Misdee

I seem to remember the late, great John Wetton (King Crimson, Asia, Roxy Music, Uriah Heep, U.K ect) used to live in Farnham back in the late '80's/ early '90's. There's always been loads of musos in that neck of the woods. I expect a lot of Guitar Village's customers are more likely to be investment bankers, though, also in abundance in that part of Surrey.

EBMM hired a creative design consultancy called DreamWorks to help design the Bongo. DreamWorks are owned by BMW and part of their design team.

You should have gone the whole hog and faked a Scouse accent.

It's still hard to believe. Something about life I have learned the hard way is that far too often the worst things seem to happen to the best people. Mani always seemed like a very warm and friendly chap and his bass playing was so perfect for whatever music he was making. You can hear him progress as a player from the catchy riffs and grooves on the first album to The Second Coming. Songs like Love Spreads have got really busy bass parts with lots of hooks and turnarounds that drive the music along. Everything in life is a time and a place, and, at a certain time in a particular place, for a while the Stone Roses were the most important band in the world. Mani was a big part of that.

Seriously, some of those basses are so heavy (upwards of 12 pounds) they are painful to play even sitting down. They hurt your leg and cut off the circulation! The reissue Gibson did a few years ago was a bit of a travesty. The only thing it had in common with the original basses was the overall shape. Not surprising considering what a major undertaking it would be for Gibson to try recreate the Moog electronics ect.

I remember going in there back in must be the early 1990's and they had some lovely stuff in stock back then, Wal basses ect. Friendly and knowledgeable staff, and a very upmarket home counties vibe. I expect it's still pretty much the same. Long may they prosper.

To me, it's a lot of money for something that's a lot of unsatisfactory compromises. My philosophy is that if you have to think about it that hard you don't really want it.

That bass was Gibson's attempt to take on the increasingly sophisticated bass designs that were emerging by the mid-to-late '70's. They did a good job in so many ways, as the sublime tone of those basses proves. It's one of the best sounds for heavy rock/ alternative music ever in my opinion. However, as was not at all uncommon at that time, comfort and playability for the poor sod who had shelled out all that money were not really considered at any stage of the design process. So you ended up with a bass where the reach to the first fret was so far away it was in another post code and you needed the services of an orthopedic surgeon after playing a 45 minute set standing up with it.

Regarding the Jazz Bass with a single rear pickup, I think you might be thinking of early-2000's era Dan Glenn. He was/is(?) and L.A-based fretless player who had a beard, looked a bit like Mo Foster and played a fretless Modulus Jazz that had one rear pickup. Could it be you have got the two a bit mixed up/ mixed together?

I can only think of Mo Foster, who had a double bass fingerboard grafted on to his Jazz Bass when he had it made fretless, but I'm pretty sure that bass had both pickups on it. Probably not what you are thinking of.

Jack Bruce was one of those players that sounded like himself regardless of what bass he played. I don't think the difference between a Spector and Warwick would be that apparent. He just dug into those strings and did his thing.

Those RD Artists sound amazing but weigh a ton and are a bit ungainly to play. I remember when they were new in the shops around the time I started playing and they were ridiculously expensive, much more than a Fender or Rickenbacker, none of which I could afford.

I very strongly disagree with this version of history. If you or anybody else enjoys Hooky's playing and find it inspiring for whatever reason then good luck to you, nothing wrong with that. If you like and enjoy his style that's good enough reason. But that doesn't mean that objectively he is an accomplished musician or indeed qualified in any way to judge other exponents of the bass. He's just someone who people who don't play the bass think must be important because they've heard of him .Whenever I hear him interviewed about playing the bass he seems to be full of self-regard, mainly for his own lack of ability, something which he mistakenly sees as a great asset. That's why I think he is a conspicuously bad choice to present this series. I was passionately interested in music in 1979, just like you were, and in playing the bass. I thought Peter Hook was a crap bass player then, and I've heard nothing to change my mind in the interim period. Listening to him thrashing away was depressing back then, and it takes me right back whenever I hear it now. Lots of kids played like that in those days, I think that Hooky was just the one who ended up being famous. In the early ,1980's most bass players not playing slap or fretless were not influenced by his style. He still wasn't that well-known by then, and there were plenty of other role models. For post-punk bass players in the early '80's (and I know because I was one of them) bassists like Sting, Bruce Foxton Horace Panter and JJ Burnel were far more influential than Peter Hook. The idea that Joy Division were such an important band at that time is a classic example of a tale told in the telling. They had a cult following and a certain profile in the music press, but their "legend" is something which has been created subsequently by people with an agenda which necessitates rewriting history to their own ends. When they were together they were a moderately well-known post-punk band from Manchester. Nothing more than that. And regarding any equivalence between Mick Karn and Peter Hook, there isn't any. The crucial difference between the two is that Mick Karn's style is defined by his imagination, not by his limitations. It's also wrong to claim that Mick Karn wasn't a trained musician when he had a background in playing the oboe in orchestras ect. I know he claimed to have no knowledge of scales and chords ect, but in practise he clearly did. His facility on the instrument is in a different stratosphere to Peter Hook (and most other bass players, for that matter). That should be obvious to anyone who listens.

Kim Jong Un, maybe. Make sure you wash your hands after touching those strings.

Great basslines can also be one-off phenomena, like Slave To The Rhythm by Grace Jones, played by Luis Jardim (RIP). You couldn't really point out much of a body of recorded work as a bass player for multi-instrumentalist Luis, but he was obviously a terrific player and that track alone must be one of the standout bass parts of the 1980's, and that was the decade of the standout bass part. Players like that will most likely be overlooked, as will session musicians who were guitar and bass doublers, like the late great Tommy Cogbill. But like I keep saying, I'll be watching avidly and enjoying whatever crumbs of comfort and inspiration this series has to offer. Bear in mind I regularly spend an hour or more watching brain dead British couples deciding if they want to sell their pre-war semi in Slough and move to Post-war semi in Swindon with a bigger garden and sufficient room to add an incontinence-themed extension ( pending planning permission). I'm sure I'll be glued to this bass fest.