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Do "Pro-Bassists" Ever Mess Up?

#141
BassByBaldSteve said:
Yup. What sidemen were making in the year 2000 vs. what they make now? It's comedy. Check this out: There was a gig I missed out on in 2002 that paid, no joke, $5000/week. Only audition I ever had where I played spotless. Bro, I knew I had it, and so did the band. It was a home run, obvious to everyone in the room. About a week later the contractor calls. I think I'm about to sign contracts, but instead I'm told the original bassist had a change of heart and decided to take the gig back. Not surprising, given this band was about to do a tour of Japan and southeast Asia opening for Kravitz. But that money? Long gone. Heck, half the backing bands, at least in LA for new artists, nowadays come straight out of MI - kids with no experience that they can pay peanuts (EDIT: Should add that I'm not dissing the players - they're obviously all on-point or they wouldn't get hired). It is VERY hard out there now.

But, yeah - that incident I mentioned made my blood boil, too. I was like, "You make like $100,000 a week, literally, and you want to get a guy fired who is making $500 because he's just trying to be nice? You're a legit evil human being"

Yeah...I live in NC now and am very happy to not be a part of that whole thing.
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I hear you. There's something very wrong with people who do things like that.

The best story I ever heard about musician pay was Nathan East talking about touring with Barry White in like 73. He hired a bunch of kids out of North Texas State, called them the "Love Unlimited Orchestra," and paid them $250 a week! $250 wasn't even much by 70's standards, let alone 1973. But he thought he was happy...I guess that's what counts :D
 
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#142
BassByBaldSteve said:
A guy I know who does Pro-Tools / sequencing management for touring acts during road prep, like resetting, editing, and starting/stopping all the stems and whatnot during rehearsals. He'd always say how on gigs where RM was the MD, he rarely saw the same exact bands twice from week to week. Someone was always getting switched out. He saw dudes get fired constantly. One guy said "hi" to a pop artist (won't say who publicly) he was working for one time before they started playing and got fired for it (at the artist's request - it was despicable) right then and there. My bud heard the speech RM had to give the band afterwards, about how "You aren't here to be the artist's friend. He already has friends. You're here to make them sound and look good" and etc, etc, etc - stuff like that. Tough scene right now. So many of these pop stars are absolute monsters.
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jerry said:
Some artists make the musicians and other road crew sign (no eye contact) contracts.
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It makes me think back to the justin Timberlake concert video I watched on Netflix last week, the footage shown makes him seem like a genuinely good guy to work with /for. I don't know what he pays, etc, but they all seemed happy.

Some of the people I play with regularly in my wedding band have worked with him when they played with Alicia Keys and they said he was a humble, talented, and all around nice guy.

The only gig I've ever done with someone established was backing a motown singer for a one nighter subbing for a friend. This person pretty much uses pickup bands in every town. In any event, I had heard horror stories about the way this artist treated players, but the person was very nice to me. The artist clearly knew what they wanted to hear and wasnt shy about letting anyone know what was needed, but im cool with that. In fact, I felt good when I was told by the road manager that not getting yelled at as a bassist was an accomplishment and showed that I knew how to play behind a singer - I thought that was a cool statement, and can thank the few years I backed the high school show choir 20 something years ago...I knew that would pay off at some point ;-). In fact, considering this person said onstage that James Jamerson taught this singer and siblings how to sing harmony when they would all hang out at his house, I'll really take it as a compliment that I fit the music. Of course, I did screw up the first note of the show due to waiting for a cue that never came, but I guess I either covered it well or it was too late to fire me because it already started...(Now you know the artist was not buddy rich - ha!)

Anyway, I'm happy playing weddings and such and being a social worker during the week, plus I am allowed to look our singers in the eye and even greet them, so it's all good!
 
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#143
Here is a simple mistake on the RECORDED in the STUDIO composition.
The "Superbulous" bass player plays E instead of F natural.
JBmistake.PNG

Here is a sound bite of that tutti (the 3rd/last one) at a very slow tempo.
The mistake is at around 0:15
https://www.talkbass.com/attachment...0/?temp_hash=5db7afbefc8b7823cf4419453109698d

Here is a sound bite only of that mistake at a very slow tempo.
https://www.talkbass.com/attachment...0/?temp_hash=5db7afbefc8b7823cf4419453109698d

And here is the name of that composition - Bruford - Joe Frazier.
Music by Jeff Berlin Guitar John Clark Bass Jeff Berlin Keyboard Dave Stewart Drums Bill Bruford.


