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03-01-2008, 11:58 AM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: Nashville, TN | | | Bass Solo, Run Away!
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--------BASS SOLOS-------
Jazz band w/upright -- everybody stops but the piano player vamping lightly, the bassist goes way up the neck with a lot of badly intonated poopity poop poop formless twiddling, with optional grimacing & grunting. Bar chatter goes up.
Hybrid blues-rock w/Rickenbacker -- bassist going off on extended noodling (also in the high register and sounding like pop-pop poopity poopity poop, only much louder, maybe with EFX). Guitar player can't count to 12 and steps in to attempt drunken riff-based call & response pissing match. Drummer rises to the challenge. Organist goes to the bar.
Funk w/exotic wood plank -- Band drops out except for drums, bass solo sounds like small-screen version of Normandy Invasion, lots of chattering machine gun poppitypoppitypoppitypoppity SLAP. Not as prone to high register noodling though. Mid-neck assault and slightly back-bent posture, right hand/thumb to appear as a flailing blur. Don't attempt to look serene and spiritual doing this unless you are Vic Wooten. Can sound like angry chattering squirrels throwing nuts at a tin roof..... unless you are Vic Wooten.
Classic Blues w/ Fender P -- There are no bass solos. Don't. Exception: One real slow showpiece grinder at the end of the set...keep the sludgy bottom groove while the rest of the band backs way off so people can marvel at the thick pelvis pushing thump AND the absolute lack of definition in those 30-yr-old BBQ sauce & nicotine - crusted flatwounds. The audience loves to cheer for the quiet kid on the non-flashy instrument. Once.
Trad. Bluegrass w/ Kay upright (say "string bass" or "doghouse") -- only once per night, and the rest of the band just plays lightly the downbeat chords for each section, the bass player keeps playing the same 1-5 pattern finishing up with a slightly flashy and attention-getting three note ascending run back to one. Pentatonic minor is a hanging offense, eighth notes are edgy.
Country w/Peavey -- No solos. Ever. Bluegrass is the country version of jazz (chops-focused), if you want a solo go there. Roots are deep, keep them there. Fifths always work in country. Maybe if it's a loose night you can play a solo in "mama don't allow", but it better be the normal boogie-woogie arpeggio. Extended chords invite flying bottles. Keep it Dorian.
Nu-punk-grass -- hippie guys with fiddles and mandolins and kilts and dobros and dreadlocks and overalls with no shirts and the bass player is a young college symphony guy who met the banjo player at a party and they shared a hand-rolled cigarette and the most amazing tri-tone arco ragas entered the cosmic flow, maaaaaan.......
Coffee-house w/fretless boutique bass -- Sensitive Singer-Songwriter takes break from introspective lyrical navel-gazing and gives bassist an entire spaciously empty verse in a landscape of pastel wanderey DADGAD-tuned acoustic guitar. Bassist - rip thru some pseudo Jaco Manring cliches - furious Phyrgian fretless smeary honks, growls and noodles, sliding chords with pointlessly overdone clusters of harmonics. Sounds like angry cows in a rainstorm. |
03-01-2008, 12:01 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Bronx, NY | | | Heh
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...?!
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03-01-2008, 12:12 PM
|  | I Know Nothing | | Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Columbia River Gorge, WA. | | Quote:
Originally Posted by Bobby King  Sounds like angry cows in a rainstorm. | Ahhh...so nice!  |
03-01-2008, 12:17 PM
|  | passionate hack | | Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Malone, NY/ Montreal, Quebec | | | Great read. I love cartoons in prose!
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a few of my heros: David Suzuki, Jean Beliveau, Galileo, Richard Dawkins, Louis Pasteur, Niels-Henning O-P
Crappy Bassist with Expensive Gear Club member 156
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03-01-2008, 12:30 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Los Angeles | | | Brilliant. |
03-01-2008, 09:22 PM
|  | is, against all odds, still a scuba viking. | | Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Alta Loma, California | | | dude... amazing!!!
