Author Topic: Great Stanley Clarke disc: THE BASS-IC COLLECTION (Read 528 times)

effclef · « **on:** April 22, 2004, 04:58:13 AM »

If you want to try out Stanley's sound, pick this best-of disc up. It has 14 songs on it and really does a great job of showcasing the sound he gets out of his Alembic. It's become one of my favorites, even more than the regular releases of his.

Amazon (etc) has it.

EffClef

keavin · « **Reply #1 on:** April 22, 2004, 06:15:08 AM »

i listen the contemporary stations(jazz)often & he's not gettin alot of play!!,i wonder whats up with that?,,,,any word yet on some pics of his '30th anniv alembic' yet? mica??val??

effclef · « **Reply #2 on:** April 22, 2004, 06:24:12 AM »

Ehhhhh there's no accounting for taste. Half the bands I love (like King's X, Gary Numan) get almost no airplay.

EffClef

PS Doug Pinnick of King's X played a Hamer 12-string bass (triple strings, low and two identical octaves) on lots of their songs, but nowadays seems to use just plain 4 strings tuned low low low low low. No idea if he's ever tried an Alembic.

jazzyvee · « **Reply #3 on:** April 22, 2004, 09:00:17 AM »

Well I can rectify the lack of airplay for Stanley. I produce and present a Jazz programme in Birmingham, England called the NotStrictlyazz programme.

Since I started the programme about 5 years ago, I always use two of Stanleys tracks, the Programme theme tune is Blues For Mingus from the double live album and also Between Love and Magic from the Bass-ic Collection CD so as far as my listeners are concerned he is on the radio every week.

If you want to catch the programme it is available live over the internet from the web site.
Http://www.newstyleradio.co.uk
I air the programme every Monday evening between 20:00 and 22:00 GMT.

I often play tracks which include him as either band leader or bass player for other musicians.

Hope you get to listen.
Jazzy vee

valvil · « **Reply #4 on:** April 22, 2004, 09:22:48 PM »

Well, eventually we will post pictures of Stanley's bass, but first we gotta deliver it to the man. He knows he's getting it, but has no idea what it looks like (well he knows the body shape of course), so we don't want to spoil that surprise.

Valentino

rami · « **Reply #5 on:** April 23, 2004, 06:38:30 AM »

Does anyone know if Stanley reads anything on the Alembic club site, and if so, where the heck is he?

keavin · « **Reply #6 on:** April 23, 2004, 07:19:02 AM »

thats a good question! i know he reads the stuff on his interactive web-site & he also answers questions & has a chat room, BUT i think he's busy preparing for the rite of strings(all acoustic) tour,which is him ,al dimiola & jean juc ponty, because he hasn't replied to any messages lately,and the tour starts early june ,but have you checked out his site latley?....but i'm pretty sure he does read some of the alembic here on the site.

the_mule · « **Reply #7 on:** April 29, 2004, 05:29:38 AM »

I've been searching around and listening to a lot of Stanley Clarke's recordings, my personal favorites are (no particular order):

- (solo) Stanley Clarke
- (solo) Live 1976-1977
- (solo) If This Bass Could Only Talk
- Return To Forever - Romantic Warrior

With the last one being a blasting 'heads up!' for anyone into over-the-top jazz-fusion, symphonic rock and the wonderful music that was both created and killed in the seventies...

jazzyvee · « **Reply #8 on:** April 29, 2004, 05:09:40 PM »

I love the stuff he was playing on the Romantic Warrior. It was my first expirience of listening to fusion stuff and what these guys were playing it just blew my mind away.

As much as Stanley and the other guys in the band have moved on from those heady days I'd still love RTF to get together to do a tour. Clarke, Corea, White and Di Meola.... Would be awesome.

However the way accountants and agents get in the way sometimes I doubt if it would happen even if the guys wanted to do it.

mint_bass · « **Reply #9 on:** April 30, 2004, 01:51:44 AM »

i just bought the sujested album last night it is great i really like school days and silly putty and mothership connection i had not heard a lot of stanley clarke before but i really like this journey to love which is also good and i bought charles mingus ah um mingus which is also great

kmh364 · « **Reply #10 on:** May 07, 2004, 07:17:34 PM »

Effclef,

Caught King's X last night at the Green Room in Seaside Park down at the Jersey Shore. Show was awesome. I've been a fan since '89 when I heard Gretchen Goes To Nebraska on WSOU (Seton Hall's Radio Station), but that was the first time I saw them. Pinnick is playing 4-str. Yamaha's these days. Tuned low, low, low is an understatement...it sounded like he was using a bass synth as the whole club was subsonically resonating, LOL!

effclef · « **Reply #11 on:** May 08, 2004, 09:18:50 AM »

KMH - great to hear they are still rocking! It is funny that King's X fans come out of the woodwork and it is all a shock to hear that someone else likes them. I saw It's Love on MTV back when that was new, and was hooked. I think around the same time I saw a Bass Player column that showed him with his 12-string Hamer bass.

I've seen them twice in concert, each at fairly small clubs. I feel bad that they don't get much airplay, but they must enjoy what they do to do so much touring.

Dogman is still their hardest, and my favorite, work. Coincidence: I just listened to Black Like Sunday last night!

(Ty and Doug's solo projects are pretty good, and I just picked up Jerry Gaskill's solo, but haven't heard it yet.)

Whether Doug has played an Alembic, I am not sure. You can imagine what King's X might sound like with a Series in his hands.

It's almost like we should take up a collection and buy an inexpensive Epic off eBay for all our dream bassists, to ....uh.... infect them with the Alembic bug!

EffClef

adriaan · « **Reply #12 on:** May 08, 2004, 04:56:52 PM »

As one of that perhaps rare (at least for this particular thread) breed of older music afficionados, may I second mint_bass in his choosing Mingus Ah-Um.

Anyone with ears attached AND the presumption that they know good music MUST know Goodbye Pork-Pie Hat. The rendition on Mingus Ah-Um is mighty impressive, and I daresay the one on Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus is terribly sad-and-wise-and-therefore-incomparably-beautiful too (at my funeral they will play either this, or Charles Ives, Three Places in New England, part 3).

How one can even consider spending any amount of time listening to a band with a name like King's X (so I gather they've been to London by train - it obviously meant a big deal to them at the time but I don't care much for London railway stations, personally) while there is Mingus music to experience, is beyond me. Okay, if 1950s music is not your cup of tea, try Sue's Changes. Or try the ever-cool East Coasting album.

David Houck · « **Reply #13 on:** May 08, 2004, 06:20:01 PM »

I love Goodbye Pork-Pie Hat. I wanted to work it up for a trio a couple years back; but I couldn't work out the chords satisfactorily enough to show it to my guitar player. Perhaps someone might have some suggestions. Here are the chords from the lead sheet I have; I suppose there are some alternate voicings that I'm not thinking of: (b = flat)

F7 Db7 | Gbmaj7 B7 |
Eb7 Db7 | Eb7 F7 |
Bb-7 Db7 | G-7 C7 |
D7 G7 | Db7 Gbmaj7 | B7 Bb7 |
C7 Eb7 | F7 Db7 |
Gbmaj7 B7 :||

David Houck · « **Reply #14 on:** May 08, 2004, 06:31:26 PM »

Well I have to admit that, if I'm familiar with Three Places In New England, I can't seem to remember it.