Prog Bass - The Squire Factor

[Bilbo]

My passion for Jazz is taking a knock lately for reasons that are to do with the dearth of meaningful playing opportunities where I live and the disconnect between the amount of time you need to spend keeping your chops together and the amount of work you get. Anyway, I have been revisiting an old friend in the form of Prog Rock and started looking at what's new out there and I am enjoying checking out stuff I have missed over recent years. Whilst there are a lot of interesting things out there to take stock of, one of the things that I am finding a little tedious is the over-reliance on Chris Squire-esque bass playing whether it is the ownership of a Rickenbacker 4001 or just the purloining of Squire's rattly, crunchy sound. One of the attractions of Prog originally was the diversity. It seems like a lot of the New Prog is arguably derivative but, whereas no-one steals from Steve Howe, Alex Lifeson, Peter Banks, Steve Hackett or Bill Bruford, Alan White, Phil Collins etc, every other bass player wants to be Chris Squire.

Is it me or am I just seeing ghosts?

[fleabag]

Count me in as one of the other players that doesnt want to emulate the Squire sound. Maybe i'm a minority

Sounding like a chainsaw with a turbo isnt the tone i've ever sought, but, you know, diversity rules. Sad world if we all liked the same thing.

[KevB]

Prog's like Royston Vasey Bilbo, you never leave...

Actually I have heard a few Howe imitators in modern prog (check out some Magenta) but I get where you are coming from, he was a huge influence on so many players that it's bound to have filtered through in some bands. Plenty of prog out there with non squire musings on the low end though.

[Bilbo]

It may be my imagination but every band I see, live or on video seem to with have a Rickenbacker or SOUND like they have a Rickenbacker. Maybe Progressive Rock has stopped Progressing (Chapman Sticks are another frequent offender - The Levin Factor!)

[ezbass]

9 minutes ago, Bilbo said:

Chapman Sticks are another frequent offender - The Levin Factor!

Nick Beggs is another prog stickist. Although he uses Spectors when not tapping.

Edited January 14, 2020 by ezbass

[Dad3353]

Not what one might call classic 'prog rock', but another approach to what to do with a bass guitar. Try listening to Jack Casady here, playing 'Live' ...

Bless Its Pointed Little Head (Jefferson Airplane...) Here's the 'intro' track; it just gets betterer and betterer once launched, so give it a few moments while the pre-show b&w film ends (King Kong is being attacked by the airplanes at the top of the Empire State Building...).

 

Edited January 14, 2020 by Dad3353

[fleabag]

I saw Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen back in the 70's when i was embryonic

Band was Hot Tuna - heady days indeed

[4000]

1 hour ago, Bilbo said:

It may be my imagination but every band I see, live or on video seem to with have a Rickenbacker or SOUND like they have a Rickenbacker. Maybe Progressive Rock has stopped Progressing (Chapman Sticks are another frequent offender - The Levin Factor!)

I don’t think any of the more recent Prog bands I’ve seen have Rics or sound like Chris (although I use Rics and have a version of “that” Ric sound - not the same as Chris’s though - we’re not a Prog band, although we have some Prog influences).
What have you been listening to? I’ll admit I’m not up to date on Prog bands, really; as discussed in previous threads, most of the modern Prog bands veer too much into metal territory for my liking (Not that I don’t like metal, but I like my Prog old-school and uplifting, acoustic guitars and Mellotrons).
Obviously older bands like Druid and Renaissance have a Squire thing going on, but I can’t really think of anyone modern. Last thing I can think of would probably be Spock’s Beard. I’d be grateful to hear any suggestions. 
One thing I would say is that you could argue the same about Jaco and certain types of Jazz. 

 

 

[skidder652003]

Love steven wilson for more modern prog and of course Radiohead are sublime

[4000]

Of course the other thing I have to say is that for a lot people Chris has the best tone ever, so it’s hard not to want to pinch a bit of it.😉

[4000]

2 minutes ago, skidder652003 said:

Love steven wilson for more modern prog and of course Radiohead are sublime

See to me neither have any sort of Squire approach. A trebly bass sound (e.g. Beggs) does not a Chris Squire clone make. 

[skidder652003]

Just now, 4000 said:

See to me neither have any sort of Squire approach. A trebly bass sound (e.g. Beggs) does not a Chris Squire clone make. 

absoloutely, love the Squire

The Yes Album in my top 5 all time favourites

 

[Bilbo]

Don't get me wrong. I love Chris Squire. I just don't want to be him 😃

[StickyDBRmf]

OK I like the new Gong. And there's a band from my stomping grounds - Princeton NJ USA called Cactus Karma that sounds like National Health/Henry Cow sorta. Dave Stewart definitely. I'm trying to do/sound different on Stick will post when I get something recorded. Funny, no appologees here my biggest initial bass influence is Criss & the main reason I wanted a Stick was the T.L. SOUND but I sound NOTHING  like either of them. And the Stick community kinda depresses me 'cause it usually sounds like treacly covers with no balls (am I gonna be censored?), testicles? What do you chaps call them in polite society? , or Bach stuff. I will search my other stuff & post accordingly.

