Innehållsförteckning för October 2021 från Bass Player

Michael Jackson, ‘Billie Jean’ (1982) Louis Johnson’s classic bass-line makes ‘Billie Jean’ one of the late MJ’s best songs, a career highlight that still stands up today, regardless of the controversies attached to the sometime King Of Pop. Atop the subtle backing vocals and synth wash, the line drives the song forward as it builds, leading to an understated but funky vibe which contrasts perfectly with Jackson’s emotional wails about the girl who is, famously, not his lover.…

Welcome back, bass players! Let’s talk pedalboardsor more precisely, what to consider when you’re utilizing pedalboards on stage. The first question to pose is, ‘Do you really need a pedalboard?’ After all, they can be one of the most likely causes of any mid-gig technical issues, and we can achieve lots of different sounds and tones simply by using different techniques, adjusting our bass or amp EQ, or even changing basses. However, if you like to utilize weird and wonderful sounds, or if you have a very specific bass voice made up of certain effects, then you’re going to need a pedalboard as part of your live setup. The placement of your board depends on the role you play beyond just being the bass player. Most of us will stick…

I grew up down Texas way, working summers at my father’s sawmill, and scraping together minimum wage to buy a beat-up SG bass. The fretboard pyrotechnics of Sheehan and Lee were beyond my reach, but inspiration came slithering across the yard one scorching afternoon through the screen door of a nearby rib shack. As I unloaded lumber from a boxcar, the bluesman growled about gold tooth displays and beauticians at the wheel of his V8 Ford, the backbeat matching the loping rhythm of our sawmill’s conveyor chain. Heat waves shimmied on the tracks as epiphany struck from the percolating bass, laying a muddy groove wide as the West Texas plains, with a mind-blowing breakdown at the end that was both bad and nationwide. The band, of course, was ZZ Top—but…

The funk fans among us have long been in awe of the work of George Porter Jr and The Meters, the New Orleans-based band he co-founded in 1965 with Art Neville, Leo Nocentelli, and Joseph ‘Zigaboo’ Modeliste. They’ve long been hailed alongside Sly & The Family Stone and Parliament-Funkadelic as progenitors of funk, with their signature instrumental ‘Cissy Strut’ from 1969 an archetype of laid-back, effortless groove. As well as recording their own classics, The Meters also became the house band for Allen Toussaint’s label and studio in New Orleans, backing records for a range of musicians including Dr. John, Paul McCartney, and Robert Palmer; they famously backed Patti Labelle on her 1974 hit, ‘Lady Marmalade’. Porter was later sampled by hip-hop artists such as A Tribe Called Quest, Run…

Why did you decide to write about the Rio album, Annie? It’s my favorite Duran Duran album, and I think front-to-back it’s their most consistent effort. Plus, it’s an album that grows with you as you age. But I also think Rio has a great backstory, between how long it took for it to succeed in America, to the music videos they filmed, and how the album really propelled them to global stardom. It’s a work of art, not just an album. What is special about John’s bass playing, as you see it? A great question. From writing this book, one thing that struck me about his playing is what an astute listener he obviously is. His bass parts fit like a glove within Duran Duran’s arrangements, and he’s always…

Your new Schecter Hellraiser is a beauty, Dan. Yes, I’m a huge fan of it—both the way it looks and the way it plays. Schecter have been producing the Hellraiser model for a while, and I’ve been using them since I joined Cradle back in 2012. It’s a five-string, because I’ve only ever used a five in this band. I guess the aesthetics are where I made the most changes to the stock model. They had a finish called the Dragon Burst, which was yellow to green, with black at the edges, so I thought that replacing the yellow with lime green would look cool. It has block inlays for a bit of class, and I switched out the pickups. Which pickups did you go for? Fishman Fluence pickups, which…

Price | $7,680 Made In | UK Body | Three-quarter size, handmade; laminated maple and mahogany, with mahogany liner trim and internal structure Neck | Removable (fixed neck also available); quartersawn maple, 41” scale Fingerboard | Sustainable ebony with inlay carbon fiber spine Pickups | Channel Blaster II piezo, with acrylic elements Hardware | Blast Cult brass, aluminium and steel tuners, handmade; adjustable maple bridge with star adjusters; ebony endpin with skateboard wheel foot Case/gigbag included | No WHAT WE THINK Plus | Sublime build quality and sonic attributes Minus | No gigbag Overall | A beautifully crafted instrument, designed around innovation BP RATING…

JB-75MN NA VINTAGE Price | $166 Made In | China Body | American ash Neck | Maple Neck joint | Bolt-on Fingerboard | Maple, 20 frets Pickups | 2 x Roswell JBA Alnico-5 single-coils Controls | 2 x volume, tone Hardware | Chrome Case/gig-bag included | No Left-handed option | Yes RB-414BK CLASSIC Price | $217 Made In | China Body | Mahogany Neck | Mahogany Neck joint | Set neck Fingerboard | Amaranth, 22 frets Pickups | Mini-humbucker (neck) and single coil (bridge) Controls | 2 x volume, 2 x tone, 3-way pickup selector Hardware | Chrome Case/gig-bag included | Yes Left-handed option | Yes WHAT WE THINK Plus | Affordable, decent tones Minus | Some build issues on the RB Overall | Useful debut or backup basses at…

