Rookie band needs advice

[whitecadillac]

Although I have been around music much of my life I have only played in a band for the past couple years. We play a bluesy/country style of rock. Maybe Petty meets Dwight or maybe even Gram.

We consist of myself on lead guitar and vocals, another guitar, bass, keys and drums.

The issue is this: we tend to sound way more "musical" on slower quieter numbers than we do on faster louder ones. As the volume and pace picks up, it seems like the musical quality diminishes.

Do any of you more experienced folks have any advice on how to rehearse and play so that we might improve?

Thanks.

[dantedayjob]

rehearse and play

Your answer (as is often the case) is right there in your question...

You just have to work at it... break the tunes down into pieces if you have to, play that darned chorus or bridge into the ground until you nail it...

[whitecadillac]

Thanks.

[tone4days]

first thing to investigate is exactly what the two guitars and keys are doing (inversions, which registers they are playing in, tone choices, etc) ... if they are overlapping sonically and rhythmically disjoint, that is gonna muck things up

the next thing to do is double check that your meter is tight ... fast and 'all over the place' is not cool ... fast and locked in the pocket is what you are after

next is dynamics check ... too many bands seem to default to fast = loud ... be sure to work out the dynamic flow up and down throughout the song

good luck
t4d

[Luke]

Is the drummer playing to a click track?

[kevinhifi]

When you work on a fast song, let the drummer play the beat and have everyone else lay back a lot. Start like this and then slowly add more from the other instruments until it sounds full but not too busy. I'll sometimes find that the faster ones drive better with less. If you want to play fast strumming on the guitar to match, keep it very very simple. And like tone4days says...the dynamics are just as important for fast music as for slower music; a lot of bands forget this.

[whitecadillac]

Many thanks for all the great advice.

[gregorybj]

keep on practicing together and make sure that everyone can play their part stand alone. If I could, I would play every instrument of my material, but I need other musicians for the live show. If each person can play his part stand alone then as a whole everyone should be able to play on beat and keep up the pace.

Keep up the practice and Rehearsal!

God Bless

[rogwerks]

musicality...

does not happen over night...

practice, praCTICE, PRACTICE....

DYNAMICS, DYNAMICS...

[whitecadillac]

Many thanks to all. I will provide a progress report down the road.