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Larry Graham - bass playing equivalent of Jimi Hendrix?


paulconnolly
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[quote name='tauzero' timestamp='1351599922' post='1853058']
Hendrix is familiar by name to at least 95% of non-musicians who listen to rock music, and his work is familiar to 95% of musicians who play guitar.
[/quote]

I think that is because he sung and fronted his own band,rather than because of his guitar playing. If he'd have just played
guitar,no matter how good you think he was,he wouldn't have been even half as familiar to most people.

In a similar way,Larry Graham is more well know (at least in the US) for singing 'One in a Million You' than he is for playing
bass.

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[quote name='cheddatom' timestamp='1351588588' post='1852849']
was anyone else using effects on bass like LG before he did it?
[/quote]

Anthony Jackson's phased part on For The Love Of Money, though I'm guessing it will have happened alongside what Larry Graham was doing also as opposed to being before it.

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[quote name='thisnameistaken' timestamp='1351606978' post='1853182']
And Entwistle most of the time sounds like he's bored stiff and desperately trying to entertain himself.
[/quote]

Harsh. 'Live at Leeds' sounds more like he's an unstoppable force of nature trying to rein himself in...much like Jimi in fact :P

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[quote name='LawrenceH' timestamp='1351611792' post='1853250']
What about the heavy bass fuzz on the Beatles' 'Think For Yourself' in 1965?
[/quote]

just checked out his diary, I didn't realise most of his stuff was from the 70s onwards. I should have known I didn't have the knowledge for a topic like this! I just thought it was the one area where the comparison works.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Embarrassed to admit this, but I hadn't heard of Larry until tonight when he was in Jool Holland. Thoroughly enjoyed his song, though I'm not a big slap fan. What was he playing? Bit like a Jazz, but neck pickup was strangely angled.

On the whole 'bass Jimi' question.... Forget it! I don't think bass and guitar are really comparable. Jaco is nothing like Jimi really - Jaco was technically perfect, and could have easily held his own with classical musicians. Wooten is like a refined modern equivalent, though obviously has his own distinctive style. Jamerson did lay the foundations, but not exactly difficult to replicate. Entwistle..... Love what he did, maybe the closest the bass world has to a ' Jimi'. My knowledge of Larry is limited, but I think it's fair to say he didn't do as much for bass as Jimi did for guitar, nor for music as a whole. Did he invent slap? Probably not a fair thing to say, double bass players were using this for many years before him.

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I didn't see it tonight,but I saw the short show on Tuesday,and he was using a Moon bass like he's
been doing for years (I bet Warwick weren't too chuffed).

Did he invent slap bass? As far as the Electric Bass goes,he is usually credited with doing just that,although
there are claims that Louis Johnson also developed the technique independently around the same period.
Yes,Upright players have slapped for years,but Electric slap is a very different technique

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[quote name='paulconnolly' timestamp='1351457236' post='1851450']
Today's Sunday Times culture section has an article on Larry Graham claiming that "he did for electric bass what Jimi Hendrix did for electric guitar". Well did he?

[/quote]

Whoever wrote that article had clearly never heard of Colin Hodgkinson.

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[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1351512876' post='1851911']
It's a throwaway statement.

No more point to it than saying Larry Graham did for bass what Nancy Sinatra did for boots, or Bernard Matthews did for British turkey farming.
[/quote]
I don't think it's fair to compare Jimi Hendrix to the might of Bernard Matthews. Jimi couldn't hold a candle to him. :D

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