Jim Fielder

[bassist15]

Never hear much talk of Fielder on talkbass. He is a really great bassist that ive heard a few times with Blood Sweat and Tears. I know he played a P and J Fender bass at different times. PIctures are hard to find of this guy. Discuss

 

[emblymouse]

I was an aspiring 12 yr old bassist when my big brother the horn player bought those 1st couple BS+T albums. My newly bass tuned ears heard those alot around our house. I don't remember his bass (in retrospect I'd guess a P by the thump), but I recall ads for 'Altec Lansing' speakers featuring him. This would have been in the all B+W Guitar Player magazines circa 1971. I'm sure I'm probably using some things I heard him play in those formative years.

 

[cb56]

Here you go. Someone is selling this on ebay.

I also dug his playing with that band.

 

[steveb98]

Remember seeing Jim play with the Buffalo Springfield one night. It cracked me up he was all the way over on the right side of a large stage. Guess he decided he want to be further away. He was using a Fender Dual Showman with two cabinets. He walked beside the cabinet and with a big swing of his hips knocked the cabinets over and six inches or so. Then just wonders around on the far right of the stage. He was playing great.

Another time I ran into an old friend who wanted to go hear some music. I knew he liked bands with horns and said there is some band playing the Whiskey with horns supposed to be good. We go and it is original Blood, Sweat, and Tears with Al Kooper. Their first album had just came out. I became a big fan that night they were tight and kickin' ass!

 

[Tom Howland]

Read in Bassplayer, that Jim used a 1963 Jazz body with a 1963-Percision neck.

Also has an old Percision at home.

 

[Johnny Crab]

Interview: http://www.rdrop.com/users/rickert/fielder.html

Played with: Invalid Link Removed

School daze: http://home.adelphia.net/~khecker/alumni_photos2.html

 

[GM60466]

Jim is probably the most under-rated bassist of the era. Beside Springfield and BS&T, the music he did with Zappa and Eddie Mundi is great as well. He was the fist bassist I knew who mixed and matched a jazz body with a pbass neck.

GM

 

[j-raj]

Jim is a killer bassist and too nice of a guy, I was introduced to him last summer in Austin at the NS booth... He is so cool to talk to.

 

[Alan Vorse]

Highly under-rated. His lines are so active, yet don't get in the way. How do you do that in a large band with horns?

 

[nysbob]

That first BS&T album really got my attention when it came out - he definitely was one of the first guys I was aware of and impressed with. You could really hear what he was playing, and it was very cool.

 

[markjazzbassist]

he is a killer bassist. im a big fan. i have their second album (self-titled). Great playing and he really stretches out, all over the place.

 

[emblymouse]

the music he did with Zappa and Eddie Mundi is great as well. GM

I was not aware, what did he do W/ Zappa? (and I thought I was Frankhead!)

 

[GM60466]

Jim Fielder played bass and guitar with the Mothers of Invention from fall 1966 through February 1967.

the Mothers of Invention: Absolutely Free
(1967, lp,usa, Verve)
the Mothers of Invention: Mothermania
(1969, lp, usa, verve)

There are also a few bootlegs of Jim playing with Mike Bloomfield and Zappa from early 1967.

GM

 

[fretlessrock]

You might as well give the full link to Peter van Laarhoven's excellent United Mutations site, and the Jim Fielder page:

http://united-mutations.com/f/jim_fielder.htm

There was an excellent piece on him in BP a while back, and it mentions his FZ connection. I don't think that he made the trip to NYC/Garrick, and he was more known as a session guy IIRC. Roy Estrada was the main guy on bass until the flo and eddie band.

 

[BigDaddyRob]

I remember reading an interview with him in Downbeat or some other magazine back in the 70s when I was a fledging young bassist. He said he picked with three fingers instead of the customary two, which was the norm back then. That was what got me started with my right-hand technique.

Wow. Hadn't thought about that in a while.

 

[polo515]

I remember buying the first BS&T and the first Electric Flag albums on the same day. Both great, similar approaches, but what really hooked me to BS&T was Fielders punchy lines and great phrasing. Live he sounded great and was a real talent in that era. Of course, Electric Flags Harvey Brooks was no slouch. We grew up in the same housing development in Queens, just blocks away from Al Kooper who one day performed at my Junior High School (JHS109) assembly as a folk singer.

 

[adrian garcia]

Jim was my first major influence and now a very dear friend. He has been playing for Neil Sedaka for over 25 years. We hook up everytime he is in town. Lovely human being. Fantastic player.
Link Removed

 

[winston]

I've always been impressed by Jim's work with BS&T, particularly the solo breaks on "Smiling Faces." It's good to know he's alive and well. I also recall Jaco citing him as a major influence in several interviews.

 

[adrian garcia]

I was so influenced by Jim that while I was playing a production show at Mandalay Bay, I would often see the marquee at the Orleans Hotel on the way to work announcing Neil Sedaka. I remembered from a Mikael Jansson interview in Bass Player that Jim had been the bassist for Neil for years. I also remember when I arrived in Miami from Havana in 1968 at ten years old going into a drug store tht sold lp's then. I asked my dad, who was himself a pro musician to buy me the B,S&T record with Spinning Wheel because I loved the tune from hearing it on the radio. Jim floored me with his playing a couple of years before I began to play bass- it just stuck with me. So, one evening, on the way to my gig , i called 411 and asked for the # to the Orleans, called the hotel and asked for Mr James Fielder. He answered and I introduced myself and told him what a fan I was. He got a big kick out of that and we agreed to meet for Thai lunch the next day. Since then we have our Thai lunch ritual everytime he is in town, about 3 times a year. It was quite special when he was my guest at a concert by the Nevada Jazz Society which was featuring some latin jazz tunes. I was nervous that Jim was in the audience, but he was very kind. I am blessed to call him a friend. He lives in Texas now. I look forward to seeing him again soon.

 

[emblymouse]

Adrian, what a great story. I was your age when I was hearing him for the first time. Please let him know how he has influenced others over the years.
Jeez, now I'm reconstructing 'Smiling Faces' in my head from memory. It's been a while since I ran those tapes.