In this bass lesson, you’re going to learn
5 ways you can start writing real songs using
nothing but the bass.
Hi I’m Luke from Become A Bassist and if
you ever wonder how bass players approach
writing music, then stick around.
[Video Intro]
Today’s lesson actually comes from an email
subscriber named Steve who emailed me and
said:
Hey Luke, I love your YouTube lessons mate
- very well explained.
Something that I have struggled with for years
is writing songs.
I have been playing bass for 20 years but
writing songs on the bass I find difficult
because I can’t imagine how the 'rest' of
the song would go (outside of the bass part)
Writing on guitar or piano would be alot easier
because there are chords and melodies going
on that make the song a lot more apparent.
However, I cant play those instruments very
well and the songs I try to write on them
are very uninspiring as I can’t jump between
chords very easily.
So my question is: What is a good approach
for writing songs using the bass as my instrument.
What is a good approach for trying to write
some riffs / melodies as a starting point
for a song?
This is such a good question!
Now truthfully, it probably IS easier to write
songs using a guitar or a piano.
You’ll notice that a lot of famous bass
players who are also songwriters play one
or both of those instruments in addition to
bass.
Think about people like Paul McCartney, Roger
Waters, John Deacon, Sting - there are plenty
more, but they all play bass primarily, but
they all play a secondary instrument which
they compose on as well.
Guitar and piano probably are a little more
conducive to songwriting, but that doesn’t
mean you can’t write songs using nothing
but your bass - you absolutely can.
So let’s dive in to these 5 methods.
The first method is one that I like to use
a lot, and that is to start not with a riff
or a chord progression or anything like that,
but to start with the melody of the song.
For me the melody is everything - the melody
IS the song.
A lot of instrumentalists (guitarists in particular)
will come up with really cool riffs and different
parts, and then kind of slap a melody on top
of that that (hopefully) fits with what else
is going on.
This is definitely a legit way of doing things,
but try reversing that.
START with the melody and get everything else
to support that.
So where can you get these melodies from?
There’s tons of options.
You might be noodling on your bass and you
play something that you like the sound of.
You might just be idly humming in the shower
or in the car and you hum something you actually
like the sound of.
This is how a lot of songs get written by
a lot of great songwriters - they aren't in
a 'songwriting' mode when their best ideas
come out of them.
These ideas you get, you can just hum them
or play them and record them into your phone
and from there, you can play around with them.
I’ve got hundreds of different little ideas
I’ve recorded into my phone.
Some of them I had my bass in my hands so
I played the ideas on my bass, but most of
them, I was doing something completely unrelated
and had the idea.
When you have this little melody though, what
are you supposed to do with it?
Well a good start is to try putting some bass
notes underneath it.
I’ve got a little melody here that we can
try it with.
The melody goes like this [plays melody] So
let’s try putting some different bass notes
underneath it and see what sounds good.
We can start by using notes
of the melody.
We can change every 2 beats, every bar, every
2 bars - there aren’t any rules at this
stage.
Once you have notes that you think work well,
you can build chords around them.
That might sound something like this.
[plays chords] Same bass notes, now it’s
just more filled out and actually feels like
the skeleton of a song!
If you need help with chords and how to play
them on your own bass, then check out my Bass
Chord Pro mini-course.
It’s a free resource that’ll show you
just about every chord you’d ever need on
your bass.
You can sign up for it up here or in the first
link in the description.
This melody first method is great because
everything you do is in service of the melody,
which is what most people will be listening
for anyway.
The next method for making your own songs
is to start with the drum groove!
It can be hard to just come up with something
from inside a vacuum where you don’t have
anything to work from, and using a drum groove
to jumpstart the process is a great way of
doing things.
If you kind of know some drummer’s vocabulary,
you can just kind of imagine what a drummer
might do and then play something to that OR
you could go one step further and actually
find an actual drum loop and play along with
it.
I’ve got one right here - I haven’t listened
to it yet, so let’s put it on and see what
we can find.
[plays track] OK - cool.
If you already have ideas, you can try to
apply them to the new track.
IF we used the other idea we just had, it’d
sound like this.
[plays melody] and with the chords we just
used.
[plays chords]
Of course, you could also just come at it
completely fresh with no other ideas in mind.
You could just pick a sound or even just a
single note and play around.
[plays around] Something like that.
