What’s the biggest difference in your bass playing over the past decade?
I’m a little more self-aware. I’m figuring out ways to implement flashy techniques in ways that go beyond showing off on solos, and instead are used to get a point across in a song.

Can you give an example from Still Stuck in Your Throat?
On “Frey’d Fuckin’ Nerve Endingz” and for the quick bursts on “Premadawnutt” I use a technique I call “fanning” because it looks like I’m just flailing my right hand over the strings [laughs]. I downstroke with my thumb, and then upstroke with my forefinger or middle finger. It’s almost like slapping and plucking, but I’m just brushing across the string. It looks like you’d be all over the place, but I’m really accurate with it, and I can use it to create a fast punk rock thing.
I adopted the technique after watching three Japanese women playing these 3-string guitars [shamisens]. They were wailing on them with these big triangular picks in a way that looked like fanning. Their wrists were really fluid and loose and going super-fast. It looked like anarchy but it was totally controlled.

What are you doing with your fretting hand when fanning?
Whatever it takes, which is usually not much. Sometimes I’ll use an octave, but I mostly do it with one note on one string. I do a lot slapping and plucking like that, too. On “Frey’d Fuckin’ Nerve Endingz” I actually use barre chords on the chorus.

It looks like you’re using fanning in the video for Fishbone’s cover of Sublime’s “Date Rape,” except you’re using your thumb and pinkie to brush the strings.
Right. That’s what I’m doing on the improvised bass breaks at the beginning, and it looks like fanning, too. I shake my hand from side to side to create a blur of notes—the motion looks like when you give somebody the “hang loose” sign. I usually do that to play one note on one string really fast, but in that case, my left hand is all over the place. I wanted to make the most of those fills, and fills are main place I implement the technique. I hope more people pick up on fanning and start implementing it their music.