Just watching The Cure at the IOW festival. Their bass player has plenty to do. I’m not a bass aficionado but there area some pretty complex arrangements going on there. And he’s 66 years old. Fair play to him.
So, who else is having to put in a shift and perhaps not getting the recognition they deserve?
17 song set and a 10 song encore according to setlist.fm.
Good effort.
I was playing some Cure songs in a party band at the weekend and can confirm that the bass parts aren’t as easy as they sound, but are very satisfying when everyone gets it right.
My nomination is another bass player – Mick Quinn of Supergrass, who I’m off to see next Sunday. Inventive, bouncy bass lines and top backing vocals. He’s holding it all together, and then some.
I’ve always been impressed by Mick. He would have been worshipped by bassists everywhere, if he was born 20 years earlier (I’m thinking Entwhistle, Bruce, Squire.)
Actually the whole band qualifies as hard working.
If we are talking bassists, ex-Glencoe, Blockhead and WJB, Norman Watt-Roy is still gigging all over, now mainly for the pleasure. One regular current gig is with the James Oliver Band, not that one, clearly, but he gets some time off, now he’s 75. Another occasional sideman in the same band is Geraint Watkins, erstwhile key tinkler for everyone from Van to Macca, having been first a Balham Alligator. The days he is also a member of a revived Slim Chance as well as backing Reg Meuross’ Fire & Dust project. Also 75.
That’s a great shout. Always the first to be sweating through the stage suit is NWR. The Blockheads were a brilliant, tight sounding outfit.
I recall doing fascinated as the shirt got darker with the sweat and it falling from his face. This was with Wilko at the Holmfirth Picturedrome.
James Oliver Band are a great watch too!
Can someone more musical tell me I’m wrong, but Cliff Williams from AC/DC appears to have it slightly easier then many?
update: Just read his wikipedia page. The answer appears to be: yes.
Looks like he’s had (and continues to have) a very nice life!
Other bassists I feel slightly sorry for:
Ged Grimes has been in Simple Minds for 16 years, and has to churn out Derek Forbes’ lines every night, yet nobody knows or cares who he is. And he has to play alongside a drummer who smiles all the time.
Ditto: that fella* in New Order. Half the audience hate him for who he is not, the other half don’t care who he is.
(*) I looked him up so you don’t have to: Tom Chapman. Me neither.
There was a time in the 00s where every new band seemed to have someone called Tom Chapman in it. He’s probably one of those.
I think it’s a truism: “Hardest Working People in Music” are the bass players.
(#notbiasedatall)
If memory serves, Tom Chapman was the bassist in Bernard Sumner’s ill feted Bad Lieutenant project from 2009. That band was supposed to be a vehicle for the collaboration between Sumner and Blur’s Alex James, but the latter had to (presumably) drop out due to that year’s Blur reunion. So Chapman has form for replacing someone else.
I still refer to the extra guitarist as MarionBloke.
Jeff Tweedy, runs 2 concurrent recording careers, releases triple albums and this year is touring in 3 different incarnations, Wilco, Jeff Tweedy band and solo all over the place
Plus writing very good books in between! What a great guy. How to Write One Song is inspiring, hilarious, and helps explain how his mind works. Very clever stuff.
Yes, books too
A shout out for Damon Albarn here. You think he has been quiet and then a new Gorillaz / Blur / Good Bad & The Queen / Solo album will be released. He never seems to stop