Hello, and a big thank you! Since my last column I’ve had lots of people contact me with their stories. It’s wonderful that conversations have been started, and some assumptions challenged as a result. As the world of gigs opens up and we all start playing in front of audiences, it’s natural for us to feel a bit nervous of how to handle situations that were once second nature. So, it’s important to take little steps that allow our minds and bodies to feel confident enough to take the plunge into live shows, recording sessions and rehearsals. The old assumptions are back, so let’s take a deep breath and have a couple of strategies up our sleeves. This month’s bass assumption comes from a session player and educator called Sarah,…

“I’m a professional musician, because that’s what I’m supposed to do,” says the great Nick Beggs. “As ridiculous as it sounds, some people are called to the ministry and some people are called to the music industry, and they’re very different, but there is absolutely a parity of headspace. You know why you were born.” Beggs, the co-founder of the pop act Kajagoogoo, was almost inescapable throughout the Eighties, thanks to the huge hits that band scored and the equally huge bass parts heard on said hits, but he’s been better known subsequently for his work with a range of musicians of the progressive rock persuasion, notably Steve Hackett and Steven Wilson. Along the way he’s led a variety of more or less remarkable bands, such as Ellis, Beggs &…

‘What does it weigh?’ We’re asked this question so frequently that weight now appears among the detailed specifications of every instrument we offer for sale. Weight requirements have also been a common custom order demand at Elrick Basses since day one. However, as fabrication of solid-body electric basses is essentially a subtractive process, estimating the finished weight of a given instrument is, at best, an educated guess. Our wood selection has traditionally been the best way to target a weight range, but with the diminishing availability of swamp ash and a limited selection of lightweight alternative woods suitable for construction, another option has become commonplace—chambered bodies. Chambering is nothing new. In the late Sixties, Fender’s infamous ‘smuggler’s Tele’ included chambers for weight relief beneath the pickguard. In the Eighties, Gibson…

What basses are you playing on Live In Texas, Dusty? Bolin Guitars make them for me—they’re really close to a Fender Telecaster bass. I may ask for an odd color or a stranger shape here and there, but if you close your eyes it feels like a Tele. There aren’t too many modifications—I move the pickup here and there, because I play with my fingers, and I like to play in a certain place and strike the string in a certain way. Sometimes I’ll use a left-handed machine head setup, but the bass is still strung right-handed, so it’s just for the aesthetic. Is your bass style still evolving after all these years? I’m always learning, or at least I try to. I like to experiment with tones. I like…

If you were looking for someone to advise you on playing bass and staying healthy, you couldn’t really ask for a better combination of expertize than that of the San Diego-raised health professional Anna Achimowicz. She’s a bass player, a choreographer, and the founder of the Rock Dance Theatre project—but most importantly, a physiotherapist at her own Performing Arts Medicine practice, which specializes in medicine for stage performers and health services in the live arts industry. Her latest programme, Body Management For Bassists, has much to offer all of us. Talk us through what you do, Anna. I’ve been a professional choreographer, dancer and performer for the last 20 years, as well as working in medicine. It’s kind of a perfect marriage if you want to treat people in the…

Price | $199.90, $249.90, $299.90 Made In | China Output | Gnome/Gnome i200 watts at 4 ohms, 130 watts at 8 ohms; Gnome iPro 280 watts at 4 ohms, 180 watts at 8 ohms Features | Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, Master, signal level/compressor LED indicator, LED power indicator, automatic limiter/compressor, Class D power amp section with clip, thermal, DC, over current and short circuit protection Connections | Front panel.25” jack input on front for active and passive basses, .25” jack output headphones; Rear panel Post EQ balanced XLR DI output with ground lift switch, .25” jack speaker output, USB type B Digital audio output, IEC power connector, power switch Dimensions (LxWxH) | Gnome/ Gnome i6.7 x 4.6 x 1.8” Gnome iPro7.9 x 5.4 x 1.9” Weight | Gnome/Gnome i2.2lbs Gnome…

The British session bassist Brian ‘Herbie’ Flowers (“I get booked because of my stupid name!”) told us last time we interviewed him that he’s recorded over 20,000 sessions. This barely-imaginable number of studio dates took place over 50 years, which makes it at least conceivable—and also understandable that his memories of playing electric and upright bass on Lou Reed’s 1972 hit ‘Walk On The Wild Side’, released half a century ago next year, are hardly vivid. “What the producer wants is for you to come up with something that is a bit catchy and will make a listener go, ‘Oh, that’s good’,” said the great man. “What you’re doing is putting together a product that will capture the public’s information. With Lou Reed it was easy to say, ‘Can I…

