| Trumpet: | 1223 |
| Trombone: | 338 |
| Alto Sax: | 237 |
| Tenor Sax: | 121 |
| Baritone Sax: | 17 |
| Other horns: | 4 |
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Silent Rip
User |
Posted: 2006-04-21 04:27 CEST | |
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What do you all think of this? The thing is, me and some other guys at my school want to start up a ska band, but we can't find anyone to play guitar. And I mean no one. This is really bad because guitar is pretty much the backbone of all ska music. Also we can't find a trombone. If we attempted the band, the horn line-up would be trumpet, alto sax, tenor sax. Is there anything wrong with this? Could we pull off a ska outfit with drums, bass, alto and tenor sax and trumpet? Or is it not even worth it? |
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Faulk
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Posted: 2006-04-21 06:48 CEST | |
| If I were you, yeah I'd do it anyway. It'll probably sound empty but your horns can start figuring out melodys and riffs so that when you do get a guitarist, you'll have some material to work with. | ||
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widby
User |
Posted: 2006-04-21 14:41 CEST | |
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what about having a piano? Everyband has a guitar, but couldn't a piano do a similar job? Or get an insane bass player, anyway i don't think a guitar is vital. Cool idea |
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charpi
User |
Posted: 2006-04-21 18:14 CEST | |
Its crazy but i agree with widby and maybe your band start a new age of ska  How knows?? And remember this: The good music contribute with new ideas(I really dont know if this sentence is correct, but... Im not a master of English)
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Shizzle
User |
Posted: 2006-04-22 00:42 CEST | |
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Don't let not having a guitar stop you.. At least start the band, eventually after a couple of months you might find a guitarist, let him join. My advice up until then would be to have kickass song intros with horns. I'm actually a guitarist and when a ska band has kickass horns I honestly miss that theres even a guitar playing. If you never find a guitarist and it does cause you guys problems.. One of you can always learn guitar. Ska is probably one of easiest genres on guitar, I can't say you'd be awesome in a day but you shouldn't have to many troubles. It's mostly simple chords with a simple rhythm. Piano in place of guitar If you can find a piano player that likes ska that might be cool.. Don't the aquabats have a piano? They're different but kind of annoying if your not in the mood for that differentness |
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Silent Rip
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Posted: 2006-04-22 01:49 CEST | |
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Haha the only piano players good enough are in the band, one plays trumpet and the other drums. It's a cool idea, anyway...maybe later on we can experiment with that. You are right, we can always find a guitar players later on. What do you guys think of the horn line-up? I can't think of a ska band that doesn't have a trombone. |
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Shizzle
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Posted: 2006-04-22 04:47 CEST | |
| Yea, trombone is a very popular in ska.. You can make it though. If you suck, you can always find one of them too later on. | ||
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widby
User |
Posted: 2006-04-22 12:32 CEST | |
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it depends, if you'd like really smooth, bright horn lines the rbf, then a bone and trumpet are a good combo. but having 2 sax and a trumpet is good. the tenor can be you "trombone". good luck with what you choose, i wanna get rid of my guitarist now... |
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Kevin
User |
Posted: 2006-04-22 21:40 CEST | |
| Firstly, don't worry about the lack of trombone. You can get some really smooth classy hornline with what you currently have. Saxes can give very sweet lines with a very unique feel. On that note, if your trumpet player plays piano, test it out with him doing the upbeats and such on the piano and if it works out, forget the trumpet. He could always whip it out for a song or something or for recording but it could be really awesome with piano and two saxes. It's a possibility and in my opinion, I think it would be pretty awesome. That's what I would do in that situation. I think an all sax horn section whould be beautiful [maybe even through a clarinet in there because that sounds awesome. A band called Skaladdin has Alto, Tenor and Clarinet as their horns and it is pretty amamzing] and also, keys are amazing and you can do alot of really neat stuff with them. You may break your idea of what a ska band should be but honestly that's what will make it awesome. I love it when people mix things up. Oh yeah, I just remembered taht my ska band has a song with no guitar, the guitar player plays trumpet for it [it's a pirate song] The trombone plays the upbeats and the bass just plays really fat with alot of style. | ||
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catchbigdandthe22manifesto
User |
Posted: 2006-04-22 23:42 CEST | |
| I don't think that de bone is so important, my band has only an alto sax and a trumpet, it sounds high for sure, but we arrange things to have different melodies and it sounds great! | ||
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swim lil fishi
User |
Posted: 2006-04-23 20:04 CEST | |
Shizzle wrote:
The Pietasters have a piano |
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Silent Rip
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Posted: 2006-04-24 04:07 CEST | |
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Well guys, thanks to your great advice, I think we will try out the idea. We have all the talent, the only thing we lack is conventional instrumentation. But hey, since when was ska conventional? Heh. We're trying to get together this weekend. I'll tell you how things go if or when we get something done. Once again, thanks for all the helpful advice. Any further thoughts on the matter would be appreciated also. |
