Who made you decide "I'm going to play bass!"

[Cameronj279]

Just curious as to who every bodies main 'idols' would be. For me it was Les Claypool and Ryan Martinie. Just after a while of listening I decided "I want to be able to do that"

So yeah, who inspires you!?

[LukeFRC]

no one. someone gave me a bass and showed me how to play (ironically) seven nation army, and it was fun so I kept going

[kevin_lindsay]

Jean-Jacques Burnel from The Stranglers!!!!!

I heard that fabulously grungy bass sound and thought "I want to do THAT"!!!

[Cameronj279]

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1339255778' post='1685984']
no one. someone gave me a bass and showed me how to play (ironically) seven nation army, and it was fun so I kept going
[/quote]

First song I ever learned to play (and wasn't that long ago in all honesty), I quiver in pain at hearing the song now just 'cause it was all I could do for about a month Shame too, I really liked that song

[KingBollock]

Steve Harris and Lemmy. If my Dad had had his way I'd have been a Drummer. If I'd have had my way I'd have had a Radio Controlled Monster Truck.

[BottomE]

After a brief start into guitar i soon realised that the thrusting and histrionics weren't for me so i tried bass and never looked back. That was about 1978/1979 something like that. Bass Idols:

Marcus Miller
Rocco (Tower of Power)
Willie Week(e)s
Ron Carter
Anyone who plays a tasty line that suits the composition.

[ezbass]

Pino was the guy who made me want to take it up originally back in the early 80s although I was also well aware of John Entwistle and Andy Fraser too. However, after a couple of years of not getting anywhere bandwise with the bass, I was ask to join a band to play rhythm guitar. Thus the next nigh on 20 years were spent on the thin stringed thing. As time went on I got disillusioned with guitar (I was OK at it, but was always playing catch up with my peers who made it all look and sound so effortless) and became aware of Roscoe Beck, Tony Levin, Chuck Rainey and a reborn Pino, all of which made me want to go back to bass. And so here I am, all the players mentioned previously have had an influence together with Rocco Prestia and the lesser known Chris Childs (Thunder, Illegal Eagles, Bad Influence.....). So glad I came back to the low side

[Big_Stu]

Jimmy Lea of Slade; yes - I set my sights ridiculously high.

[Rayman]

Jean Jaques Burnel, 1979. I heard Hanging Around, and that was it.

[Doctor J]

I saw this tune played a couple of months after this video was taken and the 14 year old me thought bass was the coolest instrument in the world and that I had to play it.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUAAbO1-jjU[/media]

Obviously, I was way off but I've really enjoyed playing bass all the same.

[Hobbayne]

Circa 1980, I was into the 2 tone stuff, Specials and Madness. Sir Horace and Bedders got me listing to the bass for the fist time. Bruce Foxton was my insperation with his plectrum powered lines.

[rogerstodge]

Jean Jacques Burnel after seeing him on the Raven tour....... Fantastic

[BassBus]

Can't give one name as it was one of two people. 1977 and Alan Freeman played Pink Floyd's Sheep on his Saturday Rock show and I thought " I want to play that". So either David Gilmore of Roger Waters, whoever played bass on that track.

[yorks5stringer]

Eric Weatherley was the guy who switched me on to Bass...who?

He was a guy my age14- 15ish? at Walbottle School talking about music ( he hung around with quite a lot of guys much older). I suspect he may have been repeating what one of them had said but was saying how the Bass seemed to underpin everything in a song and how all the parts were different but fitted together and I thought, "that's how I feel about the Bass too" although I'd never articulated it.
So thanks, "Wefty", you set me off on a 40 year journey fulll of quite a few Basses, false starts and current impotence, but I've enjoyed the trip!

Oh, and Bassists who were heroes of the time included Colin Hodgkinson (saw Backdoor twice in the early 70's), Trevor Bolder (Spiders from M.a.r.s) and James Jamerson.

[plumbob]

Well we had a 3 piece drums, guitar and keyboards, and we just couldn’t find any bass players, so some how it was decided that I should play bass.

After purchasing said instrument, and I think only having it less than a week, the rest of the band turned up at my 18[sup]th[/sup] birthday party, they left me a present, Level 42 Standing in the Light album with an accompanying note which read “Happy Birthday we think you should play bass like this guy !”

Of course I can only deduce from this, that I must have been one hell of a sh*te guitarist !!!!

