John Baker Saunders Mad Season, Walkabouts

[BlackElan]

Have not seen a thread dedicated to him yet but I always will remember him for his work with Mad Season and Layne Staley.



If anyone knows more about the gear he used or any other stories relating to him please share.

 

[jerry]

I dug Mad Season, I haven't listened to it in quite awhile, time to dig it out.

 

[BlackElan]

Just bumping this thread, can anyone ID the year of his Fender Jazz bass?

 

[mikeswals]

I think it was a 71. But someone here on TB owns that Jazz Bass now.

 

[pnut166]

I dug Mad Season, I haven't listened to it in quite awhile, time to dig it out.

+1. There were rumors that another disc was in the can, but never released. Anybody know anything about that ? One of my fave songs to play is "Wake Up". Ultra simple, but sounds sooo sweet.

 

[rulyøngo]

I just started listening to him, what a great bassist!!!

 

[DONZI97]

Still one of my favorite albums, so he got that tone with a jazz bass? I always wondered what he used.

 

[nellie48]

Resurrecting this thread. Here is the infamous John "Baker" Saunders 1971 Jazz bass. I've had it for about 15 years now. Was sold to me by Baker's former roommate in the early days of eBay. According to the roommate, he kept it for a few years as no one claimed it after Baker died. The pinup girl sticker is the giveaway that its the same one. I've searched to see if I could find the very same same pinup girl sticker anywhere. Never seen one. Looking at footage of Baker playing the bass, you can also see a drop D tuner on it, which this bass has. Its crossed my mind to contact Mike McCready or Barret Martin to see if they might want a piece of this history back. Maybe I will one of these days. I love the bass though. Unfortunately, they are the only ones left from Mad Season. Heroin addiction took too many great musicians from that Seattle scene and era. Thats the music that got me starting to play bass, so its quite sentimental to me.

 

[meadeam]

Wow, this is incredible. I absolutely loved Mad Season back then, and still do today. By '95 the bloom had fallen off of the Seattle scene, but I've always felt Mad Season was one of the best bands from that era even though they were technically a "super group". It is really cool that his bass is still out there and that it belongs to a true fan. There's a good chance that it at one time belonged to Jeff Ament. I've read that Jeff let Baker borrow a bass when he first got to Seattle, as he arrived without one. I don't know how much truth there is to that.

@nellie48 Are you from Seattle? I lived there from the very end of the 90s until 2009. I moved there from Minneapolis, and am now in Cincinnati (just across the river anyway). Prior to Mad Season, Baker played with the Lamont Cranston band. I remember them playing around Minneapolis when I was a kid. They were a straight ahead blues band.

 

[nellie48]

Wow, this is incredible. I absolutely loved Mad Season back then, and still do today. By '95 the bloom had fallen off of the Seattle scene, but I've always felt Mad Season was one of the best bands from that era even though they were technically a "super group". It is really cool that his bass is still out there and that it belongs to a true fan. There's a good chance that it at one time belonged to Jeff Ament. I've read that Jeff let Baker borrow a bass when he first got to Seattle, as he arrived without one. I don't know how much truth there is to that.

@nellie48 Are you from Seattle? I lived there from the very end of the 90s until 2009. I moved there from Minneapolis, and am now in Cincinnati (just across the river anyway). Prior to Mad Season, Baker played with the Lamont Cranston band. I remember them playing around Minneapolis when I was a kid. They were a straight ahead blues band.

You live in Cincinnati!! So do I! I’m in Loveland. I grew up in Oregon, so not that far from Seattle.