It's truly amazing how those who have risen to the highest levels of their art have have weathered self doubts, ridiculous criticism from others, and yet somehow managed to make it all work. A good lesson for all of us.
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Carol Kaye tidbit
- Thread starter MEKer
- Start date
Great. Yes, for most of these pro players the instrument was just a tool. It either did the job or it didn't. When I first started playing for a living around 1962 I got a Fender because it was affordable and had the right bass sounds and it was what the pros used. But I and all the other guys I hung out with took our instruments for granted. If it didn't sound or play right you traded it in and got one that was made a bit better. We were much too busy playing music and having fun at it to really pay much attention to our instruments other than to keep them in working order. And being a working musician was very competitive even then so you were much more concerned about becoming a better player so you could get the better paying gigs. The thought that someday a Fender bass from that era would be a prized collectible never entered anyone's mind.
Quite so. With the double-bass, intonation is done by ear, it's up to the player, due to the instrument being fretless. As the bass guitar is actually an evolution of that instrument, it would make sense that players who were doing professional gigs during the bass guitar's 'infancy' as it were, would carry over many assumptions from the upright bass. I find that a lot of double-bass technique works quite well on the bass guitar, but that in many ways, they are still quite different instruments.
And yes, I agree about audiences. They might not know what specifically is making the band's sound suck, but they are usually aware of the fact when something is wrong.
They are like night and day to me. They both have four strings and are tuned the same but that's where the similarities end. The biggest challenge for me on upright is abandoning habits developed from decades of elctric bass playing that don't work for upright.
YMMV and back to the thread....
I asked Carol about this sevenyears. Here's her reply--
"you can run into any store, have the guys there pick out the bass for you, and get to the next date and have the 1-2 mins it takes to set it up (even for a shim in the neck) and play....
it would take me a lot longer to change new strings and quickly "age them with the gunk" breaking them in so they'd record good.....than the lunch-break drop-in at the store to get the new bass with pre-aged strings to begin with.."
Bear in mind that she's talking about back in the 60s and 70s before giant chain stores like Guitar Center. She dealt with a couple music stores in LA that catered to the many top pro session players and working musicians there. The guys who worked in those stores (often the owners) knew the instruments they were selling, unlike a lot of places now. They'd have them set up pretty well and they were on display and played a lot before they went out the door. Now I go into a store and some young guitar player who doesn't know the first thing about a bass tries to steer me to something that he thinks looks cool. "hey dude--you gotta try this. It's wicked". Then he picks it up, cranks the treble wide open and plays the one obligatory slap solo that he knows.
62bass
All very good points - thanks for the insight. And lol at the bold part!
Could be from all those years playing the old Fenders. Intonation was not their strong suite, and well neither was anything else
. She's also right about having had to beat on them to get any kind of sound out of them as my arms still ache today from having to do the same in the past on the old Fender junk.
But even better quality fretted basses that are well setup can be out of tune in certain spots on the neck, every fretted I've owned had one or two places where they were flat or sharp.
I finally switched to fretless in frustration some years ago which cured all that (er the frustration anyway, maybe not the intonation
). Now I at least have the opportunity to play in tune everywhere (even if I'm out of tune everywhere now ).Eliminating the frets also helps a bunch with the tone, gets rid of that flat, weak attack with all the buzzing and clanking and adds heft to the plucked note. All without additional effort banging on the thing.
I'm tempted to try one of her makeshift mutes tho to see how it sounds.... intriguing...
LS
And, thank you Bass62, for posting Carol's reply. Carol has typically, quickly replied to any and all questions. The one, of many things, that always seem to be glossed over in critiques of Carol is that one is comparing how things are now with the state of music, instruments, strings, etc. of the 1960's. That's over 40 years ago, folks. Things were very different then. Your account of how music stores were different is a great example.
LOL, I was only referring to her preceding comments. I do respect her for playing a better part if it fit the song, especially after doing it his way at first.
How and why did this thread turn into an 'Old Fenders are junk' one? They aren't. Most have no intonation issues, and can be set up to play very nicely indeed, at least in my experience. Plenty of very fine working pros still use them and have no issues with the tone and playability. Just a matter of finding a good one, which I agree they certainly all weren't.
There is also a bit of the old tarring Fender players as a bunch of stick in the mud modern-bass-haters, which is uncalled for and ridiculous. There are many reasons for playing a given instrument and it says nothing about someone other than it works for them.
Rant over.
See, while my fretless acoustic is fun, I actually like all the clanky sound that comes on my fretted.Could be from all those years playing the old Fenders. Intonation was not their strong suite, and well neither was anything else
She's also right about having had to beat on them to get any kind of sound out of them as my arms still ache today from having to do the same in the past on the old Fender junk.