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Skek
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Posted: 2006-04-25 19:48 CEST | |
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You definitely don't need a guitar or trombone! General Rudie (www.skapages.com/generalrudie) is one of the best ska bands you'll ever hear, and although there's a guitar on their recordings, they often tour without it, and use only a keyboard (usually on organ sounds, not piano sounds) for live shows. It takes about three ounces of skill to play ska keyboard, and with a good synth you'll get alot of variety. And plus, a trained monkey could do it. So yeah, start the band. |
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Silent Rip
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Posted: 2006-04-26 01:54 CEST | |
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Well I thought we were going to totally attempt the idea but now I've found that some of my bandmates aren't as in to the ska idea as I thought. Me and the trumpet player are gung-ho, full throttle, totally want to do it. The bassist is having doubts (mainly about finding a vocalist). The alto doubts we could do it all. I don't know how the drummer feels. The doubters believe we would be better off doing a jazz combo. We already tried that a while ago and even though I love jazz and stuff, I wasn't feeling the idea. I think a ska band would tons more fun, both for us and people we play for. What do you think of the vocalist problem? I mean I can sing to some degree (I'm not fantastic), but the others apparently don't share that sentiment. I know what you're thinking, finding a vocalist has to be the stupidest problem one can have, any schmuck can sing in a ska band. The thing to understand is I'm having problems convincing the other band members that we can really pull off a ska outfit. I even printed out this thread and showed it to some of them. I know they're all skeptical about the idea and I'm having trouble convincing them. Any advice about all of this? |
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Skek
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Posted: 2006-04-26 02:24 CEST | |
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Whoa whoa whoa.... not just any "schmuck" can sing for a ska band, or for any band for that matter. If you actually can't sing please don't. The solution to BOTH your problems is really simple: play ska and play jazz and don't get a singer. Just be a hip instrumental ska-jazz outfit. Problem solved. |
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widby
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Posted: 2006-04-27 17:40 CEST | |
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my band, we don't have a singer. They take too long to set up on sound checks, and they still sound awful, i can barely hear them with a band behind them. Singers are good, you just need someone who can sing and an amazing sound tech. What about rap? |
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SeverFire
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Posted: 2006-04-30 01:49 CEST | |
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I think you guys should try it. Just remember: Ska is not ska because of horns. Ska is ska because of its strong upbeats/offbeats. In ska bands, the upbeats are done primarily by the guitarist, but I think you guys can pull it off with the bass and drums, and always having one of the hornline players doing some sort of upbeat rhythm going on. |
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Spaminator 3000
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Posted: 2006-05-01 02:22 CEST | |
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As most people have suggested, I would go for a band even without guitar. To be honest, in a considerable amount of 1st wave ska, horns not a guitar played on the upbeats. So you could try that. I also agree that keyboard would be fine. I just saw Soulive yesterday (they are goddamn awesome if you guys haven't ever heard them) and they are some funky mothers. But I quickly noticed something odd: they didn't have a bass player. Bass is one of the most essential elements of funk, so I was pretty shocked. But then I realized that their keyboard player was playing the bass line in addition to soloing and junk on the keyboard. He was crazy, because those bass lines were super-funky/syncopated and not easy to play over. So yeah, put the keyboard on some cool organ sound and go for it. In reggae, the cousin of ska, quite often keyboard is quite often the most prominent instrument playing on the upbeats with the guitar just making strumming/scratching noises. Sorry this was so long and good luck! |
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Spaminator 3000
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Posted: 2006-05-01 02:26 CEST | |
| Oh yeah, I forgot...I'm going to have to disagree with Skek. I think you should try singing vocals on a couple of songs and see how you do. Two artists immediately came to my mind: Bob Dylan and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Everyone agrees that Bob Dylan has a nasal, raspy voice, yet he is still one of the most celebrated singers ever. And Anthony Kiedis of RHCP hadn't ever really sung before when they formed the Peppers. Like anything, if you practice, you'll get better at it. | ||
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Tbone_it_BIG_Bee
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Posted: 2006-05-01 03:32 CEST | |
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just do an acappella Ska band. so no one can give you shit it'd be fuuuuun. |
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twotonemasta
User |
Posted: 2006-08-15 17:07 CEST | |
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sing to ur style and u should be fine there's a fine line between sucking and being original, and id practice with out a guitar but continue the search cause if u have crazy horn chemistry that could really help any future guitarist make good parts |
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marty
Moderator |
Posted: 2006-08-20 22:58 CEST | |
| A guitar is the only chordal instrument in a ska band. You could do it with a piano, but you'd need a pretty damn good piano player to make it interesting and fresh. A bass would be too low to pull it off. | ||