Musical turning points

[Rayman]

I was chatting to a muso mate a couple of nights ago, and we got onto the subject of a particular point in time when some song, or gig or whatever suddenly changed your musical direction or even tastes almost overnight.

Until Bassday 06 in Manchester I was pretty much a rocker, P bass, slung low, pound the strings like there's no tomorrow and make sure it's loud. I liked other genres, some Jazz, some Funk etc, but not to any great extent.

Then I saw Adam Nitti live for the first time at bassday. I remember just thinking, my god, that's what I want to sound like, I want to hear more stuff like that. To me, his sound is perfect, and it instantly changed the way I thought about bass guitar and music generally. It just opened my eyes and ears to a whole different world. It looked so effortless and relaxed, but the tones coming from his fingers just blew me away.

This is the song that did it.....

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoLqaQmlx1Y&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoLqaQmlx1Y...feature=related[/url]

[Doddy]

Seeing Marcus Miller at Sankeys in Manchester in '96 did it for me. I'd only been playing for a few months and had not
heard him yet. My dad took me to the gig and it blew me away. The feel,the groove,the playing,the sound,the energy
and the music just changed my whole perception of the instrument.

[Rayman]

[quote name='Doddy' post='922950' date='Aug 12 2010, 05:24 PM']Seeing Marcus Miller at Sankeys in Manchester in '96 did it for me. I'd only been playing for a few months and had not
heard him yet. My dad took me to the gig and it blew me away. The feel,the groove,the playing,the sound,the energy
and the music just changed my whole perception of the instrument.[/quote]

I still haven't seen Marcus live. I'm a big fan, and had a ticket to see him on the recent Tutu tour in London, but guess what? It was the same night as Bassday last November, where I was due to do a masterclass with.......Adam Nitti. So I wasn't going to miss out on that, and didn't go to see Marcus. His usual drummer Poogie Bell made an appearance at bassday though, and that was great fun, he's a funny bloke and an amazing drummer too.

[Truckstop]

When I got Dream Theater Scenes From A Memory DVD for my 15th birthday. Never heard of Dream Theater before then and they just blew me away. The next day, I bought my first 6 string and honestly, have not touched anything since with less strings.

Truckstop

[Doddy]

[quote name='Rayman' post='922960' date='Aug 12 2010, 05:35 PM']I still haven't seen Marcus live. I'm a big fan, and had a ticket to see him on the recent Tutu tour in London, but guess what? It was the same night as Bassday last November, where I was due to do a masterclass with.......Adam Nitti. So I wasn't going to miss out on that, and didn't go to see Marcus. His usual drummer Poogie Bell made an appearance at bassday though, and that was great fun, he's a funny bloke and an amazing drummer too.[/quote]

Yeah I was at Bassday last year. I was hovering at the back of the Nitti masterclass.He's a great player.
Poogie is a downright funky drummer too.

[Rayman]

[quote name='Doddy' post='922972' date='Aug 12 2010, 05:44 PM']Yeah I was at Bassday last year. I was hovering at the back of the Nitti masterclass.He's a great player.[/quote]

I was the clown at the front, with the borrowed white Spector, pretending to understand what he was talking about.

[brick]

[quote name='Doddy' post='922972' date='Aug 12 2010, 05:44 PM']Poogie is a downright funky drummer too.[/quote]

really need to check out more of his stuff, liked his playing with MM and the live album he recorded with Erykah Badu is pretty epic

Edited August 12, 2010 by brick

[nick]

Acid House 1990
Up until then was just playing the usual bog-standard indie style basslines, but like a lot of people found myself going to certain clubs of Manchester at the time. That type of music totally opened my hears (and mind) to how a simple well played bassline, can groove so much more, than something frantic or flashy.
After that, next point was rediscovering Northern Soul & Motown, which I had liked at school (was a mod); another form of dance music with great examples of interplay between bass & drums.

[cycrowave]

Seeing nick oliveri with qotsa, Halloween in my home town. He was naked, painted as a skeleton standing atop the left speaker stack for most of the gig. Before then I was mostly into jazz and funk bass players, but all of a sudden I decided playing with a pick was not sacrilege but a necessary tool for certain scenarios.

[Pete Academy]

Apart from hearing Stan's School Days album and Mahavishnu's Birds Of Fire, buying the AWB's white album and EWF's That's The Way Of The World.

[ShergoldSnickers]

Going round to a mate's house to listen to a new album he'd got...

Larks Tongues in Aspic - King Crimson

He hated it. It just massively clicked with me.

