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Most influential bassist(s)

Who is (are) the most influential bassists?

  • Total voters
    122
  • Poll closed .
#49
What about Flea? How about Dee Dee Ramone? Jerry Only? Glen Matlock or Sid Vicious?

When I think of "influential" I think of who bassists aspire to be like. As a modern bassist, I'll never say that I want to be like Jaco, nor will I say that I want to be like John Entwistle, Stanley Clarke or James Jamerson.

Do I repsect them for what they've accomplished? Sure I do! But the truth is that many of today's musicians have no idea who any of them are.

I'm currently 32 years old. As of today, I can cite a very selected few as being major influences, as far as bassists go. Paul McCartney. Flea, Dee Dee Ramone. Twiggy Ramirez, Tony Kanal, Gene Simmons, John Paul Jones, Jerry Only, Steve Harris, Robin "Graves" Eaglestone, Nagash/ Lex Icon, Jason Newsted, Cliff Burton, John Myung and Geezer Butler.

Those are all early influences to who I was listening to when when I first picked up the bass guitar. I never aspired to be a slapper. And although I do some occasional tapping, I'm mostly a fingerstyle metal player. Granted, I'll use a pick here and there, but not often.

Realistically, I take more influence from guitarists. I just prefer the lower register. It's about how they play. How they arrange. Today, I'll cite Herman Li and Sam Totman as an influence just as quickly as I would Geezer Butler.

Of course, this is personal experience. One person differs from the next.
 
#50
I'll do my best to tabulate all this and we can do a top 5 runoff. As anyone who saw UK and UCONN last night knows, not everyone will dig the outcome but it's all fun and games anyway. Think of all this as March Madness and the Final Four (Five) of Bass Guitar. :)
 
#52
Roy Vogt said:
The idea here is to vote for the bassist or bassists you feel to be the most influential as far as how the instrument is played and how players have developed in their evolution. This would not necessarily be your favorite, but one (or more) who may have influenced your favorite. I'll try to look at the results, including write ins, and tabulate the top 5 and then have a run-off vote in a later thread.
Thanks for your participation. You can vote for as many as you wish.
In order to narrow this down to the top 5 this poll will only be active for 30 days.
Click to expand...

Roy. You gotta spell Entwistle the right way if he's included in the poll. Just sayin'... :p
 
#56
Lownote38 said:
If I could vote three times, I would add Rocco Prestia and Paul Jackson to the write in. Otherwise, I voted Jaco due to his extremely unique approach. We'd have no Weather Channel fretless (with chorus) bass lines if it weren't for him!
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You can vote for more than one player in the poll. Just list anyone else in the thread and I'll add them.
 
#57
Roscoe East said:
I voted -- it was actually more difficult than I expected, because it forced me think about what it means to be influential. Cool exercise.

E.g., I don't deny that Paul McCartney was incredibly influential...and influential to bassists. But I question whether the type of influence he had is/was as overt as the type of influence someone like, say, Larry Graham or James Jamerson or Jaco Pastorius had.

Paul's influence strikes me as more abstract: He influenced bassists to recognize that they could play interesting lines that weren't completely background foundation/support parts (and yet that still provided the necessary foundation/support). He influenced bassists to recognize that they were valuable members of a band, both in terms of musical contribution and band image. He influenced bassists to recognize that they were worthy of the spotlight.

But you almost never hear bassists copping McCartney's lines or licks or phrasing. Unlike Larry, James, or Jaco, Paul's influence was almost extrinsic to the bass guitar. He influenced the way bassists thought about playing bass, rather than influencing the way they played bass. That's a fascinating distinction imho.
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My thoughts exactly. Almost verbatim. Spooky. :eek:

"Influential" being the key word, I voted for James Jamerson, Larry Graham, and Jaco. Period. Because IMO, the influence of those three cats can be widely heard to this day, in the playing styles of thousands of bassists the world over - in ways that few others have accomplished.

Now if the key word was "innovative", my list would be quite different (although JJ, LG & JP would still make the cut). Several of the rock players in particular would qualify easily - including Chris Squire, John Entwistle & Jack Bruce. To which I would add the incomparable Michael Manring. :cool:

But the thing is, for all their great musical contributions, relatively few players have personally followed in the stylistic footsteps of those great innovators. You just don't hear many bassists who clearly take their stylistic cues from John Entwistle. Or Jack Bruce. Or Geddy Lee. Or Billy Sheehan. Or even Chris Squire (although during the Seventies, that was a different matter).

As for the small army of other great, famous players - people like John Paul Jones & Bruce Thomas & Graham Maby & Paul Denman; guys who achieve a distinctive style and personal voice on the instrument, some of them are among my very favorite players. But alas, few of them are/were truly influential, or even innovative, in the fullest sense of that term.

MM
 
#58
Amara said:
The punch line: until I started playing bass, I had never heard of Jamerson, Jaco, Carol Kaye, or a lot of the other big names.
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Same. But im sure you'd find its the case for the majority of people. People who don't play bass generally don't know these people. I hadn't heard of Jamerson until last year. My gf saw a documentary on him and asked me if i knew who he was.... I didn't. Carol Kaye, about the same. Jaco, some time around my 6th year of playing or something. Like 2001.

Mind you all these guys played on no records or in genres I listen to (well of course as it turns out id heard some of Kaye or Jamerson's basslines but didn't know it).

Ive never been the guy to buy musicians magazines though, or hang on musicians site...until this one late last year. So it's not like i'd have read about them.
 
#59
So far the front runners for the Final Five are:
James Jamerson aka "The Funk Brother"
Paul McCartney aka "Sir Paul"
John Entwistle (better, Lownote 38?) aka "The Ox"
Larry Graham aka "The Thumb"
Jaco Pastorius aka "The Florida Flash"
However the voting remains open for a month so in the words of the late Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, "Vote early and often!" ;)
 
#60
Roy Vogt said:
So far the front runners for the Final Five are:
James Jamerson aka "The Funk Brother"
Paul McCartney aka "Sir Paul"
John Entwistle (better, Lownote 38?) aka "The Ox"
Larry Graham aka "The Thumb"
Jaco Pastorius aka "The Florida Flash"
However the voting remains open for a month so in the words of the late Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, "Vote early and often!" ;)
Click to expand...

Yes. Better! :D You probably know be better as your former student, Frank. I'm rather new around here, though.
 

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