If they were here today?

[Ian Perge]

Great usage of Entwistle in this thread

...was that sarcasm? I don't know if im misreading your comment.

Not at all (I like to think I've pretty good with both Smilies and my general language choices in terms of displaying sarcasm and emotion. ) Your choice of Entwistle was *inspired* as the initial example of an "old-school" bassist with the ability to change both stylistically and through technology, although with everything I know about The Ox it was closer to his desire to reach what he thought of as his perfect bass tone... "full treble, full volume".

Technology made him able to reach that point an insanely long time after "Happy Jack", although I believe it was amplification that ultimately held him back until the later years. He had Alembic in the 1970's, Warwick in the 1980's, and Status Graphite in the 1990's as basses, but nothing was the equivalent in both his rig and FOH during the '60s and '70s except perhaps the Dead's setup... but they were primarily a live band while The Who wasn't nearly to the same degree. I believe that what was holding him back was amplification, which didn't truly come of age for us bassists until the '80s. I'm a big Who fan (Dad raised me on them, out of the Big Four* they were my #1 growing up, saw them as my first concert at the '89 25th Anniversary Tour) and between the live show and boots of that and previous tours I think I can say they was the first time he'd seemed to have found his ideal tone.

So not at all, you nailed in on that one!

*The Beatles, Led Zepplin, The Rolling Stones, and The Who.

 

[Wasim]

I doubt Jamerson would have changed at all - he was reluctant to switch to electric bass at all! He experimented with a 5 string and a fretless and didn't like it, and he also had effects pedals at home he toyed with but he didn't like anything to detract from the true "bass" quality, which is something about him I really respect.

 

[rockwarnick]

How are you backing him up? He didn't like a fretless bass, so he smashed it? The comment "he was asked to slap many times" is vague, if the person doing the asking is a Motown producer, that's lame. If you are getting paid as a studio musician, if you are asked to do something, do it.

I agree, sounds like a complete jerk with a rockstar ego.

Not to refer back to entwistle like i praise him or anything(which i do. he is a big influence on why and how i play bass) but he has similar stories. in the documentary(thunderfingers i think is what its called) they talk about how apparently he would sometimes being playing bass then excuse himself from the room and smash the bass if he didnt like how it felt or sounded. i think he just knew what he wanted and he knew what he didnt want.
as for all the kids doing it today just for show?... I hate to see new bands smash guitars. i thinks its stupid. Its not as captivating. pete townsend and keith going nuts? hell yea. now its just played out.
so do i back up jamerson? yes. times were changing. he didnt like it. im not surprised. he and the rest of the funk brothers(in my opinion) were under-appreciated in the big picture at the time. and even now today i suppose. so being asked do to something you didnt want to and getting upset about it? makes sense to me. especially with his problems as they were.

So not at all, you nailed in on that one!

cool, thanks!

I doubt Jamerson would have changed at all - he was reluctant to switch to electric bass at all! He experimented with a 5 string and a fretless and didn't like it, and he also had effects pedals at home he toyed with but he didn't like anything to detract from the true "bass" quality, which is something about him I really respect.

thank you. that is the kind of commment i am looking for.

 

[Lazylion]

I'd like to think there would always have been a place for both Jamerson and Jaco (taking their various personal problems out of the equation).
I saw a pic of Jaco offstage, playing a 5-string acoustic bass guitar. Maybe that's where he would have gone!

 

[rockwarnick]

really? i want to see that pic.
hey you arent far from me, im in rockville.

 

[Matt Till]

in the documentary(thunderfingers i think is what its called) they talk about how apparently he would sometimes being playing bass then excuse himself from the room and smash the bass if he didnt like how it felt or sounded. i think he just knew what he wanted and he knew what he didnt want.
as for all the kids doing it today just for show?... I hate to see new bands smash guitars.

I love Jamerson, Entwistle is a god to me, but both cases sound like stupid hissyfits to me.

Honestly, don't like a bass... give it to me (or, being that I probably wasn't around...). Here's a thought, AUTOGRAPH IT, then when some kid comes up to you at a show "Oh my god, John Entwistle, blah blah bass hero, blah blah" HAND THEM an autographed bass that you hate. That would make my lifetime, I know that.

Smashing guitars is rarely called for, and yes, it is especially stupid at a show for no reason. It was kind of cool when the Who trashed ****, because they were the first, it was so strange. Anyone who has done it after that though... I don't get it.

 

[The_Ryst]

All bass pioneering and love of Jamerson aside, he was asked to do something as part of his job and he refused. On top of that he smashed the bass. You guys must remember: he was NOBODY to everyone else, so it's not like he was rolling in the dough and had a pack of groupies at all times.

It's not like if Hendrix was asked to put less distortion on his guitar so he smashed it. Jamerson didn't have the popularity or the money to pull a stunt like that so, in my opinion, it was a very immature and childish move. Those are the plain facts, bass playing aside. The guy had a family to feed.

