To pull off any gig, you’ve got to know your roots. Sure, that involves knowing how to anchor chords of every color. But if you are Mark Winchester, the rockabilly slap-bass monster backing guitarist/singer Brian Setzer, it also means being able to capture the energy and vibe of rock & roll’s early days. On Setzer’s latest, Rockabilly Riot Volume One: A Tribute to Sun Records, Winchester pays homage to the old-time bass men who graced rock & roll’s earliest recordings, which featured artists like Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Charlie Rich.
When it came time to prepare for the Rockabilly Riot sessions, Mark hardly had to learn any new material. “I was familiar with most of the album’s classic tunes—as a lot of upright bass players would be—because that’s where you pick up a lot of slap-bass chops,” Mark says. “For tracks that I was less familiar with, I just played along with the recordings and learned the changes.” Winchester first learned to play upright in much the same way. “I started getting into rockabilly in college, playing guitar, singing, and writing songs. But I never could find an upright bass player. So I thought I’d just find an upright and teach myself to play it. Once I had one, I put on Johnny Burnette & the Rock ’n Roll Trio [Coral] and went to slappin’!”
Since moving to Nashville in 1987, Mark has been an active player on the roots music scene, playing in Planet Rockers and Emmylou Harris & the Nash Ramblers before landing a gig in the Brian Setzer Orchestra, the former Stray Cats frontman’s 16-piece big-band swing outfit. Winchester joined the group just in time to cut the Orchestra’s breakout single, “Jump, Jive, an’ Wail,” from 1998’s The Dirty Boogie [Interscope]. For Rockabilly Riot, Setzer relied on a much smaller ensemble: bass, drums, guitar, and piano.
The new CD’s sessions focused on recreating the original tracks’ vibe and spirit. “We were all in the same room, so that helped keep the energy up,” he says. “Plus, we cut the tracks pretty quick.” The energy was bolstered by the session’s spontaneity: The band hadn’t played the songs together prior to entering the studio. “Had we spent a lot of time going over the tracks before cutting them, there would have been less energy and less of an edge.” In keeping with the vintage vibe, Mark recorded his hyperkinetic bass lines using Old School technology: “I just stood in front of a huge, vintage RCA ribbon mic and slapped the piss out of the bass. That’s the way the acoustic bass sounds the best.”
After seven years of swinging with Setzer, Mark recently vacated his spot in the Brian Setzer Orchestra to focus on his solo career. Though his career trajectory might have changed, his basic approach as not: “Drive the whole thing forward and lay down a solid, pumping groove.”