I've actually heard instances of each of those that really does sound like the above description.
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Originally Posted by Dr. Cheese It is never the duty of the oppressed to make a bigot feel comfortable. | |
03-01-2008, 09:32 PM
|  | that video LIES | | Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Northern California | | | For better or for worse:
Needs to be stickied.
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Originally Posted by Fat Albert He who throws mud only loses ground. | |
03-02-2008, 08:24 AM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Ardmore, PA | | | Metal: Wah pedal and fuzz with the gain turned all the way up, psuedo-classical arpeggios played sloppily? |
03-02-2008, 08:47 AM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: London, England | | Quote:
Originally Posted by bassteban Needs to be stickied. |
+ enough so that this can get noticed and actually happen
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Talking about music is like dancing about architecture
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03-02-2008, 11:13 AM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: san francisco | | | haha, angry cows in a rainstorm- I can only WISH my bass soloes sounded as awesome as that description |
03-02-2008, 04:05 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Bay Area, CA | | | Genius! Haha, that really is brilliant. Thanks. |
03-03-2008, 02:22 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: Nashville, TN | | Quote:
Originally Posted by Anti-Product Metal: Wah pedal and fuzz with the gain turned all the way up, psuedo-classical arpeggios played sloppily? | What kind of bass?  |
03-03-2008, 03:00 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Norway | | Quote:
Originally Posted by Anti-Product Metal: Wah pedal and fuzz with the gain turned all the way up, psuedo-classical arpeggios played sloppily? | Stupid comment about Cliff, who was no doubt a more accomplished and far more original bassplayer than you will ever be. |
03-03-2008, 03:07 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Houston, Texas | | Quote:
Originally Posted by Bobby King ...bass solo sounds like small-screen version of Normandy Invasion, lots of chattering machine gun poppitypoppitypoppitypoppity SLAP. | That's a classic right there! 
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Originally Posted by Interceptor ...you're dealing with biases in perception based on data that's not grounded in research. That happens all the time. How do you think politicians work? | |
03-03-2008, 03:09 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Houston, Texas | | Quote:
Originally Posted by XtreO Stupid comment about Cliff, who was no doubt a more accomplished and far more original bassplayer than you will ever be. | Wha...??? 
__________________ Quote:
Originally Posted by Interceptor ...you're dealing with biases in perception based on data that's not grounded in research. That happens all the time. How do you think politicians work? | |
03-03-2008, 03:57 PM
| | | | I'm trying to count up how many of those entries I've been guilty of in my life. Or lacked the chops to even aspire to.
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Birdsong Club #2
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03-03-2008, 04:36 PM
|  | User | | Join Date: May 2007 Location: East Coast | | | Bobby King,
This is a great list. I printed it out and brought it to work and all the musicians and guys in the audio dept were roaring.
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Jim B - If you don't know which note to play, play them all.
LOG Roller, Fender Fan, a MusicMan, Rickenbacker-backer, Gib-son, Hay-man. http://www.jimmyleejames.com/ |
03-03-2008, 07:58 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Ardmore, PA | | Quote:
Originally Posted by XtreO Stupid comment about Cliff, who was no doubt a more accomplished and far more original bassplayer than you will ever be. | Hahaha..you missed the point. Did you read the rest? I don't actually think that, I'm just making a stereotype..never mind. I guess it would have to be with his Ric (is that what he used to record that album?) |
03-03-2008, 08:36 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: 97465 | | | har!
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"I play the damn things - I don't worship them" -- Pete Townshend
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03-03-2008, 09:42 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: Nashville, TN | | Quote:
Originally Posted by JimB52 Bobby King,
This is a great list. I printed it out and brought it to work and all the musicians and guys in the audio dept were roaring. | I can't take credit for writing that, it came to me in an email from a friend (drummer  ). I'm just sharing the love. | | Thread Tools | Search this Thread | | | | 
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