Somebody mentioned Justin Timberlake. A few months ago, I tried to transcribe that simple bass-line.
Here is JUSTIN TIMBERLIKE with - 'CAN'T STOP THE FEELING' - EUROVISION 2016 LIVE.
At around 3:13, a superb bass player plays Db instead of D, and nothing.
Here is that sound clip at a very slow tempo and one octave higher.
https://www.talkbass.com/attachment...4/?temp_hash=5db7afbefc8b7823cf4419453109698d


Here is that video:
 

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#149
Although you specifically asked about bassists messing up at their job, all humans and musicians do.

Physical cover-ups are varied for each instrument, however the reactionary audio can be universal to all instruments.

Here is a clip from my favorite "soloist" drummer, with a reaction not so far off from what I could have done on the right night:

 
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#150
On big gigs like that it is rare, but it does happen (I'll include a couple of examples below).

There are a LOT of production rehearsals that go into those performances, as well as individual practice. The players on those gigs are usually hired guns out here in Los Angeles (which I am one of) and we rely on these gigs as our primary source of income, so we're always on top of it.

If there is a mistake, it can sometimes be because the players can't hear well on stage, although that is very rare these days because we're all on In-Ear monitors and every artist has their own monitor engineer who tours with them and has worked with each musician in the band individually during rehearsals to know what exactly each player needs to hear on their in-ear mix.

Here are couple of examples of mistakes in higher caliber gigs:

At around 1:30 when it goes into the chorus:

The bassist is out of tune the whole time:

I'm sure there are more examples out there, but those are just two that I remember right now off the top of my head.
 
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#151
And that last one is what we refer to as a "clambake" … holy mother of what the frick was goin' on there????!
TheBassWizard1 said:
On big gigs like that it is rare, but it does happen (I'll include a couple of examples below).

There are a LOT of production rehearsals that go into those performances, as well as individual practice. The players on those gigs are usually hired guns out here in Los Angeles (which I am one of) and we rely on these gigs as our primary source of income, so we're always on top of it.

If there is a mistake, it can sometimes be because the players can't hear well on stage, although that is very rare these days because we're all on In-Ear monitors and every artist has their own monitor engineer who tours with them and has worked with each musician in the band individually during rehearsals to know what exactly each player needs to hear on their in-ear mix.

Here are couple of examples of mistakes in higher caliber gigs:

At around 1:30 when it goes into the chorus:

The bassist is out of tune the whole time:

I'm sure there are more examples out there, but those are just two that I remember right now off the top of my head.
Click to expand...
 
#154
TheBassWizard1 said:
On big gigs like that it is rare, but it does happen (I'll include a couple of examples below).

There are a LOT of production rehearsals that go into those performances, as well as individual practice. The players on those gigs are usually hired guns out here in Los Angeles (which I am one of) and we rely on these gigs as our primary source of income, so we're always on top of it.

If there is a mistake, it can sometimes be because the players can't hear well on stage, although that is very rare these days because we're all on In-Ear monitors and every artist has their own monitor engineer who tours with them and has worked with each musician in the band individually during rehearsals to know what exactly each player needs to hear on their in-ear mix.

Here are couple of examples of mistakes in higher caliber gigs:

At around 1:30 when it goes into the chorus:

The bassist is out of tune the whole time:

I'm sure there are more examples out there, but those are just two that I remember right now off the top of my head.
Click to expand...

God... that's not a a good look for us female bass players :meh::banghead:



The only good musician in that band is the drummer... dang
 
#156
TheBassWizard1 said:
On big gigs like that it is rare, but it does happen (I'll include a couple of examples below).

There are a LOT of production rehearsals that go into those performances, as well as individual practice. The players on those gigs are usually hired guns out here in Los Angeles (which I am one of) and we rely on these gigs as our primary source of income, so we're always on top of it.

If there is a mistake, it can sometimes be because the players can't hear well on stage, although that is very rare these days because we're all on In-Ear monitors and every artist has their own monitor engineer who tours with them and has worked with each musician in the band individually during rehearsals to know what exactly each player needs to hear on their in-ear mix.

Here are couple of examples of mistakes in higher caliber gigs:

At around 1:30 when it goes into the chorus:

The bassist is out of tune the whole time:

I'm sure there are more examples out there, but those are just two that I remember right now off the top of my head.
Click to expand...


That last clip is just awful. You can hear Cee Lo say it sounds terrible after the first song. Then halfway through the second you can hear foh pretty much kill the bass in the mix. The curious thing is you can see her tuning her bass in between songs. Maybe there was an issue with one of the tuners?
 
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#158
Of course they do. but in "most" cases you as a listener wont notice it. It may not be what they intended to play but it still works. I've never seen a complete" fail" by a pro that I know of. I think thats the level of "mess ups" most pro's operate on.
 

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