I never really intended on being a bass player. I thought drums were very cool, also guitar, because you could pump your right arm so hard when you played. So cocky but so passionate too. Go back and watch your fav music docs, lots of angst and energy gets put into that right arm of guitar players.
I got my first bass guitar when I lived in Motley, MN. A nasty ol’ Ibanez Silver Cadet. But hey, it was mine. The next day I got in a fight with a friend about what notes the strings should be tuned to, so we phoned the wise men at Guitar Center in Edina, MN (the city in which I was born, and also where parts of Mighty Ducks was filmed). They informed us of the proper tuning. Friend won, and I will never hear the end of it.
The bass guitar is an interesting thing these days. It seems as though it gets noticed more for when it’s absent than when it’s present. If there’s no bass, there’s no bootys shakin…unless it’s a last chorus of a giant Bon Jovi song where it’s only drums and vocals. People will continue the shaking through that part.
I imagine the mailman feels similarly. When he shows up, I think nothing of it. But man, when he’s a no show and daddy is expecting that publishers clearing house check (I’m in the top 15 right now), I’m livid and I don’t know if life will continue.
Everyone loooooves bass and has no idea. Like Bob Costas with the Olympics. I love the Olympics, everything about them. But Costas out with the pink eyes is like having no bass line on Another One Bites The Dust. I’m devastated, the athletes feel the loss, there’s more cloud cover in Nashville and the mailman “forgets” my clearing house update letter. So give Bob the head chair at the dinner table and may he be served with 80% dark chocolate gold medals till he gives us that money-making NBC smile again.
Bass and Bob Costas are essential. And now we know it.
