“Nobody wanted to play bass, they wanted to be up front.”Īnd yet the instrument has its own proud tradition in popular music, stretching from the mighty upright work of Jimmy Blanton in Duke Ellington’s orchestra and bebop pioneers like Oscar Pettiford to fellow jazz geniuses like Charles Mingus and Ron Carter studio champs like Kaye and James Jamerson rock warriors like Cream’s Jack Bruce and the Who’s John Entwistle funk masters like Bootsy and Sly and the Family Stone’s Larry Graham prog prodigies like Yes’ Chris Squire and Rush’s Geddy Lee fusion gods like Stanley Clarke and Jaco Pastorius and punk and postpunk masters like Weymouth and the Minutemen’s Mike Watt. “It wasn’t the number-one job,” McCartney once said, reflecting on the fateful moment when he took over the four-string after Stu Sutcliffe exited the Beatles. Guitarists, singers, and horn players tend to claim the flashiest moments in any given song, while drummers channel most of the kinetic energy, but what the bassist brings is something elemental - the part that loops endlessly in your head long after the music ends.īassists are often overlooked and undervalued, even within their own bands.

Whatever you play puts a framework around the rest of the music.”Ī great bass line, whether it’s Paul McCartney’s hypnotic “Come Together” riff, Bootsy Collins’ sly vamp from James Brown’s “Sex Machine,” or Tina Weymouth’s minimal throb on Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer,” is like a mantra: It sounds like it could go on forever, and it only feels more profound the more you hear it.

“The bass is the foundation,” session legend Carol Kaye once said, “and with the drummer you create the beat.

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