This excerpt is taken from the complete article that appears in the December 2016 issue, which is available here.

Rock Perspectives

Advanced Overlapping Phrases

Superimposing Groupings

by Aaron Edgar

I’ve always been inspired by phrasing that seems to dance its way around the pulse. Bands such as Meshuggah apply this effect. You can bob your head in quarter notes and feel their phrases starting on different parts of the beat—sometimes for several bars—before the figure eventually lands comfortably back on beat 1. We often hear this phrasing using common subdivisions, but applying this concept to advanced subdivisions such as quintuplets or septuplets can create some incredibly unusual rhythms.

Here’s a four-note pattern superimposed over quintuplets. You’ll have to play the four-note phrase five times before it resolves on the first partial of the quintuplet on beat 1.

For the complete lesson with transcriptions, check out the December 2016 issue, which is available here.

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