Rhythmic arranging

I thought I'd talk about rhythm in this post. Luckily rhythm is much easier to deal with and there are less ways to mess it up, but if you aren't careful it can still happen. One simple thing that can cause problems is flams. If you're a drummer I'm sure you know what a flam is, but if not I'll explain. A flam is when one note(usually percussion) is played quickly before another and with a lower volume. You can check it out below.

On drums this is cool, when it happens by accident with 2 different instruments it's not. The one of the worst places this can happen is between a kick drum and a bass. If your kick drum and bass guitar aren't playing complimentary rhythms, you can get flaming that can sound like mistakes. The bass and kick don't have to play the exact same thing, they shouldn't be fighting each other. Of course this can happen with any instrument, but with instruments it seems to cause more problems for whatever reason. Here is an example.

Here is another one with piano that sounds a bit strange and definitely lacks a groove.

Luckily there are some simple fixes. One thing you can try is having everything play the same rhythm or at least similar rhythms. In this example nothing sounds wrong or out of place and I don't think it would sound terrible in a song. However there are some improvments that could be made to make it groove a bit harder.

 Now listen to the 2nd example. In the 2nd example the kick drum, bass and clavinet are playing similar rhythms, which gives this example more power.

Some people might like the 1st example better, but in certain situations and songs the 2nd idea works better. By having multiple instruments playing at the same time, you give those rhythms power.

Another thing that works well is what I call trading off. What I mean by that is when one instrument is holding a note another plays a lots of notes and vice versa. This is a fundamental arranging trick and you can hear it everywhere from pop to classical music. Here are some examples

Now here is a song I wrote a while back that uses the exact same technique through out.

I hope that gave you some ideas on how to go about putting together rhythms. Most of it is intuitive, but there are some techniques that help when you're at a lost. Also keep in mind that sometimes you might want things to sound chaotic and you can do the opposite of what I've suggested above. Below are some songs I believe are examples of good rhythmic arranging.

Listen to how all the instruments compliment each other and don't fight each other. Listen to the percussion on the left and right sides. Also take note of how at the end of each phrase he sings you can hear a guitar lick, horn stab or a string riff. During the keyboard solo listen to how all the instruments play together to create a powerful rhythm for the keyboard to solo over. This creates an interesting contrast to the light funky feel of the rest of the song.

I've been getting into Kill Paris recently. Here is an example of funkstep/glitch-hop which is simple but effective. If you listen to the bass during the drop it's playing a simple line that is locked in with the kick drum. Later another lead synth part comes in the plays the exact same thing as the bass just higher. On top of all of this notice how the synths drop out when the vocal sample come in which only makes their reappearance seem to hit even harder(which doesn't seem possible). The genius of this song is they found a good rhythm, had all the instruments follow it and then took it away before you got too tired of it. A simple idea, but when it comes together like this you can turn it into a whiplash inducing groove.

Listen to how the bass, kick, piano and guitar all lock in together into the same rhythm. This makes for a powerful arrangement and is present in most hard rock and heavy metal songs.

As always check out some of my songs and arrangements on the side of this page or at productiontrax and leave a comment below. I'll be back with more on arranging in a week or 2.

Part 1 - Thoughts on Arranging
Part 2 - Timbre
Part 4 - Harmonic clarity
Part 5 - Seeing the big picture