• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Dumb-Down playing?

John Wentzien

John Wentzien

Jun 25, 2007
4,531
135
63
Elberta, AL
www.tcelectronic.com
Disclosures
Artist:TC Electronic RH450 bass system (original test-pilot)
#1
Anyone feel like they have to "dumb-down" their playing to suite certain styles? Especially Blues. (wich I've played for over 30 years)
Seems like all of the "Blues-Nazis" have tried to keep it down instead of grow like it was when I started back in the early 70's.
Advance or die is what I think...:rollno:
 
#4
I think you should be able to express yourself even while playing the blues. Are you speaking of bassists having to keep it straight while the guitars get to do what they want? I read a post online that basically said "why should I provide the comfy couch and the Hustler magazine just so that you can have a wankfest?"
 
#5
Yeah that, and people just do not have any spirit, or imagination. I blame computer games. Which if you have not seen or been around people that are obsessed with them I assure you it ain't pretty. When I was young, we went outside and played, and read BOOKS. Now if you lose electricity, today's kids are SOL. No imagination no creativity, no improvising. If you can't google it or control it with a " controller", then it ain't important.
Look at guitar hero.
 
#6
What I'm really sayin' is that the blues really advanced when guys BROKE the rules.
Muddy "inveneted electricity"
Little Walter..
I could go on-and-on..
Now-days people that try to push it "beyond" like Jason Ricci or his hero Pat Ramsey (RIP) that is now less famose when he's dead than alive.... It is truley a shame...
 
#7
xgator4u said:
Yeah that, and people just do not have any spirit, or imagination. I blame computer games. Which if you have not seen or been around people that are obsessed with them I assure you it ain't pretty. When I was young, we went outside and played, and read BOOKS. Now if you lose electricity, today's kids are SOL. No imagination no creativity, no improvising. If you can't google it or control it with a " controller", then it ain't important.
Look at guitar hero.
Click to expand...

I think that has a lot to do with it!
I'll add American Idol to the trash-bin...
 
#8
If something doesn't grow ..it dies..
When the so called "Blues Societies" move on to the next flavor of the week
Blues will be laid -watse to the same thing the Jazz purists put on the jazz guys.
The old guys are dead.....let it grow or ROT...

What is all this "save the blues" if you can't let it grow.
You are killing it instead of saving it...
 
#9
xgator4u said:
Yeah that, and people just do not have any spirit, or imagination. I blame computer games. Which if you have not seen or been around people that are obsessed with them I assure you it ain't pretty. When I was young, we went outside and played, and read BOOKS. Now if you lose electricity, today's kids are SOL. No imagination no creativity, no improvising. If you can't google it or control it with a " controller", then it ain't important.
Look at guitar hero.
Click to expand...

Personally, I blame Thomas Edison and all those other inventors and made it possible to harness electrical energy. If it wasn't for those guys, we wouldn't have any of this useless crap we have now.
 
#11
There's rule breaking, along with tradition, and then there's being really tasteful and clever with a few notes that a flourish of notes could not do.

It all depends upon the situation. POP/Rock music by its very nature is boiled down to its most basic elements. It also has to play on any kind of sound system, big or modest and still come across with its simple message.

Even within those boundaries, we have decades of innovative tones & techniques playing relatively simple music.

Blues is a simple music as well, like a solar system. But it has been hashed out & dressed up and sent downtown and from there the exploration turned into a galaxy of directions.

What's so simple or dumbed down about it?
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back