Mind you I did see Dave Gilmour stood on a wall playing Comfortably Numb at Earls Court in 1979, which did slightly blow my mind, and I instantly bought a stringed instrument, two strings too many but hey ho !!!!

[Phantomnin]

Mark King (Don't groan). A quick report about him on BBC breakfast. Much to my parents iritation, I went out and bought a bass, even though they had bought me a saxaphone six months before.
The funny thing is I'm good at some things on bass, but I suck at the machine gun slap stuff.

Drew

[KingBollock]

Just to explain my previous post...

I was 12 and my Dad had decided that my 3 brothers and me were going to be a band and he was going to manage it. None of us had ever played any instruments before, and while My Dad had bought a Classical Acoustic Guitar and a Chromatic Harmonica, he'd never played either of them. For some reason he decided that I was going to play Drums and that's what I was going to get for Christmas. I desperately wanted the Tamiya Lunchbox Radio Controlled Monster Truck (I still do!). I was a huge Iron Maiden and Motorhead fan at the time (and still am, well, at least of Motorhead. I still love the early Iron Maiden (upto and including Seventh Son of a Seventh Son), so the Bass player was important in the music I was listening to. I also knew a few Guitarists and Drummers in school, but not a single Bass player. It made sense to me that if I played Bass I would always be able to get into a band and I really didn't want to what my Dad said, just because he'd said it. I explained this to my Dad (not the bit about not wanting to play Drums because that's what he wanted me to do) and he thought it was a good idea and I got my first Bass, a Westone Raider I in Silver/Grey, that Christmas.
My next youngest brother (I am the oldest) was a promising Guitarist, it seemed to come naturally to him, though he never played in a band that hadn't been put together by me. He stopped playing altogether when Heroin became more important than the Guitar. Such a shame.

[Mornats]

Well, Gene Simmonds from Kiss was my favourite band member. He had the coolest makeup at the time. But the players that made me want to play bass are Geddy Lee, Les Claypool, Billy Gould from Faith No More and Flea. Strangely enough, I don't actually like playing slap bass despite these influences.

[MacDaddy]

Nikki Sixx

running around, throwing shapes and posing. Yep thought I, I'll have some of that.

[paul h]

My mate Steve already played guitar so I got stuck with bass.

[Dazzlovski]

The 80's and 90's were a heavy influence on my playing style, but I'm giving full credit to Bruce Foxton in making me wanna pick up the bass..
He had a great tone and there were so many great riffs that needed learning (after school)..

Happy days.

[discreet]

Bill Wyman. Aston 'Family Man' Barrett. Robbie Shakespeare. Joe Osborn. Holger Czukay. Greg Lake. Tina Weymouth.

[Lfalex v1.1]

My Dad suggested I take up an instrument when I was 19. I immediately asked for drums. That got vetoed, so I went for bass...
the next bit goes just like this....

[quote name='KingBollock' timestamp='1339261454' post='1686082']
..... I was a huge Iron Maiden and Motorhead fan at the time (and still am, well, at least of Motorhead. I still love the early Iron Maiden (upto and including Seventh Son of a Seventh Son), so the Bass player was important in the music I was listening to....he thought it was a good idea and I got my first Bass, a Westone Raider I in Silver/Grey, that Christmas.....
[/quote]

...Right down to the Westone Raider 1, which I still own.

Spooky!

[Johngh]

For me without a doubt it was Glenn Hughes during his time with Deep Purple. At the time when I got into Purple they had just realeased Come Taste the Band, and were just about to implode.
It was one of those great times when someone gets you into a band and you buy their back catalogue. There's no doubt Roger Glover is an exceptional player, but Glenn's funky style just clicked with me. And nade me think the bass is for me.

One other guy who deserves some credit at the time is Pete Surgey who is bass player with NWOBHM band Witchfynde. I had got to know Pete and we started to hang out together. He had a Aria SB900 in Witchfynde at the time, I went to his house and he showed me how to play a few bass lines and then took me to Carlsboro Sound in Mansfield and got me set up with a Jazz copy a whacking great bass bin and a Peavey amp. There was no poxy practice amp for me it was straight in with a full gig rig.

[Marvin]

Got lumped with it. I always wanted to play lead guitar...probably because I'm a tosser . But anyway, it was either bass or not being in the band with my mates.