How about some love for Ken Wild? (Seawind)

[burk48237]

Since Seawind just released it's reunion CD I thought we might give a listen to one of the unsung Bass masters of the 70's. While Pauline Wilson went on to wind a grammy doing a duet with George Benson, and their horn section ended up doing almost all the big horn dates in the 80's including Michael Jackson and Al Jareau. Their isn't much talk about Ken Wild the man who held down the low end for these guys. I forgot how good he made those J basses sound. But back in the 70's the man could rip. Here's a few samples:

Wings of Love with a frettless killer solo at about the 2:00 mark

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy-zN...eature=related

He could lay down the funk too:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWJHgYpZ_S4

Finally a ballad with a great buildup:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jgf2k...eature=related

Here's some Biography info, evidently he's still teaching, producing and doing some playing in LA

http://home.att.net/~dawild/kwbio.htm

And here's the info on the new "Reunion" CD

http://www.seawindjazz.com/

[jerry]

I was always a big fan of Seawind and Ken's playing, I also dug his work on the early Roland Vasquez albums.

[Dennis Kong]

I used to study with him in the 80's in LA from SFO.
The jet fares were cheap and there was no TSA waiting lines!

He was into listening to bassists with 5 & 6 strings back then before it became the "norm" today.

Ken was a very good teacher and always encouraged me to transcribe tunes to improve my reading abilities.

The Jazz bass in the photo used to belong me. He bought it after I returned to the shop in Hawaii in the late 70's. It was
rumoured to belong the Chuck Rainey. Many years later I asked Chuck about it and he never owned Jazz bass in the 70's.

The Seawind used be called Red Ox ??? (I think ) in Hawaii at one time and were not that popular in Waikiki clubs in the 70's because they were playing too much jazz. I remember seeing & talking the them and was amazed how great they were but they could not get many gigs so they moved to LA.

And the rest is history after that..

[burk48237]

Originally Posted by Dennis Kong

I used to study with him in the 80's in LA from SFO.
The jet fares were cheap and there was no TSA waiting lines!

He was into listening to bassists with 5 & 6 strings back then before it became the "norm" today.

Ken was a very good teacher and always encouraged me to transcribe tunes to improve my reading abilities.

The Jazz bass in the photo used to belong me. He bought it after I returned to the shop in Hawaii in the late 70's. It was
rumoured to belong the Chuck Rainey. Many years later I asked Chuck about it and he never owned Jazz bass in the 70's.

The Seawind used be called Red Ox ??? (I think ) in Hawaii at one time and were not that popular in Waikiki clubs in the 70's because they were playing too much jazz. I remember seeing & talking the them and was amazed how great they were but they could not get many gigs so they moved to LA.

And the rest is history after that..

Dennis, When you consider they had both Quincy Jones and George Duke producing them it's amazing they weren't bigger. They were kinda "tweeners" a little to jazzy for the Dance-Funk Genre, a little to much like dance music for the jazz stations. But man they sure could play.

There's a live video on You-tube with Ken playing a BC Rich bass. What was he using for a Frettless? Fender wasn't making a production frettless jazz at the time. You had to go custom. Some of his frettless solo's are reminiscent of Ralphe Armstrong's work with Jean Luc Ponty. While he may not have been Jaco (no one was) he was certainly in the same class with a lot of the other players that got famous at that time.

[KJung]

Originally Posted by jerry

I was always a big fan of Seawind and Ken's playing, I also dug his work on the early Roland Vasquez albums.

I barely remember these guys from back in the day. I'm pretty sure I covered some of their tunes on club gigs during the 'smooth jazz scare' of the early 80's.

Interesting on Roland Vasquez. I saw him a couple years ago in Ann Arbor with Anthony Jackson on bass, and it was killer. I'll have to dig up some of his stuff with this bass player also.

I saw that Amazon has the reunion CD as an import, which means the lower priced US version should show up in a few weeks (hopefully). I'll pick it up!

Thanks for the heads up Burk!

[JimK]

Originally Posted by burk48237

What was he using for a Frettless? Fender wasn't making a production frettless jazz at the time. You had to go custom. Some of his frettless solo's are reminiscent of Ralphe Armstrong's work with Jean Luc Ponty.

Interesting that you mentioned Ralphe Armstrong...at that time, he played a Fender Jazz w/ a fretless P-neck ("custom"?).
I assume Wild did the same?
(...and some added a Jazz bridge PUP on their fretless P-basses: Mark Egan, Randy Tico, etc).

...anyway, thanks, too for the memories.
I always liked the Seawind horn section...pretty sure I have 2 Seawind LPs stashed at my mom's.

[Dennis Kong]

At that time-I think he was using Fender Jazz - maybe the
one I used to own.
He converted it a fretless.. if I remember. (over 20 years ago.)
and I think he was using Walter Woods amps in those days.

He was telling me Roland V 's stuff was really hard to play! FYI.

One of his favorite fretless solos was Marcus' one on a Dave Grusin album
Ronnie Law's tune "Friends & Strangers."
We used to listen that one a lot at his apartment.
Keep in mind this is before Marcus really hit the big time- early 80's ?


On production- someone mentioned-
too jazzy for disco 'ers && too disco for the jazzers.

You can "credit" Creed Taylor for that one..it was not their decision.

They were not too happy either with the sound or mixes either.