Michael Riehle Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 Okay, so a little while ago my wife and I were doing the stay-up-all-night-and-drink-heavily thing with a friend of ours. As such things go, we started getting into heavy philosophy (oh, yeah, right, Aristotle had nothin' on us, boy http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif ). A question came up about what famous musician would you most like to meet and hang out with. I couldn't come up with an answer... ...until I translated the question as "What musician most influenced my development as a musician?" and started going through my list of influences. My answer led me to think about something that I don't see discussed on lists like this much. Okay, so you have a few bass players who you claim as influences. I'm happy for you. What about non-bass players? See, I realized that Robert Plant had a huge influence on my early musical development. It was sort of round about, but it goes something like this: 1) I loved Led Zeppelin. 2) Robert Plant was a heartthrob for a lot of girls I knew which immediately disqualified him as a "serious" musician. (Look, I was 17, okay?) 3) Then I started hearing him in interviews saying things about how the band started and what he loves about music and generally being a Real Person and pretty much ignoring questions about the heartthrob thing. 4) Then he started listing musicians that influenced him and *none* of them were what I expected. I realized that my view of music had been amazingly narrow. It was totally defined by my high-school friends. So off I went on a quest for new and different things. Later I realized that I was also far too serious about music and had missed the really important point that the reason I play is because it's fun. Fun for me, fun for my bandmates, fun for the audience in a perfect world. I can point to other musicians I learned riffs from. I can tell you about techniques I learned by imitating this bass player or that. But none of that matters as much as the attitude I learned from a vocalist whom I've never actually met. ------------------ Michael Riehle Bass Player/Band Leader fivespeed CA Local Bay Area Music Webring This message has been edited by mriehle on 04-24-2001 at 08:20 PM Michael Riehle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Friedland Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 My first big influence was Johnny Cash! His old variety show on tv in the late 60's, early 70's got me interested in playing. As a matter of fact, all those old shows did that, Hee- Haw, The Glen Campbell Good Time Hour, even the Bobby Goldsboro Show. They all featured live music, and that got me hooked! I think "A Boy Named Sue" is what started me out on my road to John Coltrane! ------------------ www.edfriedland.com www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rumpelstiltskin. Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 i think the red hot chili peppers have really defined what i want from a band. they are mostly a family, made up of friends. they don't really hang out together that much anymore, but they play a lot of music, and you can just see it when they're together on stage how much they love each other and the music they're playing together. it's really beautiful. i'm jealous, because all of my good friends have scattered to different parts of the country and are pursuing their own music. i'm left with the same option, trying to find alcohol/drug free (mostly just drug free) people who can actually write music and have fun. i usually just settle for people who don't do coke, though. http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif so i guess another obliquely musical influence on me are the people who do not do drugs, or maintain the perception that they don't do drugs. not that i respect liars who do drugs and don't want people to know about it, but i am very proud of the people in this business who don't fall into all the regular bullshit about how you're supposed to act and what you're supposed to be. so if someone maintains that image and i'm none the wiser.... there are so few bands and people who don't do drugs (pot is a drug), it really makes their music and their expression stronger to me, because i feel like i better understand who they are, and there is a place in music for people like that. because i like people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xtian_dup1 Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 There are a few people that inspire me musically, and not all of them are musicians. First mention (but not first position) goes to Paul Simon. His melodies, harmonies, and list of incredible songs going back almost 40 years are a huge inspiration to me. Les Claypool is an inspiration in attitude, but not musically. I love Primus, Bob Cock and His Yellow Sock, Holy Mackerel, etc, but I don't want to play like Les. What I admire in Les is his sense of humor, and willingness to try anything. I used to see Primus play for free on Haight Street and in Berkeley on Tuesday nights, and he has always been a free lunatic, doing whatever he wanted, and never really caring if the world ever caught up with him. Mark Kostabi is a painter who uses very strong basic geometric shapes and shadows to display an amazing amount of feeling and humour. The emotional depth of his paintings is all the more stunning due to their simplicity. (You can see some of his work at: http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/features/askmarkkostabi.asp ) Ron Carter is probably the only bass player that I can listen to with my eyes closed, and feel transported. His feel is inspiring... Lemmy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, say what you want about the guy and his music, but he has been doing the same thing for 20 years, making money doing it, having a brilliant time, and has always maintained the power and integrity that makes Motorhead, well... MOTORHEAD! I have an enormous amount of respect for the guy. (And I happen to love the music as well!) And most importantly, the female form. Literally. I love everything about a woman's body...it is the perfect shape to illustrate and inspire music and poetry, and the only thing that light should ever be allowed to touch. Fantastic. These are some of the sources of my inspiration. - Christian Budapest, Hungary Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 1. Robert Johnson. My older cousins used to play his music a lot when I was just a pup. 2. Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. ditto. 3. Peter, Paul, and Mary. And the Kingston Trio. And the rest of the "folk scare" of the sixties. 4. The Beatles. I was in seventh grade when they knocked The Singing Nun off the charts, and changed popular music on the airwaves in a big way. And Paul McCartney as a melodic bass player. 5. Cream. And Jack Bruce. 6. Canned Heat. (Fried Hockey Boogie!) And Larry Taylor. 7. Procol Harum 8. Coltrane 9. It never ends And I agree, for me the context has always been the music as a whole, not just focus on bass. The whole current scene about being a bassist is great, and I like Bass Player Magazine, but it doesn't mean much to me apart from the music. (And as you might expect with this sort of old-fashioned attitude, I spend my time playing songs instead of arpeggios!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BenLoy Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 Many players learn that final lesson sooner or later if they end up getting paid at all... Influences...hmm...so many, so diverse... -Ella Fitzgerald Try transcribing some of her scat solos sometime, they're great stuff and so melodic! -Guy Pratt The guy made me wanna learn to play bass when I saw him funkin' up those Pink Floyd shows. (Waters lovers go ahead and flame). -Jaco Who? http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif -Tony Levin Sublime Restraint -Duck Dunn Ditto. -Chuck Rainey Ditto again. -Jim Creegan (The Barenaked Ladies) I just like him, dammit. His playing is full tasty stuff that bubbles up in droves. And his technique on the double bass is first rate. I'm sure I'm forgetting a couple hundred... http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/wink.gif Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlimT Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 mriehle said: >What about non-bass players? I love reading about influences! I would have to say there were three main influences to get to wanna make music (bass playing only came about 2 years ago). In 1982, after saving all of my money, I bought a Sony Walkman and listened to Mile Davis (Kind of Blue, Four and More?, Live at the Blackhawk) Chick Corea (with Gary Burton on Crystal Silence?, An Evening with Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea, Three Quartets) and record by the Singers Unlimited and the Boss Brass. There was a ton of other music I just loved at various stages in my life (Ted Nugent, Journey, Kansas, Pearl Jam Ten before I saw frat boys partying to it ;-) ). But it was those first tapes that finally motivated me to play bass. The cool thing is that as I progress, those influences will change. It'll be cool to eventually be able to transcribe Jaco lines and study those. Not to mention some of those incredible Eddy Gomez lines on Chick Corea's Three Quartets. Another idea was to listen to some old Bobby McFerrin stuff and transcribe his bass scatting just to go outside the box for awhile. Cool Thread! 8-) SlimT It's all about the rumble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dansouth Posted April 25, 2001 Share Posted April 25, 2001 Originally posted by xtian: And most importantly, the female form. Literally. I love everything about a woman's body...it is the perfect shape to illustrate and inspire music and poetry, and the only thing that light should ever be allowed to touch. Fantastic. Is it a coincidence that the body of an electric bass (or an acoustic guitar) roughly resembles the feminine figure (in a slightly offset sort of way)? I guess that luthiers must be as inspired by women as Christian is. http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Riehle Posted April 25, 2001 Author Share Posted April 25, 2001 Originally posted by Ed Friedland: My first big influence was Johnny Cash! His old variety show on tv in the late 60's, early 70's got me interested in playing. As a matter of fact, all those old shows did that, Hee- Haw, The Glen Campbell Good Time Hour, even the Bobby Goldsboro Show. They all featured live music, and that got me hooked! I think "A Boy Named Sue" is what started me out on my road to John Coltrane! Wow, I completely forgot about the hours I used to spend listening to The Man in Black. DOH! When I was growing up there was always music in the house. In a very real way, the most important musical influences in my life were my parents. There are a number of professional (classical) musicians on my dad's side of the family and my mother's father had a reputation for being able to play any instrument he was handed. I just found out recently that my aunt (My father's sister-in-law) helped support herself in college playing bass in a dance band. Okay, not a blood relation, but I think I can claim to come by it honestly. http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/smile.gif Roy Clark. There's a man whose music I would never want to emulate who nonetheless stands as an example of why I love music. He played to and for his audience without ever leaving himself behind. A masterful musician with a strong vision of his own music and that music touched his fans in important ways. Johnny Cash. Nobody can touch him for sheer bloody-minded dedication to his craft. Bad stuff keeps happening to him and he keeps making music. Hee-Haw gets lots of grief now, but go back and listen to some of the music. The newest crop of country