Bass Player: Mike Rutherford When discussing bass playing, it is easy to forget the many bass players are not ‘just’ bass players but wear many hats and Mike Rutherford, as well as playing bass guitar for Prog legends ‘Genesis’, plays guitar and bass pedals and also adds backing vocals. More importantly, Rutherford is primarily a…

Bass Player: Geddy Lee Arguably Rush’s most successful album, ‘Moving Pictures’ appeared in 1981 and presented it’s audience with a set of tracks, each of which has become a classic; ‘Red Barchetta’, the instrumental ‘YYZ’, the evergreen ‘Tom Sawyer’ and the first of the ‘Fear’ series, ‘Witch Hunt’. One of the most celebrated tracks featured…

Bass Player: Neil Murray Bass guitarist Neil Murray is well known amongst the Rock music fraternity having played extensively with some of the greatest names within the genre. His CV includes stints with Whitesnake, Gary Moore, Black Sabbath, Japanese Rockers Vow Wow, Brian May (Queen), Graham Bonnett (Rainbow), Cozy Powell’s Hammer, the Michael Schenker Group…

Bass Player: Jack Bruce An early influence for Bilbo, the performances of Jack Bruce in the 1979 Cozy Powell album ‘Over The Top’ featured his Aria SB1000 bass before he moved over to Warwicks. Bilbo bought an Aria SB600 on the strength of it (his budget didn’t run to the 1000). You can’t get much…

Bass Player: Andy West From the 1981 Dregs album ‘Unsung Heroes’, this is the track ‘Cruise Control’, a live staple for the group to this day. The Dregs were formally known as The Dixie Dregs but dropped the Dixie for a brief period before picking it ups again. The transcription shows how intergrated West’s bass…

Bass Player: David Paton Paton was a co-founder of the UK band Pilot with Ian Bairnson, Billy Lyall and Stuart Tosh. The band were primarily famous for their two hit singles, ;Magic’ and ‘January’. Paton went on to record with The Alan Parsons Project (‘Tales of Mystery and Imagination’), Kate Bush (‘The Kick Inside’ and…

Bass Player: Andy West Who the hell are the Dixie Dregs? Well, anyone who grew up in the 1980s in the UK and who was a Rock music fan would know this tune even if they did not know who the Dregs were. ‘Take It Off The Top’ was the theme music used by Radio…

Bass Player: Jeff Andrews Jeff Andrews was an acclaimed and influential electric bassist whose virtuosic technique and fluid sound were a key component of the jazz fusion scene since the early 1980s until his passing in 2019. Andrews was an in-demand bassist, building a long and productive career within the fusion genre. He was probably…

Bass Player: Walter Becker Steely Dan started off as a band but, at some point early on in their career, songwriters Donald Fagan and Walter Becker recognised the value of ‘session musicians’ and started using an array of sidemen that reads like a who’s who of US session monsters: Chuck Rainey, Steve Gadd, Larry Carlton…

Bass Player: Jeff Berlin The title track of the 1979 Bruford album ‘One Of A Kind’ is a two part tune and this transcription in the first part only (roughly 2:20). Not too difficult as the chart is based around a lot of repeated lines so, once you have those internalised, the chart comes together…