Of course, if you’re doing this and come
up with something you like and you think could
be worthy of being it’s own song, make sure
you either write it down or record it into
your phone so you don’t forget it.
Don’t try to rely on your memory when it
comes to this stuff!
I talk a little bit more about this kind of
method in my video How To Jam On Bass, because
jamming is just like spontaneous songwriting,
so check that video out if you want to go
a little bit further into this method.
The third method is to use existing song types
and song structures to base your songs around.
One of the hard parts of songwriting is figuring
out the structure - what should go where and
when - all that sort of stuff.
But you can actually bypass this whole thing
by using existing forms - things like the
blues.
With the blues, you’ve already got a set
chord progression and form (for the most part
at least).
The only thing you have to do is figure out
the melody and then if you want, you can put
words to it.
I actually used to teach a songwriting course
at a university and this was one of the things
I usually did first - got everyone to write
a blues melody.
It’s relatively simple - you don’t have
to worry about chords or form, you could just
let yourself be creative and most of the time
when I did that exercise, they ended up being
really funny.
Because it was mostly 18 year olds fresh out
of high school, most of them ended up being
about drinking.
Jokes aside though, this is a legit way to
get started with low pressure and low stakes.
If you need help with getting started with
the blues form, check out my blues bass lines
lesson up here.
Did you also know that most pop songs - songs
you hear on the radio follow pretty much the
same structure?
It goes Intro, Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus,
Bridge, and then after the bridge, it’s
usually either Verse and choruses or just
choruses until the song finishes.
Of course there’s variations on that, for
example, if there’s a pre-chorus, that gets
chucked in there, but that’s the basic structure.
If you find yourself with 2 ideas in either
the same key or a closely related key, you
can try them out as verse and chorus ideas
and see how they sit.
That actually leads really nicely into our
4th method for writing songs and that’s
to use your knowledge of chords and music
theory.
This is more of an intellectual approach,
but if you know your chord theory, you’ll
know that every key has a family of chords
and sounds that work well within it and you’ll
know there are tons of chord progressions
that get used all the time.
Some examples of super common chord progressions
- you’ve got 1-5-6-4.
[plays chords] and it’s variant 6-4-1-5.
1-4-5 or 1-4-5-4 is super common too.
[plays chords] 1-6-2-5 works really well too
[plays chords] as well as 2-5-1-6 [plays chords]
You could combine the last method with this
one and take a few of these common progressions
and make your verses use one of the progressions
and your choruses use another.
It might be a bit formulaic, but you already
know that it’s going to sound really good
because the progressions get used all the
time.
Of course the more you get into the theory
side of things, the more your options of what
you can use opens up - you can borrow different
chords from different places and do all kinds
of things with modal mixing, relative and
parallel keys.
It’s a whole rabbit hole that we don’t
have time to go through in this video, but
it’s absolutely possible.
Finally, the last method that we’ll talk
about is collaboration.
That’s right - you don’t have to write
absolutely everything by yourself.
You can join forces with someone who maybe
plays guitar or piano and you can bounce ideas
off each other.
You might bring a riff to the table, they
might play some chords over it or you might
have this melody that sounds really cool and
they can figure out some options for what
to do with it and where to take it.
You can even do it with more than one person
if you like and when you find a partner who
you work well with, it can be incredible.
You can find potential collaborators through
different social circles, going to jam nights
or even searching on places like Craigslist
or Gumtree, although honestly, that can be
hit or miss.
To recap though, you learned 5 ways of writing
songs if you only play bass and not one of
the more ‘traditional’ songwriting instruments
like guitar or piano.
Method #1 was starting with the melody, then
putting some bass notes underneath it, then
fleshing out full chords.
Method #2 was to start with the drum groove
so you’re not starting from a completely
blank slate.
Method 3, we used existing song structures
like the blues to get the ball rolling.
Method 4 was all about using your knowledge
of chords and music theory to write and finally
we talked about finding other people that
you could write with and bounce ideas off.
By the way, you don’t have to just use one
of these methods - they are totally compatible
with each other, so you can use them all!
Thanks so much for watching - I really appreciate
it.
If you enjoyed this lesson, make sure you
subscribe to the channel and if this is your
first Become A Bassist video, check out some
of the other lessons on the channel as well.
I’m Luke from Become A Bassist and I’ll
catch you in another video soon.