music pretenders could learn a few things. I think shows which feature live music like that were a strong part of the focus on musical culture in the 60's and 70's. Ya know what? I miss 'em. ------------------ Michael Riehle Bass Player/Band Leader fivespeed CA Local Bay Area Music Webring Michael Riehle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Friedland Posted April 26, 2001 Share Posted April 26, 2001 <> AMEN BROTHER!!!! Not to sound sexist or lurid, but it's true that the feminine form is one of the most inspiring creations. Even more than that is L-O-V-E!! When you find a particular "form" that is the home of a soul that you connect with on a deep level, the love that is created can inspire the greatest works of music. The perfect melding of two spirits, yeah, that's what it's about! Ever notice how when you're in love, all those sappy love songs don't sound so sappy anymore? (except perhaps Paul McCartney's "Silly Love Songs", sorry Paul, that one's a bit TOO much even for a diehard romantic like me!) ------------------ www.edfriedland.com www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sbrock1san.rr.com Posted April 26, 2001 Share Posted April 26, 2001 I've been influenced by Jean-Luc Ponty (jazz/fusion violinist). He's had a solo career most of his life and he's always written with a great sense of freedom, because his motivation was never to get radio airplay. His sense of melody and phrasing is outstanding. I've always enjoyed the violin in "popular" music, yet it is rarely used (because I don't listen to country music). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Wise Man Posted April 26, 2001 Share Posted April 26, 2001 More answers to this vital (if I do say so myself) question can be found in the months-old "Non-bass Bass Influences" thread elsewhere on this board. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clockwirk Posted April 27, 2001 Share Posted April 27, 2001 One of my main musical influences has been Sting, but this works in a non-bass influence thread because: a) I'm not first and formost a bass player and b) I've been just as much influenced by the musicians he's worked with as I have by him. It's just his variety of styles and his ability to meld jazz and pop in a way that appeals to the masses AND musicians. I admit, sometimes it seems like he's trying a tad to hard to get every style represented, but to me, his successes greatly out number his failures. some of his musicians that have influenced me: Branford Marsalis, Kenny Kirkland, David Sanctious, Vinnie Coliauta, Manu Katche, Dominic Miller, ..... ~clockwirk~ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blackwon88 Posted April 27, 2001 Share Posted April 27, 2001 JACO STANLEY V WHITE LARRY ALPHONSO JOHN PAUL GETTY Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clockwirk Posted April 27, 2001 Share Posted April 27, 2001 How could I forget Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland? http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/redface.gif ~clockwirk~ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobT Posted April 27, 2001 Share Posted April 27, 2001 Non Bass influences: Miles Davis Dizzy Freddie Hubbard Hendrix Jimmy Page Robert Johnson Pat Metheny Wes Montgomery BB King Bach Vivaldi Beethoven Keith Moon John Bonham Art Blakey Omar Hakim Coltrane Rollins Chick Corea Herbie Hancock Thelonious Monk Ahmad Jamal Horace Silver Dinah Washington Ella Fitzgerald Betty Carter James Brown Marvin Gaye That's all I think of at the moment. I know there are more. I grew up hearng a lot of Blues, R n B and Jazz. My Dad was really into blues and as a teenager growing up and getting over the assumption that it was 'old people's music'. I realize those influences never left me. Now some years later I hear the echoes of these and other folks everytime I pick up an instrument. RobT Famous Musical Quotes: "I would rather play Chiquita Banana and have my swimming pool than play Bach and starve" - Xavier Cugat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Lawson Posted April 29, 2001 Share Posted April 29, 2001 Influences are fascinating especially when you can't hear them in someone's playing, that they have connected on a much less conscious level... I have obvious and non-obvious, and even players I don't really like who have conceptually opened me up to things that I wouldn't otherwise have heard... top of the list at the moment is Bill Frisell - it's a no-brainer, with all the loops and weird stuff, but his melodic sensibility, the lack of boundaries that he draws around his music, his switching from country to rock to swing to plain ole weird in the same tune is really inspiring... Jonatha Brooke shaped the way I think about tunes and chord structures, and is just great and makes me want to play when I listen to her. Bruce Cockburn and Don Ross's solo guitar pieces both gave me technical and textural ideas that I moved across to bass. Fripp, Torn and Eno - soundscapes... Coltrane - emotion in chops, the expressive possibilities of monster techniques... ) Tom Waits - attitude Stevie Wonder - funkiness, exuberance and the magic of an imperfect take... Joni Mitchell - everything - I want to be her... LOL and then just about everything in my music collection... I consciously learnt things from all kinds of places, from the Spice Girls to Arvo Part! cheers Steve www.steve-lawson.co.uk StevieLand - go on, you know you want to! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Friedland Posted April 30, 2001 Share Posted April 30, 2001 Steve, Spice Girls Rule!! http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/wink.gif Other non musical influences: Cycling Working Out Hiking in the mountains I think some of the most inspiring moments are to be had away from music. Then you as the musician take those experiences and trasmute them into sound. ------------------ www.edfriedland.com www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
