Finally Learning How to Play
By this time I'd been thumping along for a few years now and had played in a small variety of bands.
Then along came
Then along came
Simba
What can I say about Simba. His name is actually Humphrey. He called himself Simba because it suited him better. He was raised in Kenya and schooled in English schools -- highly educated and spoke English far better than almost everyone in Idaho. A genuinely beautiful man with his lanky, Jimmy Hendrix-ish frame, rich coffee colored skin, perfect ball-shaped afro and an impeccably trimmed beard after the Greek fashion that came to a flat point an inch below his chin. When Simba first looked at you, you were sure you were the only human in the world that mattered to him at that moment. Quite a presence.
Paul introduced me to Simba, who was looking for a bassist. At the time I only had the big blue acoustic, so that's what we went with. Just me, Simba playing guitar, and Paul on the mandolin at first. It took a few weeks of Simba working with me saying things like: "That's the old Brian I'm hearing. I want to hear the new Brian." Basically I had to stop being white and square and learn to play afro-latin style. When I got it right, the deepest expression of rapture would cross his face as he enjoyed the rhythm and tone of my bass. Lots of poly rhythms, which I'll explain in a moment.
Our first gig was an open mic at the Alehouse in Moscow and went so badly that Simba almost called it quits right then. But he didn't, and soon we had a saxophone, drummer, bongo, two guitars, and backup female vocalist. Once we got the basic rhythms and songs down, then he went out a recruited an entire horn section. We were good before the horns, but the horns provided the flash that made everyone notice how good we were. But by then we're looking at a band with 15 members. About then things started getting serious and I went out and bought a used Fender fretless Jazz Bass, necessary for its speed and power compared to the acoustic, and new Genz-Benz amp. Both were decent quality, but I must admit that both were the first I looked at. I typically buy things that way, and it always seems to work out. The amp I selected because it was drink height. I have spilled more booze on that amp than I care to admit. It has seen a lot of gigs.
Our first gig was an open mic at the Alehouse in Moscow and went so badly that Simba almost called it quits right then. But he didn't, and soon we had a saxophone, drummer, bongo, two guitars, and backup female vocalist. Once we got the basic rhythms and songs down, then he went out a recruited an entire horn section. We were good before the horns, but the horns provided the flash that made everyone notice how good we were. But by then we're looking at a band with 15 members. About then things started getting serious and I went out and bought a used Fender fretless Jazz Bass, necessary for its speed and power compared to the acoustic, and new Genz-Benz amp. Both were decent quality, but I must admit that both were the first I looked at. I typically buy things that way, and it always seems to work out. The amp I selected because it was drink height. I have spilled more booze on that amp than I care to admit. It has seen a lot of gigs.
So, the music. Simba wrote a few originals, but for the most part he selected pop tunes from Africa and Latin American from the 1990's. We played them with a fuller American style. The originals have much leaner, tighter rhythms, and we only had Simba to explain how to play this stuff. I like our interpretations quite a bit, especially for an American audience, but I would not call it authentic at all. A good portion of the songs were sung in foreign languages -- Swahili, Zulu, Latin pigeon English. The stuff was so fun to play that we played almost all of it with a happy and bouncy. I'm the bass player so I have a great deal of the blame to shoulder for playing all these songs so happy and bouncy.
Then after playing with Simba for a couple years I asked him what one of the songs was about. He said: "It's about a man longing for his love who was forced to marry a rich man. The title literally means 'It's Wrong'."
My shoulders drooped and I said:
"Oh. . . . Sorry."
Here’s a vid of us playing. Poor quality sound but you get the idea of the energy:
Then after playing with Simba for a couple years I asked him what one of the songs was about. He said: "It's about a man longing for his love who was forced to marry a rich man. The title literally means 'It's Wrong'."
My shoulders drooped and I said:
"Oh. . . . Sorry."
