BERNARD EDWARDS / CHIC - Le Freak / ISOLATED BASS

[Bart Funk Bass]

 

[JJTee]

Glorious. Seriously tight. Can hear the flatwound strings clearly during the bridge - that glassy harmonic edge.

[Belka]

Thanks for posting. I heard that actually the strings on his MusicMan were half-rounds rather than full flatwounds. Certainly dead sounding anyway. 

Interestingly, whereas a lot of isolated tracks show a level of dirt and sloppiness that isn't apparent in the final mix, Bernard seems to play very cleanly and with a light touch (I'd guess that those harmonics you can hear in the bridge are due to not pressing down that hard on the fretboard, although it could be a right hand thing). His muting is also very good - no lower strings ringing out in when he does parts in the upper register. 

[MartinB]

Yeah, GHS Brite Flats were the stock strings apparently. Those repeated notes on the bridge could be played on the 5th and 7th frets, so even careful fret-hand muting would probably still let those harmonics through! It's nice to be reminded that even the greats are only human... and that the mix hides a multitude of sins 😆

[JJTee]

One thing slightly puzzling me is that in a Bass Player article about the song, Nile Rodgers said Bernard plugged straight into the desk to record it (with the band playing live, together). Yet on this I can hear what sounds like a bleed of the track from some headphones. 
Any ideas?

[Muzz]

This makes me very happy indeed - I've always been very down on the slight hesitation/timing issue I have for the roots in the bridge part, but now I can hear even Bernard didn't get them bang on all the time...still a million miles better than a quantised version, though... 🙂

[MoonBassAlpha]

5 hours ago, JJTee said:

One thing slightly puzzling me is that in a Bass Player article about the song, Nile Rodgers said Bernard plugged straight into the desk to record it (with the band playing live, together). Yet on this I can hear what sounds like a bleed of the track from some headphones. 
Any ideas?

Tape crosstalk?

[drTStingray]

Bernard (from the live performances Ive seen) plucked the strings very close to the bridge - I wondered if that influenced the level of overtones on the upper strings (and maybe they're heightened by the level of compression in use).

Whatever, it's a great performance of a great line. Love the bass sound as well - some modern producers could learn a thing or two from this - I'm astonished hearing modern disco with such imprecise and wooly bass sounds - just hearing the subtle use of both very short notes and longer and in some cases, slid ones in this is an eye opener - the magic is in the subtlety (although not on here the reversed hand claps in the instrumental break is another example of clever production ideas) which all combined create a magical and classic disco song.  

Edited April 2, 2021 by drTStingray

[nilebodgers]

The muting is really very good on this. One of the greats for sure.

[JJTee]

And all to think that this song is the result of being refused entry to Studio 64, a couple of bottles of champagne and a sweary jam at Nile’s apartment. Oh, and a couple of very gifted musicians...

[JJTee]

It’s those octave turnaround fills that always have me struggling. Very nimble fingers to get that octave note and return to the root as tightly as Bernard. And so consistent - super tight all the way through, with (according to Nile) it all done in one take with no punch-ins.

Edited April 2, 2021 by JJTee

[JJTee]

4 hours ago, MoonBassAlpha said:

Tape crosstalk?

Good call 

[Muzz]

4 hours ago, JJTee said:

It’s those octave turnaround fills that always have me struggling. Very nimble fingers to get that octave note and return to the root as tightly as Bernard. And so consistent - super tight all the way through, with (according to Nile) it all done in one take with no punch-ins.

That was what I was happy about; he's not quite super tight all the way through...not something detectable on the finished record, though, and as I said, definitely better than perfectly quantised...

[Richie-X]

Has anybody been smart enough to download and save this ?
I am desperately looking for that track, but it has vanished ...
and I can't locate it anywhere else ...

Thanks a lot in advance

Richie

[pete.young]

We could ask @Bart Funk Bass , he was on the site earlier this week.

[Muzz]

There's an app called Moises, which uses AI to split mp3s/wavs, etc down into mixable tracks (it's very, very good), and you can drop everything out but the bass. Free for a few goes, it's also a great practice app...

 

[Bart Funk Bass]

On 19/10/2023 at 09:36, Richie-X said:

Has anybody been smart enough to download and save this ?
I am desperately looking for that track, but it has vanished ...
and I can't locate it anywhere else ...

Thanks a lot in advance

Richie

 

 

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