 

[The Lurker]

I'd like to think there would always have been a place for both Jamerson and Jaco (taking their various personal problems out of the equation).
I saw a pic of Jaco offstage, playing a 5-string acoustic bass guitar. Maybe that's where he would have gone!

actually, between that post and your sig, it got me wondering if perhaps Jaco wouldn't have wound up going on to invent some of the stuff the jaco ripoffs/clones/sincere imitators/very-heavily-influenced-people wound up doing anyways. The mental/physical illness thing's the deal-breaker, though-- if he didn't clean up, he would have died unpleasantly someday.

Heck, maybe Jamerson would have gone back to playing upright and playing straight jazz, wound up in the ron carter/ray brown category.

So other than jamerson, entwistle, Burton, and jaco, who else could we run through the same what-if mill? There's gotta be more dead bass players than that.

Here's another guy who sorta dropped out-- Greg Ridley from Humble Pie. WOund up running an antique store out in the sticks in the UK.

Berry Oakley? I really don't know.... he was a hard one to figure for this. IMHO, I think if he and Duane hadn't died, the original ABB outfit wouldn't have lasted that much longer than without them. I don't know what he would have done after that...

Felix Pappalardi from Mountain? He was murdered in 1983, but basically quit anything but production work in the mid or late 70s due to having gone stone deaf.

Actually, to name another guy who changed a lot, look at Tim Bogert-- went from a Pbass to 5 and 6 strings, taps, slaps, etc, and pretty much dropped the whole raga thing he used to do.

Kenny Aaronson from Dust, too. (and a mighty band Dust was, too).

Paul Samwell-Smith from the Yardbirds went over to the production side of things entirely after he quit the band....

 

[Shmelbee]

I agree, sounds like a complete jerk with a rockstar ego.

Or, a...baby? Although, I doubt the stories about smashing and refusing, etc. are anything more than just misconstrued stories that have only a SHRED of truth to them.

I think Jaco would have continued to make some sweet music, but the late eighties/early ninties would have seen some WEIRD experimental stuff, kinda like Herbie Hancock's industrial nonsense.

 

[gomez hacienda]

I think Jamerson would still be playing that Fender P with the same strings on it if he could, though I doubt he'd be big at all. He wasn't in life for the most part and it took his death to get real recognition. Before you say he was famous, remember before he died he couldn't find work and he was listed as the guy who did all that motown $hit. That said, I still think he'd be plunking along behind some of the greatest hits around. Unfortunatly I think he'd hear most of the garbage that comes out these days and just up and retire.

As for Jaco, I think he'd start releasing bad albums, try to go experimental or whatever with synths etc etc. Then I'd think he'd get tossed into rehab or commit suicide. Sounds grim, and I don't like Jaco, but thats how I see it going down. Then 20 years later some bass player would say that the world wasn't ready for him.

Pretty darn close to bein' spot-on, methinks.

 

[bassist15]

I went back and re-read the part about jamerson and one acount had him smashing it but most of the others say that after the take he was on the verge of smashing and and told the other funk brothers "Never let me play that thing again". As for the person who said he was a session musician and shouldve listened when they asked him to slap.....yes he was a studio musician, but people came to him cause they knew what he could do ...He wasnt your run of the mill session player when he lived in LA people came to him to have that Jamerson touch to a song.
As for Jaco playing the Acoustic 5 string.....he had that made for him in the early 70's but his close person friends have quoted Jaco saying he was never quite satisfied with it. He did frequently use it to warm up and such. He played in on a track by Ira Sullivan in the early 70's ....you can hear it on ira's myspace.

 

[Lazylion]

As for Jaco playing the Acoustic 5 string.....he had that made for him in the early 70's but his close person friends have quoted Jaco saying he was never quite satisfied with it. He did frequently use it to warm up and such.

Had he lived, maybe he would have had a luthier make him one he liked better! I would have loved to hear what he would've done with one of those 11-string monsters!
(but with a big fat neck!)

 

[Alan Vorse]

I think Jamerson would still be playing that Fender P with the same strings on it if he could, though I doubt he'd be big at all. He wasn't in life for the most part and it took his death to get real recognition. Before you say he was famous, remember before he died he couldn't find work and he was listed as the guy who did all that motown $hit. That said, I still think he'd be plunking along behind some of the greatest hits around. Unfortunatly I think he'd hear most of the garbage that comes out these days and just up and retire.

Can you name me one studio player from the 60s that was "big"? Most of those guys (or Carol Kaye) did not get credit on those tracks. They were not celebrated as players until later. If someone could have got Jamerson off the sauce and cleaned up, I think his career would have followed that of Chuck Rainey's:Still recording, but getting more into education. I could also see him hanging up electric and going back to upright full-time, trying to be the next Ray Brown.

 

[Baryonyx]

Man, can you imagine if Shawn Lane were alive today the kind of things he would be getting up to! I know it's only been a couple of years, but...