Here’s a vid of us playing. Poor quality sound but you get the idea of the energy:
https://www.facebook.com/cherilynne.camis/videos/10202989735890378/
Ok. Let's get into poly-rhythms. Poly-rhythmic music is an African style that has various instruments playing different rhythms at the same time. When done correctly, every instrument has its own space in time and no other instrument is playing a note at that moment. In that we you get a full, rich sound without playing loudly. No one is fighting to be heard because each has his own space. It sounds formulaic, but actually is not. Players are encourage to find unused holes in the rhythm and move there as the song progresses, thus opening new holes for other instruments to find. The basic rhythm continues to stand while all players are moving around within. It's like an unsolved Rubic's Cube. When one row moves, it moves all the colors in the row. It's hard to learn and Simba drilled us for months on this technique. Most of the songs had a 2 to 8 bar repeat on the rhythm, usually with only 2 or 3 chords in that space. Simba would have us practice the same 2 bar repeat sometimes for 15 minutes. After 5 minutes you be bored. Still bored at 10 minutes. Then something crazy would happen. Time and space would open up. Time slowed way down and you could almost walk around in the rhythm, examining the spacing of the notes in time. You could reach out and move one note just slightly and the whole thing would change, opening opportunities for other players. Fucking amazing!
Examples:
I Don't Even Know the Name of This Song
Instrumental
Geez. I don't know the names of either of those songs, but they both illustrate the moving poly-rhythms idea. The first one is a bit complex and has Ben playing the fantastic opening melody on the guitar (Ben is amazing). The sax (Alex, at the time) was emphasizing a few of Ben's melodic notes, but that is atypical of poly-rhythms. Later, after Ben gives up the melody, you can hear him take up a rhythm supporting the vocal melody that fits beautifully between the notes of the bass. Some are at the same time (specifically on the one), but most don't.
The second song, the instrumental, is more simple. The bass hits the one and two square while the guitar (Simba) hits a double strum on the two and the fat AND of the two. Ditto four and fat AND of four. While the guitar is hitting a strum at the same instant as the second bass note, you don't notice for a couple reasons: 1) differing frequencies allow them to be played simultaneously without overpowering each other and 2) the fat AND completely exonerates the guitar's rhythm overlap.
Now, I learned much more than poly-rhythms from Simba. He didn't teach me some things directly, but I learned from watching him. Simba is a keyboard player originally, but played the guitar to lead this group (funny strummer -- often with his thumb). He had a really great ear. He could hear everything going on, and it was quite a large group, and could single out a bad sound so quickly, and signal its maker to cease and desist. First sign was a wrinkle in the crows feet of his eye on the side of the band of the offending player (those paying attention would look around that side of the band to see who he was signalling ("hope it's not me"). Then a deeper wrinkle. And a head turn might have meant: "Are you deaf man! Stop making that awful noise!"
So I learned to watch Simba. But more than that. Simba's body gave out SOOO much information about how he wanted a song played at any given moment. You had to keep your eyes glued to him at all times because he seldom played the same song with the same emotion twice. Sina Makosa in particular would be played in a large variety of tempos and styles based on the whim of Simba at the time. I also learned that I could turn the boat. The bass player is like a rudder on (in this case) a large ship. I answer the helm, but can turn the boat often in anticipation of the helm. I learned to listen to the band at large, and individual players to see if what I was playing would have the desired effect on their playing. If I lay down a solid bass line, do they have more confidence in their solo -- etc. When I change from straight quarter notes to a syncopated set of three notes, how does it affect the rest of the band. I used to do that on Three Little Birds all the time. The entire band would shift gears on my whim.
Three Little Birds
Upon listening to this recording, I now think my change-up of the rhythm caused a response in the band that was a bit harsh. My bad. Nowadays I would hear this and come up with a different, slighter, rhythm change.
Here are the other songs I have recordings of. Note that this is after the basic band got good, but before Simba brought in all the horns. I have no recordings of that.
Pando
Sweet Mother
Get Lucky (Yes, the Daft Punk Song)
Monkey Man
Hotel California -- not actually named that. Simba wrote this song and its chords slightly mirrored those of the famous Eagles song.
Malaika -- A beautiful lullaby.
Sweet Lover
The band got bigger, to the point of barely fitting on a stage. It got to the point where the hardest thing for me to do was find a place on stage for me and my amp.
