Local bass "hero"

[123321]

Lee Sklar approach here. A song is superior to any instrument/s it's played on. I'm as anti-pyrotechnics as they come, it's tasteless, boring and when too modern-jazzy my brain even has a hard time processing it as beauty. Do what the song demands. Still, in almost any kind of genre, a song might demand a bass solo, of course, and being capable at that is desirable too.

If you read about Leland's history, you'll see he went through the fusion/chops phase... I'd love to hear that!

 

[radioface]

such is the plight of the bass player vs. public perception -- its an anti-parallel thankless job: When you are locking hard into the drummer, playing solid note values and supporting the vocals and other instruments, you are really kicking azz but the (non-playing/listening) audience just goes "Meh"...OTOH, I guy with a million chops and less than adequate groove gets the "Wow!" from same said audience.

There is a way to play "More is Less" on bass (Vinnie Colaiuta has practically made a career of this on drums), but on bass it takes having a real good drummer that ya lock in with very well and "tasty" for-the-song flash playing is done in "punctuations" - spots here and there within certain songs (works best in vocal-dead areas) - without ever sacrificing the groove and always supporting the other players first and foremost before breaking into something creative. YMMV, of course

I agree with you 100%.

 

[40Hz]

thats how i felt watching John Holmes movies....when he died, I felt like every man on Earth moved up one notch

Well, like they say, keep giving them an inch and eventually you get a John Holmes...or something like that.

 

[BAG]

such is the plight of the bass player vs. public perception -- its an anti-parallel thankless job: When you are locking hard into the drummer, playing solid note values and supporting the vocals and other instruments, you are really kicking azz but the (non-playing/listening) audience just goes "Meh"...OTOH, I guy with a million chops and less than adequate groove gets the "Wow!" from same said audience.

All too often this is true.
A local young soloist in this town does a semi-decent job using looping (he's basically an Ed Sheeran fan and copy-cat) with a decent voice and very average guitar skills. He doesn't string his guitar properly and it regularly goes out of tune halfway through songs thereby needed re-tuning between almost every song, he occasionally fluffs his loops and has to start again and yet, so many local think he is fantastic.

 

[123321]

In summation... Bass Hack or Bassist- and the wisdom to know the difference...

 

[Alex J]

I read one time Carlos Santana said the best note in a song is sometimes one that is never played.

Maybe, but then he also hired Doug Rauch as his bassist, who double thumbed his way through pretty much everything. A good player is a good player is a good player.

 

[blue4]

I'm a simple player, just trying to serve the song like most but I still don't understand why a busy player automatically equals fool with no groove for many of us. I keep thinking back to the OP. The guy's in a three piece band, so there's more space than usual. He has talent. And most importantly, he has the audience approval and attention. So I hesitate to assume that he's doing something wrong, or that he's a frustrated guitarist, or even that the audience is too dumb to know what they like or what "real" bass playing is. Perhaps he's just found a niche in his market. Maybe his band encourages the way he plays, the same way Geddy is marketed by Rush (on a way smaller scale obviously).