Innehållsförteckning för January 2022 från Bass Player

Whatever you may have thought of Motörhead, you couldn’t deny the impact of their music, delivered by the genuinely iconic Ian ‘Lemmy’ Kilmister, who died in 2015 at the age of 70. Of course, a lot of people didn’t like his songs, his singing, or his image, come to that: Lemmy wasn’t exactly someone you could easily define or ignore. As a bass player, his tones and playing style were unorthodox to say the least, but they propelled him to a godlike position in our world... even if, as I say, his music wasn’t for you. In this issue, we show you to achieve those very bass tones, we look back at Lemmy’s chaotic life, and we ask why he remains as popular in the afterlife as he was when…

The late saxophonist John Coltrane arguably peaked with his iconic 1964 album A Love Supreme, bringing spiritual themes to his art; a new live album, A Love Supreme: Live In Seattle restates the album’s impact. Coltrane’s band features Jimmy Garrison plus a second bassist, Donald Rafael Garrett. Jazz lovers will also appreciate Esperanza Spalding’s recent eighth album, Songwrights Apothecary Lab, containing 12 tracks, each assembled with the help of music therapists, neuroscientists, experts in Sufism and South Indian Carnatic music to evoke particular emotions.…

“Lemmy had this huge glass, maybe 12 inches tall, which he would fill up to an inch from the top with ice and Jack Daniel’s, and add a little Coca-Cola. Needless to say, things got a little confused: [Motörhead drummer] Philthy couldn’t remember his parts, and we spent an entire day going over the songs and getting them right, and then we recorded them.” “We started mixing at a studio called One On One, owned by a guy named Richard Landis, which had a solid-state SSL 4000 series desk. The three songs we were mixing were ‘Going To Brazil’, ‘Love Me Forever’ and ‘No Voices In The Sky’, which I think is a great song. "So I’m mixing one of the songs, and Lemmy walks in. He had taken one…

Burnt Sugar—whose full title is Burnt Sugar, The Arkestra Chamber—makes music like you’ve never heard before. In fact, they’ve never really heard it, either: This highly improvisatory and eclectic group creates new pieces every performance via a special hand-signal conducting system. The collective is co-led by groove-guru bassist Jared Michael Nickerson, whose musical background spans funk, rock, pop, and more. His upbringing in Dayton, Ohio informs that span of genres, and in turn his stylistic choices in Burnt Sugar. Nickerson and the band recently released a new album, Angels Over Oakanda, so we hit him with some burning questions. How does Angels Over Oakanda differ from Burnt Sugar’s other albums? It could probably be linked right up to the first four records as far as its spirit, but it’s pandemic-related.…

Phil Thornalley, songwriter and bass player, laughs as he recalls the creation of a certain iconic bass part. Back in 1983, he was producing the British band The Cure when their long-time bass player Simon Gallup stepped away from the band for a while. In Gallup’s absence, a single called ‘The Love Cats’ was given an unusual bass part. “Robert Smith, the Cure’s singer, had shown me the principal bass-line when we were on tour, and I’d learned it on electric bass. When we got to the studio to record it, I saw this double bass—and Robert said to me, ‘You’ve gotta play that!’ I had to get a tuner out and put some marks on the bass neck, because I had no idea where the notes were. When we…

Godin’s sumptuous A4 and A5 acoustic-electric basses, the AE range, have been around for a few years: This new 2021 version has a redesigned electronics suite for bass players looking for an acoustic element to their sound. Beautifully designed and assembled, the A5 that we’ve been sent for review comes with a pricetag that will make most of us wince, especially in these impoverished early months of the year—but you do get a whole lot of bass innovation for your bucks. Build Quality This instrument oozes a feeling of quality, from the semi-gloss finish of the body, the almost frictionless rear neck finish and the diamond-hard Richlite fretboard. It feels expensive but also innovative, partly because its construction—essentially a chunky, Precision-style neck bolted to a partly acoustic body—is genuinely unusual.…

Why take two distortion pedals out when you can take one? That’s the logic behind both of these handsome effects units, one from Ashdown and the other from Fender. The former is the signature overdrive of Dream Theater’s bassist extraordinaire John Myung, a user of Ashdown’s amps, and the latter an all-purpose unit that is half the size and half the price. This review isn’t a comparison of these two high-functioning units, though: Simply an exploration of what you can get for a certain outlay if you’re looking for a pedal with more than one drive option. Ashdown have produced their Double Drive pedal after consultation with Myung and his bass tech Maddi Schieferstein, the idea being to create a pedal that would sit well tonally with his signature Ernie…

