Ambient/Post-Rock/Textural bass playing thread

[steubig]

It's funny, I buried myself in Headhunters and Thrust so deeply that it took me a couple decades to dig myself out of that hole, look around, and wonder "huh, I wonder what Herbie's band just before this was doing?" Seriously, I got turned on to those first Herbie+Paul Jackson et al albums my freshman year in college -- 1978 -- and didn't even listen to Sextant until 2004!

I've since made up for lost time, and those MWandishi-era albums are now some of the favorites in my entire collection.

i found out about them when i was about 16 or so. growing up in cali in the early 70s meant that certain recreational activities went along with listening to music. i swear we saw a ufo one night listening to "sextant."


do you and @ugly_bassplayer know about the offshoot albums like julian priester's "love, love," bennie maupin's "jewel in the lotus," buster william's "pinnacle," and eddie henderson's "realization" and "inside out"? a lot of the same basic concepts and many of the same players.

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

i found out about them when i was about 16 or so. growing up in cali in the early 70s meant that certain recreational activities went along with listening to music. i swear we saw a ufo one night listening to "sextant."


do you and @ugly_bassplayer know about the offshoot albums like julian priester's "love, love," bennie maupin's "jewel in the lotus," buster william's "pinnacle," and eddie henderson's "realization" and "inside out"? a lot of the same basic concepts and many of the same players.

Jewel in the lotus is dope!!!!!
If I remember correctly....buster is on that one!!!!....forget who's on drums...???
(Pun intended)

 

[Bob_Ross]

do you and @ugly_bassplayer know about the offshoot albums like julian priester's "love, love," bennie maupin's "jewel in the lotus," buster william's "pinnacle," and eddie henderson's "realization" and "inside out"? a lot of the same basic concepts and many of the same players.

Oh chit... I sense a rabbit hole coming up in 3, 2, 1...

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

Oh chit... I sense a rabbit hole coming up in 3, 2, 1...

Oh yes!!!
Down you go!!!!

 

[lordradish]

. But I don't enjoy that album nearly as much as the Johnny McLaughlin, Electric Guitarist album that preceded it in JM's discography; that is one of my desert island discs. Stellar performances all around, with a revolving cast of musicians that includes bassists Fernando Saunders, Neil Jason, Alphonso Johnson, Stanley Clarke, and Jack Bruce.

Okay, I completely forgot about this album, and I loved it just as much as OTB. In fact, I'm gonna go listen to it, right now.

 

[lordradish]

paul jackson is criminally underrated.

Absofrickin'lutely.

I have an embarrassing Paul Jackson story. Back in '05, my band was on the roster with the Headhunters at a festival. So, the guy's my idol, and what do I do? Well, there was a couple more bands on between us and them, so I ended up having a few more beers than I should have. Hanging out backstage, finally went to talk to Jackson, and yup, drunk guy doing the OMFG YOU'RE MY IDOL BLAH BLAH BLAH. Missed opportunity, one of the few chances to meet one of the greats that's influenced me, possibly have a conversation, and yeah, drunk fanboy. I might as well have yelled FREEEBIRD. What really sucks is I could have gone back to the camp where he and the band were staying and hung out and partied with them all night, but I was too embarrassed.

He is something to watch, I can't recall too many people I've seen that are so obviously expressing pure joy while playing... smiling, laughing out loud, all of it. Wonderful dude.

 

[lordradish]

In other news, got the Iridium, last night. Wow, just wow, although, man, did I do something stupid...

Okay, so my guy from my duo's coming over tomorrow for another all-day jam/recording session, so all I want to do is get some banks of presets together. Of course, I have to learn the navigation, which isn't too hard. So, I'm going through the presets, some aren't playing, others sound really thin and crappy. I'm thinking, ***, this sounded so much better in the demos. 2.5k for this? Maybe I'm just tired. Maybe there's a bug.

Maybe I played along with it for a half hour before I realized my mod wheel was all the way in the up position.

But once I got past that, ohhhh yeah. Now that I got some banks together, I just sat down and started looking at what makes up the patches, and such. I think I'm gonna end up being a much better sound designer because of the way this is laid out with the visual interface. Very intuitive. Although, I am having a hard time getting my head around the resonator oscillator, as well as the kernels oscillator, which is this strange thing that's kind of like FM synthesis but more, where you can have up to 6 kernels going on each of the three oscillators. But I'll get there.