But even better quality fretted basses that are well setup can be out of tune in certain spots on the neck, every fretted I've owned had one or two places where they were flat or sharp.
I finally switched to fretless in frustration some years ago which cured all that (er the frustration anyway, maybe not the intonation
Eliminating the frets also helps a bunch with the tone, gets rid of that flat, weak attack with all the buzzing and clanking and adds heft to the plucked note. All without additional effort banging on the thing.
I'm tempted to try one of her makeshift mutes tho to see how it sounds.... intriguing...
LS
I have nothing to add, didn't even know who the lady was until after I joined TB, but would like to say I've enjoyed reading this...a lot of substance here. It was a bit of a shock to find out that many of my old favorite bass parts were played by a girl...I feel like the guy in the commercial who drank Lipton tea all his life and then discovered the good stuff. Better late than never. Thanks again for a very interesting and informative read.
I don't know if this was aimed at me but for the record I don't think old Fenders are junk. IMO they get more reverence than they deserve, that's all.
I have no problem with anyone playing what works for them. That's why it annoys me when some Fender players think everyone should own one. Who are they to make that call?
I don't understand how you can take the time to drive to a music store, bargain with a rep, trade your bass, and drive back home..... But say you don't have time to change your strings. Sounds kind of loony. I guess she recorded 14 hours a day 7 days a week. Seriously, it takes ten to twenty minutes to change your strings. I don't get it.
Then why wouldn't you take care of the tool that makes you money? You can't be a bass player without a bass, you're not gonna go in and hum the tunes. So why take for granted the only thing that lets you do your job? The reasoning behind all this stuff just makes no sense to me. I don't have time to change my strings but I have half a day to go trade a bass. I don't 30 minutes to set up my bass but I have time to trade it in. It's not like you guys were playing complex instruments like there are today. I just don't get it. 
I was going to clean house this weekend, but I really don't have time...think I'll just move instead.
hype |hīp| informal
noun
extravagant or intensive publicity or promotion : she relied on hype and headlines to stoke up interest in her music.
a deception carried out for the sake of publicity.
Nobody outside of her circle of musicians ever knew what a Carol Kaye was until she came out with instruction books, which BTW, never ever mentioned this. First I heard of it was a few years ago. Why is that so unbelievable to think she had a regular music store by the studios she worked at where she could get a bass every year or two? If Carol Kaye needed a bass right away, she could get it.
Don't assume that the procedure for you to buy a bass today was the same procedure for her 50 years ago. And please tell me what is so complex about the basses today as opposed to 50 years ago. Extra knobs? A couple extra strings? Bah...the strings still go on the same wayThen why wouldn't you take care of the tool that makes you money? You can't be a bass player without a bass, you're not gonna go in and hum the tunes. So why take for granted the only thing that lets you do your job? The reasoning behind all this stuff just makes no sense to me. I don't have time to change my strings but I have half a day to go trade a bass. I don't 30 minutes to set up my bass but I have time to trade it in. It's not like you guys were playing complex instruments like there are today. I just don't get it.
The reason Carol didn't care is because she knew that the bass meant nothing and her playing meant everything. Therefore she treated them pretty much the same way she treats them now...as tools with zero sentimental attachment to any of them.
Believe it or not, the line " she relied on hype and headlines to stoke up interest in her music." was in the definition of Hype that I cut and pasted; it isn't my personal editorial on CK.
While I have no doubt that Carol could get a bass whenever she wanted, the story about her being too busy to change strings seems to come up in every recent interview or article related to her. See also; Hyperbole.
Don't assume that the procedure for you to buy a bass today was the same procedure for her 50 years ago. And please tell me what is so complex about the basses today as opposed to 50 years ago. Extra knobs? A couple extra strings? Bah...the strings still go on the same way
The reason Carol didn't care is because she knew that the bass meant nothing and her playing meant everything. Therefore she treated them pretty much the same way she treats them now...as tools with zero sentimental attachment to any of them.
Exactly right Jimmy. And Carol has said that many times before. It falls on deaf ears to those who are into the whole hype of vintage instruments and boutique instruments. It also upsets those who would rather just talk about playing music. She played music, 12 hours a day and 7 days a week. Days off were rare. Vacations were almost unheard of. There is no longer a recording scene like that going on anywhere in the world. There will probably never be another one like it.
Regarding fine old acoustic guitars like her Epiphone Emperor, she liked them a lot more because of their quality workmanship and their sound. Solid body instruments were different. A lot of musicians then felt the same way. Carol isn't the only one who referred to the electric bass as "a plank with strings".
Back then there was no vintage instrument market for solid body electrics. There was one though for very well made acoustic instruments. I remember looking though the AFofM magazine from New York and seeing old Strombergs (orchestral arch top guitars) going for $17,000 in 1963.
