I got to hang out with Baron Browne a little bit in Beijing when Vital Information toured. I was taking the band around town and to and from the gig. Their soundcheck was fraught with hours of technical difficulties, all of which had been solved by the time Baron came out from the dressing room and plugged his bass in, oblivious to the craziness involved in getting Frank Gambale and Tom Coster's US voltage rigs to work. He was a very laid back guy, kept to himself most of the time except when Christian McBride was around (playing the same festival with Dianne Reeves). I got to meet Baron and McBride while they were having breakfast and was then tasked with getting McBride's enormously heavy upright roadcase onto the bus to the gig - no easy task when directing a bunch of Chinese "roadies" with no spatial awareness. McBride shows up to the gig, bass in gigbag - we'd spent 20 minutes trying to get the EMPTY case onto the bus. I remember Baron's bass was a Groove Tools - can't remember the brand but the model name stuck with me. Both guys played great, my first experience seeing real world class players up close.
