Bass, Drums, guitar and keyboard–  is the basic rhythm section that I always use.  Being a keyboard player, I usually start with my keyboard and my left hand playing the bass lines.  I combine chord structures and lead vocal parts with my right hand or overdub the lead part.  I then work on the drum parts consisting of bass drum, snare, high hat and floor toms.  I then add the rhythm guitar and bass drum.  Once I have these basic tracks sequenced, I then work on adding additional instrumental parts or vocals.  As you can hear with my tracks, a lot of times I will hear how the vocal musical notes should flow, even without completing the lyrics-which usually takes me longest to complete.  This is just my system and not everyone uses the same system as I, but this has worked for me for over thirty years.  I do all of the parts on my Studio 440 Sequencer by Sequential Circuits, even though I have an Akai MPC 3000 (I just love the sound and feel of the 440).  However, the Studio 440 only allows you to record eight tracks, which is it’s limitation, but I simply record the eight tracks onto Logic Pro on my Mac G5, and once these tracks are recorded onto the computer, I can dub in as many additional tracks as I need!