Since I began this column two years ago, I’ve often referred to individual effects pedals and their operation, so this month we look at multi-effects units. First, let’s focus on the more budget-conscious end of the market. How dowe cram a bunch of pedals into a single box? Well, most single-effect pedals are analog, which a circuit inside that creates the sound you want. Space is often at a premium inside the casing, but if we use digital signal processing (DSP), the circuit simply becomes a platform for running programs that create effects. These include the obvious chorus, reverb and octave, as well as amp-profiling, more complex layered drives, intelligent pitch harmonizing, and even the ability to arrange effects in any order, in series and parallel. Sounds perfect... for guitar…

Amp-, bass- and pedal-makers Ashdown have unveiled a new signature head for Guy Pratt, the Interstellar-600, and a new signature pedal, the Pedal Of Doom, for Geezer Butler. The former is based on Ashdown’s ABM 900 head, and boasts extra features, such as two VU meters for input and output levels, a nine-band EQ section and, on the rear, an input for Pratt’s Moog Taurus pedal. The amp can be used with a footswitch to engage “the compression and the sub harmonics at fixed values to Guy’s exacting specifications when required”. As for the Pedal Of Doom, Ashdown tell us: “Over the past 18 months, we have been talking about what a great bass distortion requires: Fundamentally it revolves around an EQ, a predetermined structure to drive the right frequencies…

“I loved everything about Motörhead. We played with them so often that we became tight with their crew as well as the guys themselves. I would watch their sets from the monitor board at the side, because I wanted to see how the magic worked. I always watched how Lemmy picked the strings, and I realized he was using two different types of pick. “His onstage sound was ferocious. Those Marshalls were easily the loudest thing on the stage, hands down. I loved every second of it. He and the drummer, Mikkey Dee, would go at each other all the time, because Mikkey had Lemmy’s amps—basically an entire PA system—blasting away behind him. He’d shout ‘You’re fucking killing me, man!’ and Lemmy would shout back at him, just like Charlie…

How did you get started on bass? MATTEO I officially started playing bass in 2010 with a band called Donkey Breeder, a progressive band from Modena, Italy, my home town. The guys were in need of a new bassist ,and the previous one was, like me, a guitarist playing on bass, so it was my job from the beginning. I gave it a try, the guys liked me, I loved bass from the first touch and I haven’t stopped since then. Thanks to Donkey Breeder’s bass playing, I got a job in Blindead, and my adventure with Me And That Man started when I joined the band in 2017. FOZ I picked up the bass for this band! Through school I messed about with other instruments, and one day Perry…

The Harley Benton brand has made significant strides in recent times with their budget-conscious bass offerings, and this electro-acoustic is no exception. Designed as a ‘travel’ bass, its 23.5” scale length makes it ideal for players who need an affordable alternative to carrying a long-scale, regular-sized instrument with them on their travels. Equipped with a three-band preamp and tuner, it would appear to have the necessary features of an electro-acoustic instrument. So how does it perform? Build Quality The bass displays some fine timber choices and finishing, with mahogany used for the back and sides, a sitka spruce top, a nyatoh neck and laurel fingerboard, and ivory binding around the body and fingerboard edges. An abalone rosette surrounds the soundhole, with pearl front position markers along the front of the…

Hey there, bass players! If you’re following this series, then you’re well acquainted with the world of eighth notes. My previous column featured the swung eighth note, where we tapped into the world of jazz, blues shuffles, and even pop records with an underlying swing. Now, let’s subdivide a beat into three notes, resulting in eighth note triplets. Eighth note triplets are extremely common and versatile. They’re not limited to swung or shuffled feels and pack quite a rhythmic punch in rock, metal, funk, soul—you name it. While regular eighth notes subdivide a beat into two increments, eighth note triplets subdivide a beat into three increments. We often speak this rhythm as ‘tri-pa-let’. Unlike the swung eighth note, the eighth note triplet doesn’t necessary imply an overall swing, though it…

