Archive for September 2016 - Page 9

King Crimson’s Radical Action To Unseat The Hold Of Monkey Mind audio/video set is the band’s most fully realized version of its 2015 concert experience. The three-CD/one Blu-ray set from the band, with the inimitable Tony Levin on bass, has a “virtual studio album effect,” on the CDs, with no audience sound between songs. It also features a Blu-ray disc...

No Treble reader Deryl Gallant wrote in to us with a cool story on the creation of his AMJ Guitars fretless bass. Strangely enough, it started out as just a neck for his Fender Jazz and ended up with a body of reclaimed wood. Gallant tells the story: “In 2015 I visited Adam Marsh Johnston of AMJ Guitars to get...

Usually in this column I talk about general double bass (upright bass) subjects, or answer specific questions that I think will be of benefit to the largest number of readers. Lately, however, I’ve been getting a great many questions about my personal bass setup. So, in the next few columns I’m going to go through some of the things that...

Back in April, Marcus Miller and his band took the stage at Olympia Hall (L’Olympia) in Paris. Among the tunes they performed were “Tutu” and “Blast”. Thankfully, cameras were rolling.

Minimalistic, experimental French jazz-pop lounge duo What a Day has released a new EP, Specimen. In keeping with the duo’s established style, the music is primarily defined by Jonathan Joly‘s double bass, singer Léah Gracie’s vocals and more quotidian sounds, like adding machine keys being depressed. Check out the whole EP at SoundCloud. Here’s the track, “Open Space”:

Happy Sunday. Time to celebrate this week’s No Treble reader favorites. And this top 10 list is a great one. Thanks as always for reading, watching, commenting and sharing. 1. Learning Lots of Songs Quickly A reader has a “dep” gig in 5 days and needs to learn 23 songs. He reached out to Damian Erskine for advice – and...

Warwick has unveiled details on this year’s limited edition bass, which will be a take on their Corvette $$ model. The Warwick Masterbuilt Warwick Corvette $$ Ltd 2016 comes in four and five-string versions with the option for left-handed orientation. Its black korina body is topped with black walnut burl in a tinted natural transparent stain for a deep, rich...

I discovered Vahagn Stepanyan’s video on Facebook, and I really dig what he’s doing. This is Vahagn’s original tune, “One Day”, which features a nice groove, terrific musicianship and great tone.

The genesis of bassist/multi-instrumentalist Evan Marien’s new EP comes from a slightly unusual place. The instrumental electronic hip hop record, simply titled EP1, is inspired by 8-bit Nintendo music, according to the website for Marien, whose work is regularly featured in No Treble. EP1 is available at Bandcamp. Preview EP1: EP1 by EMAR EP1 Track List: Knives Dungeon Lines Decode...

Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo has shared a little more insight into the band’s upcoming album Hardwired… to Self Destruct, due November 18th. The first single, entitled “Hardwired”, was released to fans and Trujillo says its a good indicator of what’s to come. “‘Hardwired’ is the perfect statement to lead into this body of music. I think this album sounds crushing,”...

Franklin Peredo is back with another mind-bending bass tune. “The Mystery of the Flaptopus” features a creative groove and other-worldly effects to evoke a sense of wonder in musical form. Watching Peredo’s insane bass playing will evoke a sense of wonder, too.

Iconoclastic bass-piano-drums jazz trio The Bad Plus – known for its unexpected cover versions of songs – has released its 11th album, It’s Hard, an album exclusively composed of covers. The record, featuring Reid Anderson on bass, showcases the trio’s take on a wide variety of pop, prog rock, country, and alt-rock tunes. According to NPR’s First Listen, the band’s...