Yes, we heard your cries for yet more advanced scale options over dominant chords! This month’s column is an extension of our previous investigation into applying various scales over resolving dominant chords—this time looking at the Half-Whole Diminished scale, which we’ll call H-W. Diminished scales actually contain eight separate pitches and are referred to as ‘octatonic’ scales. When compared to our more common, seven-note ‘hexatonic’ harmonic system, H-W diminished scales offer up more extensions as well as the usual dominant chord tones: 1, b 9, #9, 3, #11/ b 5, 5, 13, b 7. This intervallic construction makes it a great choice for resolving dominant chords. It is more common to hear this employed over dominant chords resolving to a chord with a major quality, as in our examples, but…

The Tragically Hip’s singer Gord Downie died in 2017, and as any of his fellow Canadians will tell you, his passing was a national tragedy. Although TTH were and remain critically respected and commercially successful outside Canada, their domestic status was immense, equalled in their home country only by Rush. The fact that their 13 studio albums released since 1989 have sold 10 million copies in Canada, but only 1.5 million in the USA, is revealing. When Downie’s death was announced, the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made an emotional speech in his honor, and the country’s House of Commons observed a minute’s silence. All this indicates why so much attention has been focused on Saskadelphia, a new album by The Tragically Hip. It contains six previously unreleased tracks written…

There’s much to love about Duran Duran’s landmark 1982 album Rio: Hit singles ‘Hungry Like The Wolf’ and ‘Save A Prayer’, the mysterious Patrick Nagel cover art, and John Taylor’s nimble, sinewy bass-lines. Driven by a desire to emulate the low ends propelling Chic, Japan and Roxy Music, the Birmingham, UK native veered between moody pulses (‘New Religion’) and spring-loaded dancefloor bursts (‘Hold Back The Rain’). One of the newest volumes in Bloomsbury’s acclaimed 33 1/3 book series is dedicated to Rio. The book, out now, features new and exclusive interviews with four-fifths of the group’s lineup circa Rio—John Taylor, keyboardist Nick Rhodes, drummer Roger Taylor, and guitarist Andy Taylor—and dozens of other people involved in the band’s success back then, including video directors, label employees, radio DJs, and MTV…

THOMANN www.thomannmusic.com $166 $217 Harley Benton’s sales appeal is simple but effective. The company offers instruments with a decent spectrum of tones, while making them as playable and affordable as possible. The two HB basses we’re reviewing here are typical examples of the range, with the JB-75 a Jazz copy and the RB-414BK evidently a Rickenbacker-alike instrument. They’re remarkably cheap, but are they any good? Build Quality When something seems a little too good to be true, surprise, surprise, it usually turns out that way. Just how do you take a ’75 Jazz bass that packs a maple neck and fretboard, plus an ash body with all the natural trimmings, and sell it for the cost of two new tires for your van? There’s got to be a catch somewhere.…

Price | $1,799 Made in | USA Body | Mahogany Neck | Mahogany, 34” Neck joint | Set neck Nut width | 1.6” Fingerboard | Indian rosewood Frets | 20 Pickups | Thunderbird Rhythm (neck) and Lead (bridge) Controls | 2 x volumes, master tone Hardware | 3-point adjustable bridge, Hipshot Ultralite tuners and Graph Tech nut Weight | 8.8 lbs Case/gig bag included? | Hardshell case Left-hand option available? No WHAT WE THINK Plus | Sounds great, looks beautiful Minus | The body shape is an acquired taste Overall | Not the most versatile instrument when it comes to tones, but when the tone is this good, we can live with it BP RATING…

I SPY... 62 RYAN MADORA Dig into your favorite bass parts... and discover treasure! Ryan Madora is one of Nashville’s most sought-after touring and session bassists. Recent touring and session credits include Robben Ford, Kyshona Armstrong, and her instrumental trio, The Interludes. For the past five years, she has served as musical director for Bobby Bones, and has played with Garth Brooks, Darius Rucker, and Carrie Underwood. In addition to instructing at Nashville’s campus of Musician’s Institute, Ryan has taught at Gerald Veasley’s Bass Boot Camp, Rock’n’Roll Fantasy Camp, and at universities across the USA. She has contributed columns to No Treble for over a decade and in 2019, published her first book, Bass Players To Know: Learning From The Greats. Ryan offers online education at TrueFire and her website.…

Welcome! We’re going to take a bit of a detour this month to talk about how to learn. Most of the lessons in this column are generally about the specifics of how to approach a particular aspect of bass playing. Woven in between those specifics, you’ll have noticed a series of observations about the process of learning. For a lot of more experienced players, at least those of us who are still progressing in our craft, the mechanics of learning are so ingrained in what we do on a day-to-day basis that we rarely stop to think about how to learn rather than what to learn. This month, I’m going to draw some parallels between bass playing and something that I’ve been learning a lot about over the last few…