3 piece band style

amit

Hey guys,

I'm in a three piece band playing guitar (the other two insturments are drums and bass). We are doing a few covers of old school rock music, but are mainly starting to do originals now. I'm just wondering what are your thoughts on having only one guitar in a band.

Jimi hendrix, the chillies and many more managed to do a great job of it I think mainly because the bass and drums were so good that they easily compensated for the lack of a second guitar in their music, but then again guitarists in those bands were usually geniouses. I've noticed that some of the originals we have written sound relativley empty and bland with just one guitar.

What do good tips are there on adapting guitaring style for a situation like with just one guitar, eg, using more effects or whatever?

It would be great to hear your comments

harrisonmerwin

hey

im in a performing 3 peice band. Basically for guitar, jus make it sound full, use effects tastefully, or just make sure what your playing is suffecient to the song. Where the slack needs to be pulled up is in bass and drums. The bass is essentially your second guitar, and your link to the drums. so it is important that they play more complex rythems to fill in yoru guitar, and the drums, if they just do root note "droning" your going to sound really weak. The drummer also has to be very dynamic as you dont have another guitar to build the...build. so they have to be the soft/hard voice of the song even more so than in a 4+ group. Crescendo's and decrescendo's are the heart of a 3 peice, so work on your "building" dynamics (brinign a song from calm to rockin) and also on filling the gaps (with more expressive bass and drums)

StuntVedder10

I think the key to a 3 piece band is the bass player. If you have a great bass player and has good bass fills it picks up the slack

All Those Yesterdays

Bass player is important, but the guitar player is super important (this coming from a bass player). Need to adjust ones playing to fill the song.

PJ-Sin

Yes, it can be done!!
I am the guitarist in a three piece band myself and I think we hold it down pretty well.
Actually, we just added a lead frotman (which would make it a four man band now) but we havent played any shows or done any recordings with him yet.

If you want to check it out just look in my sig for some web addresses

Seamy ALB

3 is definitly the magic number when it comes to band members in my opinion. Ya do have to craft the music so it sounds big, it gives each instrument the chance to stand out and carry the song.

I would tend to work out harmony lines in my bass playing to complement the guitar part and to add depth to the sonics. When we riff together it is always dead tight and massive sounding.

A 3 person band is the one that is easiest to get a good live sound, 3 members are easier to co-ordinate and a 3 way split on the cash front is always good.

hendrix78

My band is a 3 peice and we make a damn good racket. We have a monster drummer who fills out a lot of the sound, though, and I tend to write "big" sounding riffs. I also agree that a good bass player is key. Our bassist has a very full tone and plays fairly busy lines.

Survo-

Nirvana, Rush.
Thats all I need to say.

IDgotI

Personally I think the biggest thing to worry about if you are a three piece is the singing. Singing and playing is a tough trick. In fact a lot of two guitar bands have two guitars to help make it easier for the players to sing. Of course, you can get around this by having a dedicated singer, and if you have one already, then your three piece is in the same league as a few other three pieces (plus singer) that haven't been mentioned such as The Who and U2 (newsflash, bono doesn't really play guitar). Anyway the point is it is *definately possible* to have an amazin' ass kickin' three piece. You also might find that adding another person changes the vibe and takes things down a peg. But the bottom line with any music is this... it either works or it doesn't. Hard to know what "X factors" make one thing / playing situation work, and another not work. But the bottom line isn't the number of people, or pedals, or outfits. The music either works or it doesn't. If it does, who cares how many people there are. If it doesn't, then don't gind your wheels, and don't hesitate to try and find someone who adds something special.

Oh... Delay and Humbuckers are good for three piece bands. Humbuckers give you a nice fat sound, and delay can help fill in some of the space.

harrisonmerwin

just came to mind...silverchair (frogstomp especially, studio or live)) very full sounding, mind you i think they had a hand or two from the pro's.

amit

Yeah I like the sound of that. 'Just doing what works for the song'.

We actually would happily get a singer along so that our bassist can focus on bass because he can't sing and play bass for some situations. But its kinda hard to find a singer.

It's probably just a matter of practice for us, and maybe I'll listen and try to observe what other bands do. Although the thing is that a lot of these bands that you guys have given me as examples have other sounds over dubbed and played with them live, but I see the point anyway.

I suppose a lot of it is just finding our own style and groove.

Mishral

I used to be in a three piece band too. or actually maybe I still am only we don´t rehearse more then a couple of times a year.
We played a sort of metal.
I don´t think effects or something like that is a solution.
Just get lot of variation in your play.
Laidback while there are singing parts. Interesting the rest.

I think it´s important to not focus on filling up for two guitars.
Keep the sound clean. Not to much distorsion and stuff.
Find your place in the soundimage.

howmuchdifference

I was in a 4-piece for a few years before we added a rythm guitarist/keyboardist. But our singer doesn't play an instrument so I know where your coming from.

What I find most helpful is to have different levels of volume. I have a good clean tone and a full driven tone compliments of my ts-9. That allows me to bring some interesting dynamics to songs between verse and chorus.

The biggest problem I encountered was going into solos though. So I use my effects processor that I use mainly for chorus, delay & reverb -- but I also kick in some added distortion with gain for soloing. This helps reduce the sonic drop off that happens in a 3-piece when the lead guitar stops playing rhythm and goes into the solos. I also use my Dunlop 535Q, which has a volume boost built in, which helps during lead lines. It also helps if the bass player can kick in some additional gain during solos with a volume or distortion. Or if the drummer can fill during the transition so it's not as noticeable if your trying to build up to something...

I also listened to some live shows from bands like Nirvana. I mean, yeah you can listen to Rush or the Police live, but it really didn't get me anywhere because few people have chops like those guys. And the kind of music we were playing was more like Pearl Jam, so listening to 3-piece bands in a similar arena helped...

We are also in a band that plays originals so we can write around those kind of things. In many cases it forced us to be creative and made the sound more interesting. We added another guitarist/keyboardist not out of necessity, but because we wanted to -- kind of like Boom. Now he has so much support that it makes what he does sound that much better...

Hope that helps...

amit

Hey yeah that does help,

That is actually something I noticed, when I change from rhythm guitar chords to a solo, the song just kinda loses its intensity and its really annoying because that just doesn't work. Maybe one thing to solve that would be to avoid playing strong low down chords and find a way to use the other instruments to create the music just as effectively, so that when I go into a solo there isn't much of an intensity drop off.

I'm kinda trying to make up for it by trying to fuse lead and rhthym style in my guitaring at the same time, like using open notes at high gains to try and mimic a power chord, or by playing chords at an octave higher.

It wasn't until I saw them live that I realised that the bassist in TOOL often has high gain on his bass which somehow makes it sound like he's playing a guitar chord when he plucks. Thats another good idea aye.

StuntVedder10

Look at Tommy Shannon (Bassist for Stevie Ray Vaughan). Stevie is IMO the best. IMO 3 man bands need to have a above average bass player to make it work out

harrisonmerwin

amit wrote:

Hey yeah that does help,

That is actually something I noticed, when I change from rhythm guitar chords to a solo, the song just kinda loses its intensity and its really annoying because that just doesn't work. Maybe one thing to solve that would be to avoid playing strong low down chords and find a way to use the other instruments to create the music just as effectively, so that when I go into a solo there isn't much of an intensity drop off.

I'm kinda trying to make up for it by trying to fuse lead and rhthym style in my guitaring at the same time, like using open notes at high gains to try and mimic a power chord, or by playing chords at an octave higher.

It wasn't until I saw them live that I realised that the bassist in TOOL often has high gain on his bass which somehow makes it sound like he's playing a guitar chord when he plucks. Thats another good idea aye.

get your bass to chord some stuff in the octave you usually do, make it funkier of course, but it fills in the gap.