Articles by Kevin Johnson - Page 470

Metal bassist Dino Fiorenza pulls out all the stops in this playthrough for the song “Biondology”. Beginning with some intense two-handed tapping, he incorporates sweep arpeggios, slap, and more to fill the song out.

Stone Temple Pilots will be hitting the road in 2018 for the first time since announcing their new singer Jeff Gutt back in November. Gutt won the job after initially having his music introduced to bassist Robert DeLeo in the summer of 2016. “The guy’s through and through a great singer, and he’s a good dude, which was definitely one...

Aguilar Amplification is kicking 2018 off by unveiling the SL 212, a new bass cabinet in their superlight SL series. Weighing in at 45 pounds, the 4-ohm cab is fitted with two custom-voiced woofers with Neodymium magnets and a phenolic tweeter with variable level control. It can handle 500 watts RMS. “We spent a lot of time working on the...

Italian-born, London-based bassist Alex Lofoco has just released his debut album, Beyond, although you wouldn’t know it’s his first solo album from the music. Sometimes biting and sometimes intimate, the intricate music brings lots of influences and was created with an A-list team of musicians. “The album is a mix of fusion rock, jazz, progressive, latin and heavy-metal, featuring an...

Level 42’s Mark King is a master of slap bass. His complex rhythmic and melodic bass lines are tough enough to tackle alone, but he manages to sing at the same time. The folks at Java Jazz Festival just shared this performance of “Something About You,” which took place in 2016. The band is in top form, and King’s performance...

Bassist Juraj Griglák has released a new live CD with a killer band. Juraj Griglák & Company Live features Bobby Sparks, Poogie Bell, and Chris Hemingway performing five of the bass player’s songs from a May 2015 concert at Barmuseum in Martin, Slovakia. “I listened to a recording from a concert in Martin and I found out that there are...

One of the great things about writing the Bass of the Week column is that builders send us photos of some of their best work. This recent Sadowsky NYC Will Lee 5-string hit my inbox and stopped me in my tracks. Built with a chambered swamp ash body, the bass’s candy apple orange finish and black pearl pickguard are enough...

Bass Battle, aka Bogdan Diaconeasa, has released a new album, but this one is a little different from his previous efforts. While it still has some killer bass on it, Electric Play focuses on the guitar. “Guys, for some of you, this new release could sound a little bit paradoxical, a project called Bass Battle with a new album has...

We’re kicking off the year right with a new track by Mike Brignardello with bass master Chuck Rainey, aptly entitled “New Years Day.” Brignardello wrote the song after participating in a yearly tradition with a third Nashville bassist. “It was inspired by an annual dinner that Victor Wooten has at his place on New Years Day,” he explains. “He gathers...

Bass and kalimba guru Olivier Babaz shared his latest video with us for his song “Cold & Bright”. Inspired by the first snow in his native Montreal, the track has Babaz wielding dual kalimbas to perform the melody while playing a bass line on his trusty upright.

It’s the end of the year and once again time to reflect on 2017. The world lost some incredible members of the bass community this year from prog-rock legends to luthiers to bass amp innovators. As always, they may be gone but their memories will live on through their work. Join us as we remember the lives and legacies of...

After releasing the RockBass Corvette Basic 8-String bass earlier this year, Warwick is now offering a set of strings for 8-string basses in their Red series. The Warwick Red 8-String set includes four strings plus four-octave strings suitable for all long scale eight-string basses. “The strings of the Warwick Red 8-String set are Roundwound, medium gauge (.017″, .040″, .025″, .060″,...