Learning it as I write this
I wouldn't say I'm a fan just yet, but I'm always up for learning a cool bass line that takes me out of my comfort zone.
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Just how bright were the 80s?
- Thread starter Just Wrong
- Start date
I wouldn't say I'm a fan just yet, but I'm always up for learning a cool bass line that takes me out of my comfort zone.
- Jun 30, 2010
- 49,603
- 222,068
- Disclosures
- musician/artist/owner - Gildaxe
Yah, the '60s brought us Jack Bruce, Jack Cassidy, John Entwistle and Tim Bogart - all up-front bass players.
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I bought one of these:
And found it so bright I returned the amp. I guess I was expecting that warm tube sound that Ashdown is/was renowned for. I should have known better!
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You could just listen to an album Pattitucci played on in the 1980s...
Compared to his latest release:
Although he is almost certainly referring to the instrument, EQ, amps and cabs, keep in mind that recordings in the 80s also tended to be "bright" and "cold," mostly because it was the early days of digital and CDs.
At the time, this was a new, fresh and clean sound. Sting's "Dream of the Blue Turtles" sounded like a radical jump in audio quality back in 1985. (Today, I'd say the recording style is kind of dated.)
Ya- all 80's music is exactly the same.....
I'm kinda enjoying this side threadYa- all 80's music is exactly the same.....
. I guess being younger, I've never heard people say everything after the 70s was bad. But the number of people I've met who insist music died after the 90s is mind-blowing In how terrible it is, yep. I’m every genre it has the worst of the worst.Ya- all 80's music is exactly the same.....
You could just listen to an album Pattitucci played on in the 1980s...
Compared to his latest release:
Although he is almost certainly referring to the instrument, EQ, amps and cabs, keep in mind that recordings in the 80s also tended to be "bright" and "cold," mostly because it was the early days of digital and CDs.
At the time, this was a new, fresh and clean sound. Sting's "Dream of the Blue Turtles" sounded like a radical jump in audio quality back in 1985. (Today, I'd say the recording style is kind of dated.)
His tone in the 80s was so bright. I guess that would be his Ken Smith with stainless steel rounds? Sounds good though. His playing is so tasteful.
The evolution of bass tone was inevitable and unavoidable.
IMPO; today's bass tones suck big time way more than the 80s.. not that i liked much of the 80s bass sounds.. bass has never been so wimpy, namby pamby and pathetic. Even the "death, metal, core, grunge, Disney Punk, thrash" bass tone, has lost all its machismoism alas its still just as pretentious.
The dictatorship of the market place has a lot to answer for.
IMPO; today's bass tones suck big time way more than the 80s.. not that i liked much of the 80s bass sounds.. bass has never been so wimpy, namby pamby and pathetic. Even the "death, metal, core, grunge, Disney Punk, thrash" bass tone, has lost all its machismoism alas its still just as pretentious.
The dictatorship of the market place has a lot to answer for.
What dictatorship is this? If you don't like the tone of a bass, you can change electronics, quite simply usually. Or not buy that bass.
A lot of hate for 80s music in this thread… Guys, wait until you hear music from like 2004 on. They use computers for a lot of sounds these days! Blasphemy 
So true.A lot of hate for 80s music in this thread… Guys, wait until you hear music from like 2004 on. They use computers for a lot of sounds these days! Blasphemy
One of the more difficult things I am finding as a Gen X player (meaning, this is the music I starting listening to as a lad) is finding people around my age to play with that *aren't* stuck in the past musically. Like, they pretty much stop at the 90's. If that far.
As for bright bass sounds, I remember a gig in college (the 90's) where I realized that all the slapping in the world was simply not going to make a dent. Bright and twanky and the bass was just... gone. It was futile.
So I joined a reggae band!
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Let’s see…”hi-fi” cabinets with scooped mids, tweeters, roundwounds, slapping, aggressive pick playing…why would it be brighter? 
But, why did you feel the need to drop into a thread about a decade of music you have zero knowledge of or care about? Boomer logic on full display...
I graduated HS in 1990, GenX born in 72 and I adore 80's music. In my opinion and in hindsight, it was the most diverse decade of music of my lifetime. The dawn of MTV and it's first few years were a mix of alternative rock/pop that wasn't on top 40 radio. Amazing to witness as young kid from 1981-1985... the golden years when MTV played music videos only. Metal... the rise of Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth, ST, etc. College Alt Rock... REM, Smithereens, Smiths, etc. R&B funk/top 40... Cameo, Kool & the Gang, New Edition, Prince and Minneapolis groups and artists, etc. Punk... Bad Brains, Black Flag, Ramones, etc. Hard rock.... Van Halen, Def Leppard, Ratt, Motley Crue, etc. Post punk/new wave.... Cure, Depeche Mode, Siouxie and Banshees, etc.
The bass tones were just as diverse as the music. I fart in the general direction of boomers who disrespect my favorite decade of music.
The bass tones were just as diverse as the music. I fart in the general direction of boomers who disrespect my favorite decade of music.
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But he did say a couple of times that he had knowledge of it-- he heard a lot of it... and didn't like it. And enough with the "OK, Boomer" nonsense. I'm one, myself, and while aging can bring the "mired in the past" thing, it can also bring perspective and wisdom.
As for me, I remember being excited at the dawn of the '80s, because I felt that the '70s merely smoothed off the edges of the wild, revolutionary '60s music and made it more arena-friendly. $$$$ The '70s also introduced the glam, punk and disco stuff which I felt had much more to do with fashion and artifice than music. I'll take Joe Cocker over Freddie Mercury any day. But I was eventually disappointed by the '80s because most of the music sounded cold and too immaculate for me. I thought Prince was absolutely brilliant at exploiting and expressing this feel-- his stuff was kind of ruthlessly airtight, especially contrasted with, say, the warm, organic Stevie Wonder music a decade earlier. But he was a creative genius with the '60s experimental spirit, which I'd missed in most '70s music.
There are some other '80s people who I liked, for example Tears for Fears, the Bangles, Billy Idol (I thought the "Rebel Yell" album sounded great and balanced the sterile '80s production and recording with something visceral). Stevie Ray Vaughan was the #1 antidote to the '80s sterility, but he was ultimately a little too derivative for me. A sensational player, but he basically just revisited Albert King, Hendrix and Albert Collins. In my opinion, of course.
I've always felt that the great leaps forward in the '80s were in technology, while the '60s ones were in songwriting (Dylan, the Beatles) and playing (Hendrix, Cream). And the importance of visuals leaped forward immensely in the '80s with MTV, which was huge, but not my thing.
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Looking back at the 80's and great bass tones.... I absolutely love the tones on The Fixx "Red Skies at Night" and "Stand or Fall." It sounds like a Spector P/J... nice full tone that would have been cool in the 90's, too.
Video Killed the Radio Star.I'm kinda enjoying this side thread
I love all kinds of music, but IMO, once it became a visual medium it drastically changed.
I was playing full time on the road through the 80's and early 90's. Yes, pop music had a lot of bass that was bright, slap became more of a thing, etc. but Entwistle, Squire, Geddy Lee, et al, had really bright tone, so it wasn't relegated to the Top 40 bands.
