How do you write bass lines?

The Lounge General Discussion
#1

Hi,

When writing drums, I find that there is an abundant pool of knowledge and tools that can be drawn upon, even dedicated books. However, the other foundational element, i.e. bass, appears to attract less attention (or interest?).

I am curious about how people here approach bass lines in their own music. Do you draw from bass line generating theories? Do you let yourself get inspired by assistive tech (arps, step sequencer, generative plug-ins, KARMA, Bass GPT, etc.) or loop libraries (MIDI or clips) to come up with a bass line? How do you humanize bass lines? Is a dedicated bass line important to your music?

Here some summary bullet points that Iā€™ve come across my research on the more theoretical side of this topic:

  • bass to chords: harmonic function, root progression and connection
  • bass to melody: consonance & dissonance, motion & direction
  • bass to drums: backbeats, syncopation
  • bass outline: pentatonic scale, spread, perfect intervals & boredom
  • embellishing: vibrato, pitch bend
13 Likes
#2
  1. Play synth with keyboard along to drum beat.
  2. Press record on sequencer when happy with bassline.

Thats about it. I might add a few trig conditions to certain notes to extend a 4 bar loop into 8.

Works for me.

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#3

I hear them in my head and try to get them down with keyboard or bass guitar

For electro basslines, I love SH101 style sequencers. Just randomly hit notes from a scale and randomly add rests and ties and be surprised by the outcome

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#4

I tend to have chords first, then start with root notes of the chords, or sometimes holding the same bass note over different chords to create some tension. Throw in some octaves and 5th notes. A few little twiddles here and there. I try to keep it more rhythmic than melodic and remind myself that less is more.

All else fails Iā€™ll chuck on an arp and see what happens.

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#5

I tend to do the above, and also keep in the back of my mind:

Contrary motion: esp when using samples of chords or otherwise use a lot of parallelism, Iā€™ll try to take bassline down when chord voicings and/or melody go up, and vice versa

Reharmonization: keeping in mind that I can change the character of chords w bassline: CEGB in chords is part of C maj7, Am9, Fmaj11, etc (havenā€™t had my coffee yet). [Edit: guess these are both implied in OPā€™s list, but]

I try to make it rhythmically, harmonically, and melodically interesting but also as minimal as possibleā€¦ right.

Curious what order folks go in, too, I tend to start with drum basics, then chords, then bass line, then melody, then percussion.

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#6

I am mainly a bass player, so I almost always write them with my bass guitar, usually fretless. Here are some things I keep in mind when writing bass lines:

a) A bass line should rarely, if ever, begin and end on the same note.
b) The note a bass line ends on should be no more than a full step away from the original note of the bass line.
c) Donā€™t be afraid of making the bass line simple, especially when the lead is complex.
d) Make the bass line more complex when the lead is simple.
e) Donā€™t be afraid to slide between notes and play microtones. The ear can handle ā€œwrongā€ notes in the bass register more easily than it can handle ā€œwrongā€ notes in the upper register.
f) Generally speaking, when the lead goes high, bass goes low for support. When the lead goes low, bass goes high. In other words, think of filling the frequency spectrum. So when both do cover the same part of the frequency spectrum then it really sticks out. Use this to your advantage.
g) Lock bass in with drums, not lead. Lead can be behind the beat and still sound good. But typically bass should be right on time, or even a bit ahead.
h) Donā€™t use an arp for bass, however tempting, unless modulated with care, and modified to meet the above guidelines.

These are thoughts off the top of my head. There are useful books that are specifically written for creating bass lines, but they are mainly intended for the bass. They still work for electronic music.

42 Likes
#7

Played bass most of my life but the funny thing is for electronic I donā€™t pick up the bass as often. If I do, I usually chop up the results and resequence. I like coming up with basslines that I may not play on the instrument.

For dance the first thing is to not make too many rules. Many times you can hear a pattern in the spaces in the music. A good thing to try is either let the piano roll scroll by while beat plays and drop a root note in everywhere you feel a note could be, or tap them in on a controller. But just play the root to start, the goal is to find a nice pattern. This works great with a step sequencer as well.

Then you can go into the piano roll and try different notes by sliding them up or down. If you are not versed in music theory, set a scale mode first.

Final thing is put the notes down where you feel they should go. Donā€™t try and avoid placing bass notes on kicks unless that is a sound you want. I hate when people say you should not have the bass and kick hit together. That puts things in a box too quickly and makes rules that donā€™t need to be made. There are ways to duck the bass when the kick hits so itā€™s not a problem. The feel and groove is most important thing. Do not compromise there.

Finally add some swing if thats the vibe you want and make sure the kick and bass are in tune. You typically dont have to tune the kick to the same root note, if its way too far away from the bass root. Instead if it sounds off, try going up or down 1 semitone on the kick sample and that will almost always solve it (example track is in D, bassline is in D, kick is unpitched 808 which resonates at G#. Just dropping it -1 to G will gel everything together)ā€¦ If you have to tune a kick more than + or- 2 semi tones then something is off and you may want to try a new kick sample.

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#8

Yeah, I never understood the ā€œruleā€ that the bass and kick should never hit together. Funk, for instance, relies on a heavy first beat.

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#9

I steal them from @Fin25

#10

Well I was stealing them from youā€¦

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#11

A veritable human centipede of sound, just digesting and repurposing each others bass outputs

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#12

this rule has nothing to do with music, itā€™s all about loudness war.

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#13

Even more for bass than for other instruments, pauses and rests are as important as the notes that are played.

This is not just about obvious ā€œlook what I did hereā€-type rests but even just about the timing when a note is released/muted before the next starts. I find that this is crucial to establishing ā€œgrooveā€, particularly because it is usually not really included in notation and left to the player.

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#14

I use the SH101 or that style sequencer and it does most of the work for me :joy:

1 Like
#15

Start a song with a specific key in mind (at least loosely). Then jam out the bass line by pressing the notes in key. Avoid notes that are close together as they sound dissonant, thatā€™s all.

#16

I donā€™t write baselines, they write me.

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#17

Sure but that is easily avoided with frequency ducking, so I donā€™t buy much into that either.

#18

Definitely ā€¦ I learnt that playing bass in bands. Ghost notes, hammer-ons and pull-offs (legato), muting with left hand (let string lift from fret/fingerboard) right hand (place finger on string) all make a difference. While little of that is directly applicable to samples or synths, you get the picture, I hope. Use variations in velocity (mapped to volume and/or filter), note length, decay and legato to add ā€˜grooveā€™ or spice to bass lines.

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#19

Sample an 808 kick with a long decay.

Trim off the transient.

Hi pass at about 80hz with a ton of resonance.

Watch the windows wobble.

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#20

with a smoking jacket and a bourbon!

This is where skip back on the 404 is awesome! Jam till you find the groove and save it! Rinse repeat!

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