Are there still great session bassist out there?

Does Pino Palladino somehow not count?

 

Abraham Laboriel
Nathan East
Stanley
Victor
….there's plenty more

 

Do you mean “young-up-and-coming” players?
I think the whole “superstar session muso” thing is over, really. Those old cats mainly rely on touring or writing for income now.
Most sessions now happen in people’s bedrooms/home studios. Yes, even “proper” stuff. I’ve done a few over the last 20 years, especially for shows.
Just my experience.

Here’s John Pierce (he’s one of the great-barely-knowns) in action about 10 years back. From 3.50...

 

Michael Rhodes is a monster session cat. Thundercat.

 

Sean Hurley, Michael Rhodes, Ian Allison are a few that come to mind when I think of modern session players...

 

Tim Lefebvre

 

Yeah um....

First off, Sklar ain't dead.

Pino

Michael Rhodes

Nathan East

Tim (last name is French and I can't spell it.)

 

Sharay Reed

 

And one of the reasons we don't see too many new, up&coming names on the Who Are The First-Call Triple-Scale Session Bassists? list is because the guys who were on that list 30+ years ago are still on the list! Leland Sklar, Tony Levin, Nathan East, Jimmy Johnson, Will Lee, Michael Rhodes, Neil Stubenhaus... Those guys are still getting the calls when the producer or MD needs to know the job will get done professionally. (Will Lee tells a funny story about trying to break into the studio scene in the early 1970s and discovering that "Lee Sklar and Tony Levin already had every gig sewn up!")

 

they are the college taught players.

the industry has changed. but the players are out there, some could argue the standard of playing has gone way up.

if you have a need for a bass player, lets say to play on a funk/R&B tune. lets say you only have $100. you know a handful of pro players in your area, but no bass players. you put the word out, you will get responses from so many people it's shocking. I don't think if you were offering the 1970 equivalent of $100 for the same job back then you would have found the same number of highly trained, capable, straight-up-awesome musicians.

 

This.

 

The cats who've been doing it the last 30-40 years are still doing it. The younger guys/gals aren't recording for major artists. Mostly their own projects. Nashville, NYC and LA are still the recording meccas.

 

Nashville is full of seasoned professional studio bass players, has been for decades

 

James Genus

 

I sure hope Anthony Jackson is still doing it. Although he has probably already run out of stellar cats to play with

 

So, the answer is....yes.

 

JMJ?

 

I wonder how many recording is done with session player to back a solo singer.

What I don't like about those is, it could've been anyone and it wouldn't matter. I prefer a band doing it together instead of paying whomever is avalaible as long as there is a bass line.

When I hear poopie like Gucci Gang I think it was made with computer than like Sklar.