band, I still think it's only fair to acknowledge the other band members signed on to play something different. I suppose it's all just rock and roll--but songs styled like "Hate to Say I told You So" by The Hives are a big switch from "Hungry Heart" by Bruce Springsteen, imo. Maybe, I'll just start writing songs like I used to for the band again soon enough, and it won't matter anyway. But, if it comes down to being between a muse and a happy bandmate....call me arrogant or pushy, but I'll start looking for a new drummer. Thanks again for all the responses. Let us know what happened. Also put up a song from each style. We would love to hear them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MalcolmTex Posted April 20, 2009 Members Share Posted April 20, 2009 Interesting "problem". In a power trio format, the guitars really need to fill out the sound. It's a difficult format, because either you have to fill it with volume and distortion, or you have to have a bluesy SRV kind of guitar style. The trick comes in when writing powerpop material. Often it draws it's influences from the bands you describe, and relies on melody and hooks rather than the blunt force trauma of guitars. I think you're going in a cool direction - don't look at it as a departure but as evolution. Check out bands like Material Issue, Cheap Trick, Weezer (to some extent), the Smithereens. These bands have both sides to them, clean guitars, dirty guitars but all have outstanding melodies. You might find that you need a 2nd guitarist or something to flesh out the sound but maybe not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Microwave Walrus Posted April 21, 2009 Members Share Posted April 21, 2009 I feel that I'm in a similar place, except that I don't really have a band put together yet. I'm not so much into 70s punk (that i know of?) as hard rock, though. I wrote one song recently that sounds like the kind of hard rock song I'd like to play/hear live, but the rest of my songs are much slower jam/coffehouse/stoner type songs. I am not a great singer, and I have enough trouble singing the slow songs. I am considering looking for a real rock singer to at least sing the harder stuff. I think it is important to balance fast songs with slower jams. Too much energy and your audience will become a sausage party, am I right or wrong here? Just remember that if you wanna be a succesfull party band, though, you should keep I'm guessing at least half of your songs fast ones! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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