Bass Player: John Giblin

John Giblin was one of the two bass players that featured on the 1979 Brand X album ‘Product’ and it’s follow-up, ‘Do They Hurt’ which was released the following year. The received wisdom is that there were two line-ups, one that featured Giblin with Phil Collins on drums and a second that featured Percy Jones and Mike Clarke. The Giblin/Collins line-up was the ‘commercial’ arm of the band whilst the Jones/Clarke line-up was more experimental. The only musician who appeared in both line-ups is the late guitarist, John Goodsall. A fairly superficial look at the various credits suggests that this is likely to be the case as Giblin did not appear on any of the tracks that Mike Clark did on these two albums and Collins, despite having been a member of the band since it’s inception, did not appear on any of the tracks that featured Jones, the notable exception being the Jones/Giblin duet,’ Wal To Wal’.

The attached transcription is a tune that Giblin also composed. ‘Rhesus Perplexus’ is a Latin tinged Fusion-Pop hybrid that features Giblin’s lovely Wal sound. Very different from Percy Jones’s iconic sound but exquisite nevertheless. A tough little read and you may need a few passes to get the gist of it.