Nick Wells

2 weeks ago | guitarworld.com | Nick Wells

Bass Week: Playing bass guitar in a metal band is easy. You carefully copy whatever riff the guitarist plays, wave horn signs at the leather-clad crowd and then go home. There's little room for improvisation and no need for you to leave the bottom string, unless you feel like showing off. Those are the clichés, anyway. “If you are going to have bass, let's hear it,” metal session ace Steve DiGorgio told Bass Player. “Let's make it just as important as the other instruments in the band.

2 weeks ago | guitarworld.com | Nick Wells

With over 2,000 albums to his credit, Lee Sklar is one of the most prolific session bassists in modern music. His work dates back to the late '60s, but he really gained momentum in the early '70s after teaming up with James Taylor. Sklar's basslines have since graced the music of Linda Ronstadt, Hall & Oates, Jackson Browne, Phil Collins, Aaron Neville, Randy Newman, Lisa Loeb, Vanessa Carlton, Willie Nelson, LeAnn Rimes, and many others.

3 weeks ago | guitarworld.com | Nick Wells

Bass Week: Critics are often quick to point out the note-heavy, often self-indulgent nature of Dream Theater's music. Those 13-minute, three-part songs just aren't cool to some people, you know? Yet if there's one grounded element to the group’s sound, it's the bass playing of John Myung. Amid blazing guitar solos and drum pyrotechnics, Myung rarely flashes his Berklee-honed shops. Instead, he's usually holding things together with rock-solid, sequencer-like ostinatos, or huge B-string pedal tones.

3 weeks ago | guitarworld.com | Nick Wells

Bass Week: Slapping, thumping – whatever you call it, for over 50 years, bassists have been using this most flamboyant of bass techniques to lay down heavy funk grooves, and endlessly irritate the owners of guitar shops everywhere. “Slapping was a matter of natural evolution for me,” Louis Johnson told Bass Player. “I plucked the strings with my thumb and tried to find the little clicks and pops I got when I strummed chords on the guitar.

3 weeks ago | guitarworld.com | Nick Wells

Bass Week: Don’t be fooled by the soft demeanour of bassist Nicole Row. Her gentle nature might lead you to believe she is equally as delicate on the bass guitar, but watching on as she plays through the rich catalog of Incubus hits proves quite the contrary. Perhaps it’s this juxtaposition of character that led to her addition to the group’s line-up following the departure of Ben Kenney in April of 2024.