I hate to find the gold coin in the pile of turds, but this pandemic is at least giving me a lot of time to both play and to also learn all of my instruments better. I've made a lot of progress with the TR-8S and the Wavestate in the last few months.

 

[cosmicevan]

Maybe I played along with it for a half hour before I realized my mod wheel was all the way in the up position.

Hahahaha, totally been there. I've also had a pedal on that I didn't realize was on. The other day I was having such weird sounds with my Stamme[n] and I couldn't understand what was wrong with my rig...I even powered it down and up again. Turned out the Tensor was on...it had a subtle setting w some random in there that was creating this weird chorusing like glitch that made no sense with what I was playing with.

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

Absofrickin'lutely.

I have an embarrassing Paul Jackson story. Back in '05, my band was on the roster with the Headhunters at a festival. So, the guy's my idol, and what do I do? Well, there was a couple more bands on between us and them, so I ended up having a few more beers than I should have. Hanging out backstage, finally went to talk to Jackson, and yup, drunk guy doing the OMFG YOU'RE MY IDOL BLAH BLAH BLAH. Missed opportunity, one of the few chances to meet one of the greats that's influenced me, possibly have a conversation, and yeah, drunk fanboy. I might as well have yelled FREEEBIRD. What really sucks is I could have gone back to the camp where he and the band were staying and hung out and partied with them all night, but I was too embarrassed.

He is something to watch, I can't recall too many people I've seen that are so obviously expressing pure joy while playing... smiling, laughing out loud, all of it. Wonderful dude.

Ouch.
Mark that one up in the ishhh happens column.

At least you got the chance to see the baddest mofo do his thang.

 

[hieronymous]

I have a Paul Jackson story - I went to the same international school as his son in Tokyo in the '80s - his son was probably 3-4 years below me. Never talked to his son, but for some reason I got the bright idea to call their house! The school had a directory so I called, talked to his wife a little bit - she said he was in the studio and couldn't talk. Oh well, I tried lol - pretty rude and I think I realized that afterwards. I don't even know what I would have said to him - kind of glad he wasn't available!

 

[Spectrum]

Y'all are some stalkers up in this thread! lol

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

Y'all are some stalkers up in this thread! lol

No one ever stalked me.

 

[Spectrum]

So this was uploaded a few days ago. As you may know, Tangerine Dream still exists, though since the passing of Edgar Froese there are now no original members left. Also, after their peak Berlin School phase in the mid 70s they've put out tons of material, much of it pretty cheesy with a few decent movie soundtrack pieces here and there. But this to me sounds like a return to their roots, just really nice. The violin, pads, and sequencing makes me happy. According to the video description:

Against The Clock is a series where we give an artist 10 minutes in the studio and see what they come up with.

Tangerine Dream is one of the most enduring electronic acts of the 20th century. Formed by Edgar Froese in 1967, the act went through multiple iterations but came to define a generation of ambient and new age music whose influence can still be heard on film scores and synth albums today. Although Froese died in 2015, the band still performs under the stewardship of Thorsten Quaeschning, who joined the band under Froese in 2003.

On this episode of Against The Clock, Quaeschning is joined by Hoshiko Yamane and Ulrich Schnauss, who combine synth, violin and guitar to make a track in 10 minutes.

Tangerine Dream’s latest album, Recurring Dreams – a collection of new versions of classic Tangerine Dream tracks – is available now. Filmed by Frank Zerban

The lady with the violin has been in the band for at least a decade or more; I remember her at the front of the stage with Froese when I saw them in Philadelphia back in 2012.

 

[hieronymous]

Y'all are some stalkers up in this thread! lol

My interpersonal skills aren't always that great...

So this was uploaded a few days ago. As you may know, Tangerine Dream still exists, though since the passing of Edgar Froese there are now no original members left. Also, after their peak Berlin School phase in the mid 70s they've put out tons of material, much of it pretty cheesy with a few decent movie soundtrack pieces here and there. But this to me sounds like a return to their roots, just really nice. The violin, pads, and sequencing makes me happy. According to the video description:

The lady with the violin has been in the band for at least a decade or more; I remember her at the front of the stage with Froese when I saw them in Philadelphia back in 2012.