Edited August 12, 2010 by ShergoldSnickers

[niceguyhomer]

What a fantastic tone Russ

I would say the biggest turning point musically for me was the album that had the most profound effect on me and that was Hot Rats - it completely changed my outlook on music.

[xilddx]

I had a biggie on Monday when I improvised a jazz walking bass line for a cover of SoaD's Chop Suey! at Kit's rehearsal. I so enjoyed doing that, never played walking bass before, well not for more than a minute or two as a warm up jam or something. I think I will become addicted, there's something deeply satisfying about it. I need to learn some theory and practice a helluva lot though instead of trying to play what I'm singing in my head and not hitting many of the notes I'm after.

I posted a clip here looking for jazz head opinions. [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=98636"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=98636[/url]

[Mog]

My first time seeing The Prodigy live really opened my eyes.Was about '95 I reckon, an open air gig in a stadium. Unbelieveable show.
Just about any Bjork gig will knock me back a bit too, musical perfection!

[johnnylager]

Good topic, initially it was Cliff - Aria basses, Boogie rig, awesome solos & met him in '86 in London. Then I went off the boil [as you do] and was handed my 'give up or play up' moments by Larry Boothroyd of [i]Victims Family[/i] & Rob Wright of [i]Nomeansno [/i]- utter bass geniuses the both of them.

[the_skezz]

A couple of things moved me more from heavy metal/rock to a more punk way of thinking. Seeing the Damned support Motorhead for starters, had a brilliant time and the band had tonnes of energy. Then listening to the stuff my dad was playing me (Ramones/Stranglers etc.) and grew to absolutely love it...the fact that players such as JJ. Burnel and Paul Simonon had better basslines than the majority of metal bassists I know didn't hurt either

[Mr Fudge]

Rush NEC 1982

[Rich]

Seeing Level 42 performing 'Foundation & Empire' live on Channel 4 in 1983.

[Mr. Foxen]

First Caricatures practice, where I realised all the technique and theory I'd been learning was a bit pointless, and I needed lots more amps and to be much louder.

[frank]

In the late 80s early 90s i was a heavy metal trash metal freak ,i was starting to branch out into other styles a little bit
and then i went to a Bootsy collins gig. It blew my head off. Had never seen or heard anything like it.

It was a magical Gig and kinda strange ( in a good way ) cause most of the crowd seemed to feel as into it as i was,
we were all completely under Bootsy s spell. Very few gigs have come close to it since.

Anyway now im into all kinds of stuff and that was the turning point, thanks Bootsy

[michael-faces]

I think mine must have been first listening Billy Sheehan. He really changed my outlook on bass, especially his NV solo; after that I branched out to guys like Michael Manring, Stu Hamm, Victor Wooten... all guys that I hadn't even heard of.

[yorick]

Seeing Celtic Frost in the 80's. Martin Eric Ain blew me away.

[BigRedX]

The first one was the most important one.

It was 1971 and I was 10 and had gone away on a two week summer holiday where I was exposed to Radio 1 for the first time all day every day.

Up to that point my interest in music had been minimal. My parents had dragged me to some classical music concerts that had bored me to death and that was it. Thos two weeks certainly opened my ears to sounds that were fun and exciting. There was lots that I was interested in but the standout songs were "Hot Love" by T.Rex and "Get Down and Get With It" by Slade.

By the time I got home I knew what I wanted to be able to play this fantastic music that I had discovered. Unfortunately my parents were dead against this loud and noisy pop "music" and it took almost 2 years of pestering to persuade them to buy me an acoustic guitar for my birthday. Of course if getting to play music hadn't been such a struggle in the early days I doubt it would have held my attention for quite so long and I might have moved on the other things by now - something I still like to remind my mum when I see her!

[JTUK]

Playing with a REALLY top-notch drummer was a real eye-opener for me.
Still the best musician I have ever played with.

2nd was playing with keyboard player who really knew his way round the keyboard and in all manner of styles.
Hum the top line to a classic golden oldie, give him a few minutes to suss out the changes and rounds and we'd be busking the song I'd never even heard of.
No dots or charts.
I'd be trying to hang onto his wanderings and I've seen him make many an older couples day just by playing their favourite
sentimental song. I don't know where these people got these songs from and I don't know where he got them from either, but the sheer delight on the customers faces..well, that blew me away more than a good few times.

Edited August 13, 2010 by JTUK

[OliverBlackman]

Wild cherry, play that funky music. Never grooved anything until then, now im a lean mean grooving machine