Babaluma -
There are two parts to this question, dominants and substitutions. There are a ton of examples of known players using both altered sounds and subs and it would take far too long to go through a million tunes for examples so I won't do that. But after this you'll be able to know the sound instantly when you hear it. That might be easier.
Also, I'm going to keep it all very, very simple. Always the best way to learn it.
There are two kinds of dominants, resolving and non-resolving. If you have a sequence like this:
Em7 - A7 - Dm7 - G7 - CM7
The A7 resolves to its I, Dm7, and the G7 resolves to its I, CM7. That's simple enough.
If you have a sequence like this:
Em7 - A7 - Am7 - D7 - Dm7 - G7 - CM7
You can see that the A7 does not resolve to its I, nor does the D7. Only the G7 resolves to its I, the CM7.
Basically the rule is only use the altered scale over resolving dominants. For non-resolving dominants use something else (we'll do it later).
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Now we use the melodic minor scale a half-step above the root of the resolving dominant to get the altered sound. So in that first sequence we'll use:
Em7 - A7alt (Bb mel m) - Dm7 - G7alt (Ab mel m) - CM7.
You have to know those scales, where to put your fingers, and then just go for it. If you do it often enough you'll find out how to resolve them. In fact, they pretty much take care of themselves, as you'll discover.
I've just done this and you can hear how it works. I've done it twice in different places on the guitar. It's honestly not difficult.
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Then there's the non-resolving dominants. If you use the altered sound over these ones you'll find it doesn't really work. What's more it's hard to resolve the sound properly. So this is how NOT to do it.
I suspect that you got the 'dirty looks' because you were using altered sounds in the wrong places!
The sequence is:
Em7 - A7 - Am7 - D7 - Dm7 - G7 - CM7
(The next three clips may not display because there's one already here so just click them)
Stream Wrong alt by ragman | Listen online for free on SoundCloud
So the thing to use over non-resolving dominants is what they call the Lydian Dominant scale. The simplest way to think of it is playing the ii melodic minor of the dominant. That is, for A7 use E mel m and for D7 use A mel m. The G7 is Ab mel m as before.
So you can see that the sequence now looks like this. And sounds like the clip.
Em7 - % - Am7 - % - Dm7 - G7 - CM7
Stream Lyd Dom by ragman | Listen online for free on SoundCloud
See the difference? And see how, when you do play the altered scale at the end, how it stands out?
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So then there are substitutions. Substitutions are a vast and complex subject. You'd need to study it. We all need to study it! But here's a simple sub trick you can use. It's not a bad introduction to subs.
If you take a Dm triad the notes are D F A. If you take the 3rd up from the D, which is F, and stack that in m3rds, you get F Ab C, which is F minor. Go up once more from the 3rd of Fm, which is Ab, and you get Ab B Eb.
You'll notice something interesting, that the last one is Abm which is the altered sound. But it's the one in the middle, the Fm, that can be used as a sub.
So now, instead of playing two lots of Em and Am in our sequence, we can play:
Em7 - Gm7 - Am7 - Cm7 - Dm7 - Abm - CM7.
The last one, again, is the altered sound because the G7 resolves. But the other two mean we're playing G mel m over the A7 and C mel m over the D7. These subs give a sort of b9 sound. They also include the 13th of the dominant so you have a 13b9 sound, which is a pretty modern sub.
Sounds like this. I've done it twice.
Stream A13b9_D13b9_G7alt by ragman | Listen online for free on SoundCloud
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That's about it. Keep it simple. Good luck
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