This is awesome! I continue to be a fan of Tangerine Dream, I really like the stuff they have been doing. I even got into the stuff from the 2000s which can admittedly be "cheesy" - sometimes seeming to go for that opera-scale bombast, usually at the expense of improvisation? But Quantum Gate is really amazing IMHO, and their live performances are cool - reworkings of classics, with long improvised encores, some documented in the Sessions series. I believe Edgar Froese himself set them on this course, called the Quantum Years - I finally found a little bit written about it, though I would love to hear him talk about it himself:

Throughout the band’s extensive career, the music of Tangerine Dream has undergone many different phases. During his last years, it was the world of quantum physics that captivated Froese. According to Froese-Acquaye, it was his dream to interpret the science of quantum physics through music.

“The current scientific knowledge of quantum physics is spectacular. If you trigger one quantum here, another quantum can be triggered one hundred thousand light years away. So there is a connection between the two quanta. In the fifties, Einstein already knew that quantum physics was some kind of magic. And now scientists have proved that it is! Edgar was so fascinated when he heard this that he thought, ‘I have to compose music out of this.’” And that’s how Tangerine Dream’s latest period began, the so-called Quantum Years, which started in 2014.

 

[steubig]

But once I got past that, ohhhh yeah. Now that I got some banks together, I just sat down and started looking at what makes up the patches, and such. I think I'm gonna end up being a much better sound designer because of the way this is laid out with the visual interface. Very intuitive. Although, I am having a hard time getting my head around the resonator oscillator, as well as the kernels oscillator, which is this strange thing that's kind of like FM synthesis but more, where you can have up to 6 kernels going on each of the three oscillators. But I'll get there.

that's great to hear. someday . . . right now little money and a couple of projects that i seem to think take precedence (and still learning more every day about hydra . . . )

i really admire the developer of the iridium. i think he'll keep making it better.

I hate to find the gold coin in the pile of turds, but this pandemic is at least giving me a lot of time to both play and to also learn all of my instruments better. I've made a lot of progress with the TR-8S and the Wavestate in the last few months.

adapt or die.

making good use of time in a bad situation is good if you're able to do it (i could myself very fortunate to have been able to do so; not everyone has been able to).

i've gotten a lot done. not going to shows really frees up your time (same with not playing them, which does kind of suck).

 

[steubig]

knowingly laughing at the tales of things being on when you're trying to figure out what's wrong (had that happen way too much; including the mod wheel issue, ugh).

reminds me of a band rehearsal.

guitar player takes a long time to set up. pedals, rack, nice amp. picks up the guitar. strums. no sound. fiddles with the volume control.

him: "my $hit's broken"

me: "plug in the guitar"

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

knowingly laughing at the tales of things being on when you're trying to figure out what's wrong (had that happen way too much; including the mod wheel issue, ugh).

reminds me of a band rehearsal.

guitar player takes a long time to set up. pedals, rack, nice amp. picks up the guitar. strums. no sound. fiddles with the volume control.

him: "my $hit's broken"

me: "plug in the guitar"

Same....
My old band......2 guitars.......
Huge pedalboards, rack mounts the whole 9 yards. Each dude had a MINIMUM of 10-12 pedals.....(punches wall at all the time lost watching those 2 nimrods pluggin in and trouble shooting a bad patch cable.)
Dang, nothing works.

« Hey bro, turn on your amp »

 

[steubig]

i called it "guitar player's disease)

 

[ugly_bassplayer]

i called it "guitar player's disease)

Yeah....for them I would put that at level 11. Spinal Tap level 11.

One of the dudes had his crap in a shock mount rack. HUGE freakin midi controlled beast of overly complex crap.
We load out one gig, the pavement was kinda cracked and bumpy.
Dude says « Nah...dont roll it on that pavement.....LIFT IT UP!!!!!!.....it’s going to be bad for the pedals solder points!!!! Looking at me like I was an idiot. »
Me: « go efff yourself»

leaves him alone to carry the 200lbs piece of garbage.
We litterally had to have a band meeting for him I to quit using the thing........he almost cried.....and I’m not kidding. Grown man, watery eyes for pedals....talk about princess attitude and 1st world problems.
(Punches another wall)

Then there’s the whole bass compressor story,....... dang I was an idiot for staying with them for so long.....

 

[steubig]

btw for the mwandishi fans, you might also like barre philips' mountainscapes from roughly the same era. i think ecm has blocked it on youtube; maybe you can find elsewhere.

great bass playing; free jazz trio, with droney analog synths.

edit: only thing i could find on yt.

guy talking first tune has abercrombie; second gets into the synth bit: