Bassplayers who were a Key influence on your playing.

[lowend1]

Every time I've seen Kenny play, he's had a different bass - once with the 'bird, once with a sunburst P, once with a "hippie-refinned" stack-knob Jazz...
"Envy" off of Derringer's "Sweet Evil" album has some great funk licks on it. Kenny was definitely ahead of his time on that one. After he cut off his hair, he started to resemble either Scott "Top Ten" Kempner of the Dictators (and Del Lords)... or maybe a non-bloated Andrew "Dice" Clay!

[Pilgrim]

If I picked the two from my list that I try to emulate style-wise, they'd be Duck Dunn and Tommy Shannon.  Just enough notes, just at the right times.

[pamlicojack]

I fist saw Jack Cornell playing with The Fabulous Knobs back in 1981.  From that moment on, I knew I wanted to play bass.  I've followed him through stints with The Woodpeckers (with Dan Baird), The Woods, and The Olympic Ass-Kickin' Team.  He taught me that you have to have a solid rhythm section to make a song work, but it helps to have a good groove as well...


GREAT player who deserves more recognition..




www.myspace.com/olympicasskickinteam 

[patman]

I first started playing when I saw a band in Cincinnati called Sampson--they were a band that formed from the remnants of the Daybreakers...

Band had a guy that played a Rick named Pat Hurley, and had the seventies "english" rotosound flatpick style nailed.

For whatever reason I looked up on stage and said to myself "I can do that"...

That was 35 or 36 years ago give or take...been playing professionally pretty much ever since...

[ack1961]

-60's, 70's & 80's -John Entwistle, Chris Squire  & Gary Thain
Most bassists know all about Entwistle and Squire...their sound really made it easy for me to seperate the bass from the rest of the music.
Gary Thain was incredible and for a short period of time gave another dimension to Uriah Heep.

- 80's & 90's - Craig Bloxom (Spy V. Spy)
Ask any Aussie about Craig Bloxom - thunderous bass and he has a killer voice to boot.

- Lately - Colin Edwin (Porcupine Tree) & Dan Maines (Clutch)
Every time I see Colin Edwin play, he looks like knows that he has the coolest job in the world and he's enjoying himself. Killer groove.
Dan Maines is one-fourth of Clutch, and holds it all together with JP Gaster, one of the best drummers ever, anywhere.

If I ever get any better, I'd like to think that each of these guys helped influence my style.  They certainly influenced me to pick up the bass at 45 years old and finally give it a try.

[Freuds_Cat]

Spy v Spy were one of the hardest working bands in Australia back in the 80's. Great live act.

[Denis]

My apologies - I thought he was referring to the median age here at the outpost - which apparently requires Carbon-14 dating to establish.

Well, I just started on this bass stuff in December, after wanting to learn how to play since 1984...

I have always loved listening to Leon Wilkeson's bass lines in so many of Skynyrd's songs. Even now the beginning of "Simple Man" gives me the chills. Probably the biggest thing which got me interested was a friend of mine in high school, who was a couple of years younger than me. His dad was the conductor for the Fayetteville Symphony and I'll bet Doug's played for 30 years now. He had some sort of Flying V in '83 and he was always horsing around with it, playing in his church group, etc. Then I went to college, then go interested in old motorcycles, and finally realized that whenever I go see shows,  I find myself most interested in what the bass player is doing. So, I though, "WTF" and bought an Ibanez, then the Dano, which I love. I think since the week before Christmas only 2 or 3 days have gone by where I didn't have the bass out. It's been a blast indeed. Should have done this in '84!

[Rocker949]

Speaking of Leon Wilkeson, I once accidentally encountered him in a church in Mississippi.  He was surrounded by people talking to him, but now I wish I'd have found a way to talk to him, too.  It really wouldn't have been that hard.

[Denis]

Always heard he was a nice guy. Too bad you didn't get to talk to him!

[Rocker949]

Always heard he was a nice guy. Too bad you didn't get to talk to him!

Believe me, I regret that now.  It would have been so easy, too.  I have also heard he was a nice guy.

[Denis]

After Billy Powell died I was reading about Leon (The Mad Hatter as he was known) and apparently his girlfriend cut his throat while he was sleeping. He survived but man, the luck those guys had was terrible. I think Skynyrd would not have sounded as good if they'd had someone other than Leon on bass.

[Rocker949]

I've never really been much of a Lynyrd Skynyrd fan, but I can appreciate their music.  From what I've heard, Leon playing was pretty important for them.  After briefly leaving and being replaced on bass by Ed King, Ronnie Van Zant told Ed that his bass playing sucked and he had to have Leon back on bass.

[gweimer]

Leon is a vastly melodic player that fit right into that "Southern outlaw" style.  I'm one of those who says if you can't cop Leon's parts, don't even bother to do most Lynyrd Skynyrd songs.

[ilan]

Carol Kaye (long before I knew it was her on the Beach Boys records) and Joe Osborn. Later there were Roger Glover, John Wetton, and Chris Squire.

[Denis]

If you listen to the earlier stuff when Ed King played bass and compare it to the Wilkeson era, there's almost no comparison. Not that King sucked (unless Ronnie said so) but Wilkeson's riffs are damn near songs themselves.