[dmccombe7]

Must admit i haven't bought or listened to many of the more recent Prog bands. When you say new prog bands how far are you going back. ?

Altho i appreciate how great CS was i was never one for emulating his sound mainly because i don't use a pick and for some odd reason the prog bands i like don't generally have that bass sound either with maybe the odd exception.

I'm talking :-

Arjen Luccassen - Lost In the New Real album,

IQ - Road of Bones,

various Anathema albums,

various Mystery albums

Steve Wilson - Hand Cannot Erase

Sound of Contact - Dimensionaut (probably in my top 3 best Prog albums ever)

I tend to buy select albums from an artist these days unlike when i was younger and would buy every album no matter if it was good or bad.

From memory the albums listed have no CS Ric sounding bass on them.

Dave

 

 

[SpondonBassed]

1 hour ago, StickyDBRmf said:

What do you chaps call them in polite society?

Gonads!

(That isn't something I'd encourage cheerleaders to shout at a football game by the way.)

Edited January 14, 2020 by SpondonBassed

[SpondonBassed]

Is prog still a cult thing?  If so I'd suggest that accessibility for the mass listening public would demand familiar sounds to keep less interested parties as followers.  Yes has to be one of the better known prog bands of all time.

I thought I was into prog because I liked Mike Oldfield but I was only scratching the surface as it turns out.  I.T. has made it possible for me to time travel back to the other artists' recordings and expand my appreciation somewhat.

Oldfield's bass was quite hooky in my opinion.  I don't know of many who adopted his sound.

Edited January 14, 2020 by SpondonBassed

[Woodinblack]

I must admit that I don't hear the chris squire thing in modern prog that much, although on the last steve hacket gig the guy did have a ric! 

My favourite would be prog rock and I don't even have a ric copy <shuffles the chapman stick slightly out of view>

[4000]

41 minutes ago, Woodinblack said:

I must admit that I don't hear the chris squire thing in modern prog that much, although on the last steve hacket gig the guy did have a ric! 

My favourite would be prog rock and I don't even have a ric copy <shuffles the chapman stick slightly out of view>

I saw ‘em with a Nick Beggs and he didn’t. But then Rutherford used one up to and including Selling England, so a Ric makes sense in context.

[4000]

3 hours ago, Bilbo said:

Don't get me wrong. I love Chris Squire. I just don't want to be him 😃

Oh I know you’re a fan from comments you’ve made. I was just wondering if you had any examples of Squire-a likes? I’m not really hearing any, but as I say, I’m maybe out of the loop a bit. Obviously bands like The Musical Box and Hackett (also Howe in Yes and Lee Pomeroy with the other Yes!).

I love the crunchy Ric sound. It’s one of my all-time favourite instrument sounds, from Roger Glover on Machinehead, through Rutherford, Camp, Squire and Lemmy Etc. Many, if not most, of my favourite-sounding bands have a variation on that sound (I’ll also include Made in Europe and almost anything by The Stranglers for a P-Bass variation of the same thing, as well as much of Entwistle’s output). Oh, and Martin Turner on Ric & TBird. I guess I always gravitated towards it.
Ironically Chris was probably the last well-known player I heard using that kind of sound, although he instantly became my favourite. I was already using a variation on that sound years before I heard him. But all of the players mentioned above, including others like Geddy, sound different to me. Yes, they’re all trebly & have that grit, and for the most part they’re busy, melodic players, but to me at least, they don’t sound the same at all. 

l mentioned Jaco and the millions of Jaco disciples before. I hear far more back pickup favouring, 16th playing ghost noted players than anything else. And of course the Marcus-Wannabees....

Edited January 14, 2020 by 4000

[Woodinblack]

8 hours ago, 4000 said:

I saw ‘em with a Nick Beggs and he didn’t. But then Rutherford used one up to and including Selling England, so a Ric makes sense in context.

Nick beggs does actually have a Ric, but didn't use it with Steve Hacket the year before but the current guy Jonas Reingold is a ric player. Not really that Chris Squire like though.

[mikel]

Well, the whole ethos of prog was that it moved on, evolved and was Inventive. Hence the term progressive rock.

[Jus Lukin]

-

Edited March 4, 2022 by Jus Lukin

[Bilbo]

As well as being before a Squire fan, my favourite bass sound is Martin Brierley on Greenslade 'Time and Tide' which is a Ric. 

The gritty bass referred to throughout this thread is the problem. I think the nuanced differences some of you reference goes over my head as, I would argue, the idea that other fusion players not sounding like Jaco does people who don't listen to a lot of those kinds of music. Beggs is a gritty growler, Jon Poole of Lifesigns. What set this off is the recording I did recently with a Prog band and the suggestion made during those sessions that the toppy growl was great because it 'cuts through' (the assumption being that cutting through was important. I always considered Geddy Lee to be a Squire disciple, even to this day. 

[Skybone]

Geddy at least admits that he's a Squire disciple.

And Ox, and Jack Casady...