Tightening up the Rhythm
Lesson time: (7min 0sec)
Alex Reeves gives you a set of bass lines to practise your drum fills against, focusing on placing musical, production-quality fills rather than just filling the gap.
Course preview
This lesson is part of the course Fills In Time: Drum Fills & Time-Feel in 15 Lessons
Watch a preview of the full course below.
Lesson transcript:
Music Lesson: Bass Lines Practice
On the DVD, there are 8 player-long bass lines.
Getting Started
- Put the DVD into your computer.
- Load the bass lines onto your iTunes or Windows Media Player.
- Transfer them to your MP3 player or phone so that you can play along in your practice room.
Bass Line 1
- Our first bass line is at 76 beats per minute.
- Play the beat at this speed with a click first to get comfortable with it.
- Once you're feeling good, play with the bass line, adding some simple fills.
Bass Line 2
- Our second bass line is from the Turn It Up and Lay It Down series of CDs.
- Here, I'm playing fills that are in the context of the tune.
- You must use the ideas that we've looked at and apply them musically.
- If you're not sure what to do, copy the fills that I played.
Bass Line 3
- The third bass line here is also from the Turn It Up and Lay It Down series.
About the instructor
Alex is a freelance musician who has performed live and in the studio with artists as diverse as Dizzee Rascal, Unkle, Bat for Lashes, Guy Garvey and Elbow. He has played headline slots at all the major UK festivals, including televised appearances on Glastonbury's Pyramid Stage, Oxygen Main Stage and T In The Park. International TV performances also include Live on MTV, the Jools Holland Hootenanny and The BBC Electric Proms with Dizzee Rascal. On stage Alex has played with artists who have scored number one singles and albums all over the world, including Boy George, The Jones Girls and Johnny Hates Jazz. Alex has also been Musical Director for Island Records' Cocknbullkid, produced an album for Lotte Mullan, and performed live with Mercury nominated rapper Ty, American Blues legend Earl Thomas and singer-songwriter Ezio. Alex has recorded in all the major studios in London, including Abbey Road, Angel, Air and Rak, and runs his own private drum studio from East London's Fortress complex. Recorded highlights at The Drum Fortress include the top 5 single Shine with the Lovefreekz, Wretch 32's Breathe, UNKLE's collaboration with Nick Cave and the beat for American rapper Nas's single Nasty. He has also played drums and percussion on major TV adverts for companies that include McDonalds, X-Box and Toyota, provided beats for computer games like Sega Rally 2 and Shellshock 2, and appeared on many TV and film soundtracks, including the major release of Brideshead Revisited. Alex writes a regular tuition column for Drummer magazine, has written a book with accompanying DVD, and recorded a 1960s funk breaks sample CD. In his MusicGurus course, Fills In Time, he distils all that studio and stage experience into 15 quick lessons that sharpen your time-feel and build a vocabulary of drum fills you can drop straight into your own playing. And yes - he still calls his mum every week. read more