How do you create a bassline? This question is not just for bass players. It’s for producers and songwriters, who are likely to be programming their own bass parts in their DAW. Keyboard players can do basslines in their left hand; guitarists do them with their thumbs. And even if you never create or play a bassline, you should know how to listen to them.
You can think of the bass as serving a dual role: a percussive one and a melodic/harmonic one. In pop, the percussive role matters more. The bassline holds the groove together, and the rhythms matter more than the pitches. The best way to understand that side of things is just to listen to songs you like, focus on the bassline and scat sing along.
Below, I list seven common types of basslines found in Anglo-American pop, what you might call the basic basslines (ha). I show each of them playing the Axis progression in C using a standard rock rhythm. Then I give some examples of each drawn from actual music. Continue reading “Low end theory”