musicman1ovation.net Posted April 30, 2001 Share Posted April 30, 2001 George Shearing was one of the first to illustrate economy of style. Later, another pianist with a similar lesson was Joe Sample. Sample's less in more sensitivity dates from another great Louis Armstrong. All these folks' playing spoke volumes without a barrage of notes. Silence is golden; one rightly placed note can be more musically satisfying than fifty perfectly executed scalar runs. I was helped by what they didn't play as much as by what they did play. From my Shearing listening time (coming from the folks' LPs on our new "Stereo Hi-Fi"), I picked up a lot from Ray Coniff. I was pre-adolescent, and it pre-dated my interest in rock. Still, while some might see Coniff's arrangements as elevator music bound, when I listened in the early sixties, we'd crank it up high, and I became permanently impressed with how different instruments played together with the same volume "envelope". He'd combine trombones, reeds and voices, which were used in an instrumental as opposed to lyrical way, and the resulting combination would come off like one sound it was a forerunner of synth patch stacking. That same lesson came a little later in Brian Wilson arrangements; combining instruments to create a sound. Combining bell with string ensemble was a signature Wilson voice that later became a staple patch of hundreds of names and variations in virtually every synthesizer since the mid eighties. In the orchestral/symphonic world, hearing combinations as a single sound is a common part of orchestration. Bringing the technique to smaller ensemble pop bands can be traced to the efforts of Coniff, Wilson and others. Going back further into history, I've got a special affinity for Rachmaninov. His very melodic sense of composition and orchestration have always been important to me. Back to pop and continuing from early on, I've been inspired by songwriters like Burt Bacharach, Jimmy Webb, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, and The Beatles. The Beatles' influence was from each of the three writing entities (Lennon/McCartney, George Harrison *AND* Ringo Starr), and the musical influence of each has been remarkable that such a cluster of talent existed in one little four piece band. This being a bass forum, Paul McCartney would be very HIGH on my short list of influential bass players. As rock 'n' roll evolved from something a bit lighter and happy (Twist and Shout) to just ROCK, which could have the seriousness and impact of a dark symphony, all wrapped up in the richly harmonic content of Jimi Hendrix' controlled feedback, I was moved by the turbo blues of Cream and Led Zeppelin. James Brown twisted the wing-nut on tight funk, and later, Tower of Power was popping of brass ensemble jabs with such machine gun accuracy that one would have thought it anal were it not for the natural fluidity of it. Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye they all had a way of inching the mainstream towards fusion. They were solid pop, but I doubt without them that some of my favorites like Chick Corea, Weather Report (Jaco!), and Herbie Hancock would have enjoyed such large audience numbers. It even led to a long-overdue wider-spread recognition of Miles. The problem with lists like this that as I try to go from the beginning, each memory of a musician that connected with me enough to teach something tends to bring more. And even if I went on and on, my list of names would still just be a tiny, tiny percentage of all the music I actually remember from repeated broadcasts or records. And a lot of that music I really loved, even though it didn't actually inspire. One thing is certain; to watch pop music, say from the forties on, has been one amazing evolving train, taking numerous forks in the tracks, and turning what used to be relatively few named genres into the huge number we have now. However, I sometimes wonder if we reached some sort of critical mass; if having recognized the value of world music and jazz on a much larger level, the "record machine" has locked innovation (note: locked innovation isn't innovation), and stamped the box.. Has the public has become more and more eclectic? Or is some sort of subtle homogenization occurring? At first, when various cultural musical aspects started combining it was really cool. Now it gets called "World" music and there are "world music synths" with all the right world music sounds... that smooth world music sound. That smooth jazz. That smooth pop. That smooth rock. I am thinking that what might have appeared as the mass acceptance of jazz, for instance, may really be a larger and more eclectic bag of clichés. Frankly, I've never really gone for extreme avant-garde experimentation in music, although I've always appreciated the fact that it occurs. But I've always enjoyed the fact that Miles often seemed in the process of re-invention. And somehow, I don't see Miles fitting the smooth jazz mold. At this point... in order to shake things up a little, maybe some avant-garde experimentation would bring on that re-invention that musicians enjoy. Corporate types hate re-invention... that is, unless it is financially successful. And then they immediately call re-invention trend. And they tell us trendy is good. Pardon this rambling folks. This isn't a write-off of contemporary music. There's always something happening that I like, but the overall creative atmosphere seems to be subjugated by a market that wants us to believe it has learned to appreciate world music and world class jazz. Maybe I need to wake up and smell the vinyl, but I think we should adhere to the separation of creation and marketing just as we do church and state. The soul of song is in the balance. This message has been edited by musicman1@ovation.net on 04-30-2001 at 02:53 AM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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