Let’s consider the Nashville numbering system, as it’s an essential component in the development of any aspiring musician. The concept is relatively simple: Off every step of a scale, a coinciding chord can be produced. This chord is then numbered accordingly, which in turn allows us to communicate progressions to one another using numeric formulas. For example, Gmaj7—Emin7—Amin7—D7 could simply be portrayed as a I-VI-II-V in G Major. The approach is decisive, effective, and a wonderful learning aid. Once you become aware of this system, you’ll notice how regularly some chord progressions feature in contemporary music Once you become aware of this system, you’ll start to notice how regularly some chord progressions feature in contemporary music. In fact, it’s not uncommon for genres such as the blues to be pretty…

A new Zoom multi-effects unit for bass, the B6, has been launched at an approximately midmarket price point of $650—and you get a wide range of features for your money. It includes 11 bass amp and four DI tones, based on tube and solid-state models, a dual input (with adjustable impedance from 1M to 10M ohms) and an A/B switch, enabling players to quickly swap between two instruments. There’s a 4.3” color touchscreen, nine footswitches, a looper, and 10 new preamp and effects models, including Bass Analog Octave, a ‘1073’ preamp, and a new ‘Djent preamp’. Review incoming.…

2021 was supposed to be the year that the live music industry got back to normal, but we know now that it’ll be 2022 at the earliest before we’re all jumping around in the front row in serious numbers. A whole range of cool tours have been announced by a range of optimistic bands, which has been rewarding to see, so let’s hope conditions continue to improve—because plans are for a whole lot of great bass players to hit the road. Keep an eye out for Cannibal Corpse, whose violent death metal should shake off those winter blues Make sure you catch the Red Hot Chili Peppers, whose impending world tour will see Flea and crew a-funking their way through 32 cities around the planet. Recently rejoined by their Blood…

"I first met Jimi Hendrix when Cream did a gig at the Regents Polytechnic in London,” the late Jack Bruce told BPa few years back. “Coincidentally, the guys that became Pink Floyd were in the audience, and apparently seeing that event made them become Pink Floyd. When I saw them recently, they told me that. I knew they were there, but I didn’t know that we were responsible for them getting together. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I leave that for you to decide...” The great bassist continued: “I was just having a pre-gig pint in a pub across the road, and in comes this guy who turns out to be Jimi Hendrix. Now, we had already heard about Jimi on the grapevine. He came up…

Describing the tone of Lemmy’s overdriven bass isn’t easy, although many have tried. The classic Motörhead line-up with guitarist ‘Fast’ Eddie Clarke and drummer Phil ‘Philthy’ Taylor didn’t sound like other bands, precisely because of the sound emanating from Lemmy’ speakers. Clarke explained, “He plays a Marshall amp with all the treble up and all the bass down, and he also plays a Rickenbacker bass, so if you can imagine the sound that you would get from that, it’s kind of like a rhythm guitar more than a bass.” More colorfully, Taylor remarked, “Our sound is not exactly as clear as a lot of other bands because of the way Lemmy plays bass. He plays it like a rhythm guitar, and he also likes a very trebly sort of ‘clappy’…

The Stave: Most music written for the bass guitar uses the bass clef. The example to the right shows the placement of the notes on the stave. Tablature: This is a graphical representation of the music. Each horizontal line corresponds with a string on the bass guitar, with the lowest line representing the lowest pitched string (E). The numbers represent the frets to be played. Numbers stacked vertically indicate notes that are played together. Where basses with five or six strings are required, the tablature stave will have five or six lines as necessary. PLAYING TECHNIQUES SLAP AND POP TECHNIQUE Notes slapped with the thumb are marked with a ‘t’, notes popped with the fingers marked with a ‘p’. ADVANCED SLAP TECHNIQUE Fretting hand slaps are marked ‘lh’ and double…

Welcome! In our last lesson, we talked about recognizing our options on a given chord progression using the notes of the triad. We used the II-V-I chord progression to demonstrate this. In this month’s lesson, we will expand on that idea in a way that I think you’ll definitely find interesting. This expansion all has to do with our trusted friends, the modes. The point of this lesson is to understand how you can use the modes to play any diatonic chord progression, even an entire song, anywhere that you choose on the fretboard. The whole concept is based on a pretty straightforward idea. When you consider the fact that each mode is simply another version of the major scale, it stands to reason that the same triads and chords…