Ok. Let's get into poly-rhythms. Poly-rhythmic music is an African style that has various instruments playing different rhythms at the same time. When done correctly, every instrument has its own space in time and no other instrument is playing a note at that moment. In that we you get a full, rich sound without playing loudly. No one is fighting to be heard because each has his own space. It sounds formulaic, but actually is not. Players are encourage to find unused holes in the rhythm and move there as the song progresses, thus opening new holes for other instruments to find. The basic rhythm continues to stand while all players are moving around within. It's like an unsolved Rubic's Cube. When one row moves, it moves all the colors in the row. It's hard to learn and Simba drilled us for months on this technique. Most of the songs had a 2 to 8 bar repeat on the rhythm, usually with only 2 or 3 chords in that space. Simba would have us practice the same 2 bar repeat sometimes for 15 minutes. After 5 minutes you be bored. Still bored at 10 minutes. Then something crazy would happen. Time and space would open up. Time slowed way down and you could almost walk around in the rhythm, examining the spacing of the notes in time. You could reach out and move one note just slightly and the whole thing would change, opening opportunities for other players. Fucking amazing!
Examples:
I Don't Even Know the Name of This Song
Instrumental
Geez. I don't know the names of either of those songs, but they both illustrate the moving poly-rhythms idea. The first one is a bit complex and has Ben playing the fantastic opening melody on the guitar (Ben is amazing). The sax (Alex, at the time) was emphasizing a few of Ben's melodic notes, but that is atypical of poly-rhythms. Later, after Ben gives up the melody, you can hear him take up a rhythm supporting the vocal melody that fits beautifully between the notes of the bass. Some are at the same time (specifically on the one), but most don't.
The second song, the instrumental, is more simple. The bass hits the one and two square while the guitar (Simba) hits a double strum on the two and the fat AND of the two. Ditto four and fat AND of four. While the guitar is hitting a strum at the same instant as the second bass note, you don't notice for a couple reasons: 1) differing frequencies allow them to be played simultaneously without overpowering each other and 2) the fat AND completely exonerates the guitar's rhythm overlap.
Now, I learned much more than poly-rhythms from Simba. He didn't teach me some things directly, but I learned from watching him. Simba is a keyboard player originally, but played the guitar to lead this group (funny strummer -- often with his thumb). He had a really great ear. He could hear everything going on, and it was quite a large group, and could single out a bad sound so quickly, and signal its maker to cease and desist. First sign was a wrinkle in the crows feet of his eye on the side of the band of the offending player (those paying attention would look around that side of the band to see who he was signalling ("hope it's not me"). Then a deeper wrinkle. And a head turn might have meant: "Are you deaf man! Stop making that awful noise!"
So I learned to watch Simba. But more than that. Simba's body gave out SOOO much information about how he wanted a song played at any given moment. You had to keep your eyes glued to him at all times because he seldom played the same song with the same emotion twice. Sina Makosa in particular would be played in a large variety of tempos and styles based on the whim of Simba at the time. I also learned that I could turn the boat. The bass player is like a rudder on (in this case) a large ship. I answer the helm, but can turn the boat often in anticipation of the helm. I learned to listen to the band at large, and individual players to see if what I was playing would have the desired effect on their playing. If I lay down a solid bass line, do they have more confidence in their solo -- etc. When I change from straight quarter notes to a syncopated set of three notes, how does it affect the rest of the band. I used to do that on Three Little Birds all the time. The entire band would shift gears on my whim.
Three Little Birds
Upon listening to this recording, I now think my change-up of the rhythm caused a response in the band that was a bit harsh. My bad. Nowadays I would hear this and come up with a different, slighter, rhythm change.
Here are the other songs I have recordings of. Note that this is after the basic band got good, but before Simba brought in all the horns. I have no recordings of that.
Pando
Sweet Mother
Get Lucky (Yes, the Daft Punk Song)
Monkey Man
Hotel California -- not actually named that. Simba wrote this song and its chords slightly mirrored those of the famous Eagles song.
Malaika -- A beautiful lullaby.
Sweet Lover
The band got bigger, to the point of barely fitting on a stage. It got to the point where the hardest thing for me to do was find a place on stage for me and my amp.
And then we started getting bigger gigs. We were easily doing $1000 in gigs a weekend through the summer of 2014.
We even started doing street gigs in front of Bucer's, Main Street Moscow. They'd close down the street, and we filled it with dancers.
We even started doing street gigs in front of Bucer's, Main Street Moscow. They'd close down the street, and we filled it with dancers.
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