What'd You Say to My Old Lady
...or: Why bass guitar kicks ass as a stand-alone blues machine!
Think of music genres as stereotypical kids in a classroom:
- The over-achieving straight-A student (indy/retro)
- The jock (classic rock)
- The cheerleader (pop/dance)
- The shop class kid (country)
- The band geek (jazz)
- The quiet, moody emo (hardcore)
- The out-of-touch rich kid (classical)
- The chip-on-his-shoulder criminal (metal/rap)
- The freaky art student (folk/world/industrial)
Aren't stereotypes fun?
Then there's the kid who sits in the back that hardly gets noticed. He's not a great student but not much of a trouble maker either. He's probably got some sort of learning disability but is pretty bright despite what everyone, including himself, thinks. He's inwardly passionate but not outwardly ambitious. Solid and dependable, he doesn't desire to be the center of attention but he's not shy either and doesn't have a problem making some noise when it's called for.
That's the blues kid.
I've also just described a typical bass player.
The Great James Jameson
A mach made in heaven.
Why then, I say, is guitar the king of the blues?
Lets argue, shall we?
GUITAR: The bass is needs to fill out the bottom end and hold the groove with the drummer, that's it job. It isn't real blues or rock without it.
BASS: Aren't you basically admitting that bass is more critical than guitar? So what's wrong with a couple bass players trading off playing traditional and non-tradition bass?
Dualing bass;
Berklee teacher Jim Stinnett and his former student Mike Gordon of Phish.
GUITAR: So who'd play guitar?
BASS: Who needs it? Why do we have to have guitar? Yeah it's cool and everything but like saxophone, is it really essential every moment of every song?
GUITAR: So all we're left with is “boom, boom boom” nothing else? Guitar is the standard accompaniment for popular vocalized music, it's what has worked for years.
BASS: So what. The harpsichord was the standard accompaniment back when the World was flat , everyone drank mead and died from a cut on their finger. Who says bass has to 'boom' all of the time just because it can?
GUITAR: But the bass is so limited compared to the guitar.
BASS: It depends on how you look at it. The way we have learned to think about the bass is limited not the instrument itself. I say, it is the guitar that is limited compared to the bass guitar. Try hitting a guitar with the full force of your hand. Try snapping the strings. Bass is harmonic melodic and percussive. Yet a bass can be strummed, picked, and finger picked just like a guitar.
GUITAR: But guitar has a greater note range than bass.
BASS: Not as much as you might think. A plain old twenty-four fret, four-string bass has a range of forty notes, not counting harmonics; a standard six-string Stratocaster only has forty seven. Also the harmonic range of the guitar is in more direct conflict with the human voice. This is one reason why blues guitar often plays it's licks in between vocal lines. The predominant frequencies of the modern bass guitar very nicely book-end the human voice both meaty frequencies below and the snappy transient frequencies above, allowing it to play constantly without interfering, unless it chooses to play in that range.
GUITAR: But a bass just doesn't sound like a guitar?
BASS: Yes it does, and no it doesn't. Both are good things. You can plug a bass into a guitar amp and guess what? It can overdrive those tubes, growl and feed back just like a guitar can. Does it sound the same as a guitar then? No, it sounds better, fuller, more intense.
GUITAR: That's just your opinion.
BASS: Yes it is. It is a new sound; I'd like to think a welcome variation, a companion not a replacement. Again, most of the limitations for bass guitar are in our head, how we've chosen to see/hear it.
GUITAR: But tens of thousands of popular songs have used this paradigm to great success. It just works, and if it ain't broken, don't fix it, right?
BASS: But for me, it is broken. All these songs are fine but the bass isn't being used to a fraction of it's potential. I am fighting against a common perception of the bass guitar, inside my own head as well everyone elses'.
I don't really see the guitar as the enemy as I have fun implying. It is a wonderful beautiful instrument and I love to hear all the amazing things that masters have done over the years and continue to push the envelope. It is just sad to me that there aren't more masters on the bass guitar because of this limited perception we seem to all share.
To reenforce a new attitude about bass I have had to kick the guitar to the curb a little. Culturally, the iconic electric guitar is too bright a star. A lot of people will assume what I'm doing is on guitar unless I make a point of stating it's all bass.
One of things I would like to accomplish with this album and this blog to change people's feelings and artificial limitations on the bass, especially other bass players.
GUITAR: Um... can I go now?
BASS: Yeah, we're done here.
“What'd You Say to My old Lady” is probably the closest thing I've written to a traditional blues song right down to the title. I wrote it with the intent of using the bass as a traditional blues vehicle but playing in an non-traditional way.
What'd You Say to My Old Lady
© 2009 Joel T Johnson
What'd you say
To my old lady
To make that poor girl cry
What'd you say
To my old lady
To make that poor little girl cry
When you treat her so bad
I can't look you in the eye
You gone and done it now
She's closed and locked the door
You gone and done it now
She's closed and locked the bedroom door
You know you better
I know you know better
Cuz we've been out here before
(bass solo)
You knew there was trouble
When the words they left your mouth
You knew there was trouble, yes you did
When those words left your mouth
But you went right on ahead, went right on
And let those poison words right out
(drum solo)
What'd you say
To my old lady
To make that poor girl cry
What'd you say
To my old lady
To make that poor little girl cry
When we hurt her so bad
I can't look me in the eye
Dry your tears
The Recording:
The main riff is played as pop and snap 'thumb' technique. Coupled with the distortion of the guitar amp and with a slowed-down back porch blues rhythm it sounds worlds away from the funk and R&B world that technique was born in.
Just to mess things up further, the after the third verse I throw a bone to the other neglected instrument in the blues world: drums. The drum solo I tried to keep from being an indulgent look-at-me arena solo but instead, what a blues solo should be: an expression of feeling within the context and structure of the song.
In the recording I used a greater proportion of room mics in the mix to give it a raw, un-produced sound, then juxtaposed that with plenty of compression to keep it 'in-your-face' and somewhat modern.
As I performed, I deliberately copped an attitude. I danced around during the vocal track, I pointed to a pretend audience. I shouted to the drummer (who wasn't actually there--on two counts), I kept it loose, I had fun with it. I limited myself to two takes at a time with at least an hour break in between to make sure it stayed 'fun' and not faked. I think I had the take I wanted after three tries.
Know a bass player? Share this with him.
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