Bond Girl's dummer Phil is a solid, seasoned drummer. Knows what to play, when to play and how to play. He knows his kit and has it dialed. He’s my age and I can say the same thing about myself. But.., I'm not a standard roots-only bass player. Or put this way, I'm in two bands that focus our creative energies on challenging and non-typical material. Both bands being quartettes allows me a lot of freedom to expand my playing for maximal effect. I think many guitar-players/drummers etc think a bass player should stay in their lane. That just doesn't consider what an open-minded musician can bring to the table, regardless of what instrument they are playing.
So at BG rehearsal last night BG Phil made a passing comment about the effect pedals I incorporate; “you should keep it simple” (as in - no pedals) … I instantly responded that Bond Girl is
not your generic cover band. (he also plays in a generic 'garage' cover band) As much as I have no interest in playing in such a band - it would be easy as I wouldn’t need to use any effect pedals. (aside from a tuner and maybe a fuzz/distortion pedal) It reminded me that there’s two definite camps for bass-players; 'cord from amp to bass', and those who use effect pedals. From an early time, I’ve been open to incorporating pedals. Czech Miroslav Vitos playing electric & upright with Weather Report in the early '70s using a wah pedal, Tim Bogert (Vanilla Fudge) ripping it up on fuzz bass and Jack Cassidy using all kinds of effects w/The Jefferson Airplane was my early inspiration/introduction to bass. Only time I did ‘amp-to-bass’ was when I was in a Chicago blues band. (as was required) And FTR - to each their own, they both have their expressed merits and I would never champion one over the other. As always - play to the needs of the material.
Anyway, I mulled over it all night and responded to Phil through an email this morning about how I felt about his “advice”. I was respectful as I very much like him and his positive addition to BG. I was direct and focused on how my use of effects was an important part of our sound (no different than Paul or Cherie as guitarists) and pointed out song by song how I incorporate effects and why. Much of Bond material incorporates orchestration and we're a guitar/bass/drums quartette. So by using targeted effects I can help fatten-up/enhance that deep sonic footprint live. It may be subtle, but w/o it it's like if removing bass - the song will suffer.
Without bragging I’ve become very good at being diplomatic in my later years and also in communicating this through writing (a lost art) and so as a similarly mature person - he ‘got it’ and acknowledged my reasoning w/o malice. Phils a good guy and a solid drummer - we make a dynamic rhythm section.
Bond Girl has our most concentrated gig schedule to date starting a week from this Saturday. We have a mini-registry at Music City SF, the hot new nightclub in the heart of downtown SF - 9 shows in the next 3 months. To Chucky that’s nothing
, but to us it’s a solid stretch of BG shows, the majority at a high profile SF club. Cherie’s feeling a little daunting about it but I’m like - yah baby! Let’s do this! Looks like a good way to end 2024 and a great start into 2025 for BG. (plus own recent 5 recordings in progress)
