Bass Player Rocks The ’Roo
Bonnaroo’s Big Bottom
July, 2007
Having spent time playing the jam-band circuit, I’ve logged my fair share of hours at hot, dusty music festivals. Call me a glutton for punishment, but I simply couldn’t resist the draw of this year’s Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival. Armed with a digital camera, a photo pass, and about a hundred gallons of water, I joined 80,000 fellow music lovers for one helluva weekend in the small town of Manchester, Tennessee. Here’s a little wrap-up of everything I saw and heard.
Day 1:
KINGS OF LEON
The first band to take the main stage, Kings Of Leon turned it out with a batch of raucous rock & roll. Judging from his performance, Jared Followill is becoming one of the hot young guns of rock bass, showing fluency and taste with both fingerstyle and pickstyle playing.
THE ROOTS
The world’s primo hip-hop band has gone into a more soulful direction as of late, allowing Hub and drum phenom Questlove to show the softer side of their groove connection. They nailed it.
SUPERJAM
Are you kidding me? A power trio with John Paul Jones, Ben Harper, and Questlove?! This late-night set was every bit as awesome as it sounded, with the three ripping through a mixture of Zeppelin and classic R&B tunes. Some of the more open-ended jams got a little tiresome, but c’mon—Led Zeppelin, man!
Day 2:
GOGOL BORDELLO
I don’t know how or why, but somehow Gogol Bordello’s puzzling mish-mash of gypsy folk music, reggae, and punk rock totally worked. On 5-string, Tommy Gobena held it all together with confidence and style.
ZIGGY MARLEY & THE MELODY MAKERS
We should all be thankful Ziggy’s prolific papa had so many sons to carry on the Marley legacy. Ziggy did dad proud, pulling out a number of Bob’s classic tunes. Paul “Pablo” Stennett’s reinterpretations of “Family Man” Barrett’s signature subhooks were both fresh and funky.
FRANZ FERDINAND
There was nothing particularly remarkable about this Scottish pop band’s set—just a collection of catchy dance grooves driven by art-student-cum-bassist Bob Hardy.
THE POLICE
Arguably the centerpiece of the whole festival (just don’t tell String Cheese Incident), the Police’s set had at least two of the band’s requisite components: a shirtless Sting proudly prancing across the stage, and stink-face grimaces from drummer Stewart Copeland at the band’s every rhythmic stumble. The real surprise was Andy Summers, who laid down some inspired guitar work, playing like he was getting paid for it. (Word on the street: he was.) Sting’s voice sounded great, but his bass could have used some more soundman love.
GALACTIC
These NOLA funk ambassadors have taken their sound to the streets with a new hip-hop set due in August (From the Corner to the Block, Anti), so for their late-night Bonnaroo set, Robert Mercurio and the boys invited a bunch of MC friends to the party. Like Hub with Questlove, Mercurio and drummer Stanton Moore make the style shift sound seamless.
THE FLAMING LIPS
Though the crowd was too large to get up close to catch the band’s theatrical stage show, Michael Ivins and company sounded great from across a field of the faithful.
GOV’T MULE
Any other bass player might freak out, should John Paul Jones jump on stage to sit in, but Andy Hess was cool as a pool of mule drool when that went down during his band’s late-night set. In case you’re wondering, that’s pretty dang cool.
Day 3:
THE DECEMBERISTS
Though I was unimpressed by frontman Colin Meloy’s wavering pitch and too-cool-for-school attitude, Nate Query sounded spot-on, especially bass-heavy tracks like “The Perfect Crime #2,” from The Crane’s Wife [Capitol, 2006].
