Jason, let's start with your live rig.
What bass or basses do you play? What is your main bass amp? Is there
anything special you do tonally (settings, EQ) to get your live sound?
My live rig... let's see. I have an Ampeg
B4R head. It is a solid state; head however, it is extremely powerful. I
have it powering an Ampeg 2x15 and a 1/15 4/10 combination. So it is pretty
massive, I have to say. I love not only playing but actually feeling the
sonic rumble from the wall. As far as my bass goes, I use a Schecter XXX
bass. It is very Motley Crue looking, but I do like the way it plays and
feels. It is nothing too amazing really.
The orthodox bass rig these days seems to be an
old SVT head and a giant cabinet. Usually, this sound is distorted and
almost all bottom end frequency. Many bassists now play through some sort of
overdrive, too. When I saw you live in Baltimore, I was struck by your
idiosyncratic sound. Are you consciously avoiding these trends in bass in
heavy bands? What do you think makes your sound stand out, as it does, from
the pack?
Well, I guess I approach playing bass differently
than most people that play in this genre. I have found that I have many
different idols than those in the
scene. When I was growing up, my bass idols were Blacky from Voivod, Steve
Harris from Iron Maiden, and Cliff Burton from Metallica. All three of these
bassists have a tone that is more high end than low end, and all three of
them cut through the murk of distortion pretty well. Actually it was
Voivod’s
"Tornado" that made me actually want to start playing. The first time I
heard that song in my headphones walking home from the local tape store, I
heard the bass break in it and was like, FUCK! I want to do that in a
band.
So now since playing in a DOOM Metal band I guess I still kept that
mentality when it comes to my tone and playing. I rarely look to see what
guy X is doing in his band, ya know, because I feel pretty confident in what
I come up with. However, it has been a bone of discussion in practices,
though, let me tell you.
I think of your bass sound as "round." It
complements Karl's midrange guitar sound nicely. Where do you think your
bass should fit into the tonal palette when you're playing live? That is,
what is your vision for your live sound? Do you accomplish this more through
the gear you've chosen or through the way you play?
The gear is important, definitely. You need the
tools to get the job done; however ,what I think is more important is how
you play the bass, or any instrument for that matter. Your passion, your
desire, your depression: All of that is part of playing in the live setting.
You can get guys out there that have a three grand rig and bass yet barely
touch their strings when they play, and it comes out like shit; and then I
have seen guys that had just the basics, and they blew my head off. So I
guess your attack and confidences is just as important as gear if not more
so. At least for me when I try and play live it is.
To the second part of the question, I guess where I see myself musically is
just being the body behind the wall of guitar. Be the goop that holds the
drums, the guitars and the vocals all together. I like my sound to cut
through but also envelop everyone that sees us play live.
What are the advantages, tonally and technically,
of playing with your fingers instead of a pick? Do you ever use a pick?
Where do you find you usually play, with regard to the pickups, with your
right hand? Do you alter your hand position as needed for different tones,
or do you play over a "sweet spot"?
I think there are a lot of advantages with
playing with your fingers, actually. Going back to one of my answers from
earlier, when I play with my fingers I
feel like I am actually playing the music between both hands. That there
isn’t anything that is in between me and the strings at all. It allows me to
feel
things more and to be more creative. I use to play with a pick back in the
day (ala Voivod), but as I got older and wiser with music I discarded them.
I do
have a sweet spot that I stay over most of the time: my right hand pretty
much stays right over the pick ups. It just fits nicely there and I just
don’t have
to think about it.
In the studio, what did you play through for your
latest record? Did you record the bass track(s) as you recorded drums, or
were they recorded as later
overdubs?
Well, in the studio I used both my B4R head and
my 1/15 4/10 cab. We mic-ed the 15 and the 10 and I also ran a direct,
so I guess I had three channels to thicken things up a bit more. As far as
recording goes, I love playing live with the drummer. Again this is just
part of the philosophy of playing that I came up with for myself over the
years. The job of a bass player is to lock in with the drummer, be a section
in the music and play off of each other at all times. So when we record,
even though I know exactly what I am going to do, I feel it is important for
me to be in the actual room with the drummer to play with him so we can be
:one" in the music. I am sure that there are those that do their tracks
separately and then paste them all together in a computer, but for me I just
can’t hang with that. It wouldn’t feel like creating music or recording
music.
What was your goal for the recorded bass sound?
How close is the recorded sound to the sound coming from the amp (or from
the board, if you played direct into it)?
Honestly, I am never really all that happy with
the tone that I get. I think it is good enough in the studio when we are
getting ready, but then as the time
goes by and we start laying down takes, I start to second guess it and then
by the time when the finish disc arrives, I am kinda over it and wish I did
it
differently. I guess my dream sound is to somehow mix the tone that Blacky
had on Nothingface with DD Verni on Years of Decay. I think both of them had
amazing tones and they cut through the music perfectly, yet still filled the
bottom. But I have never gotten that. Oh well.
How do you keep time with the drums in the
studio? Did you record with a click track?
No no no!!!! I think a click can really take the
life and swing out of music. I think that is in part why so many bands that
are active today sound so sterile and lifeless. But that is just my opinion.
How much editing did you perform on
your songs? Do you prefer the get the "perfect" take, or do you prefer to
edit to achieve your goals?
Studio Trickery!!! Haha. No, actually, I try my
damnedest to get the perfect take the first time with the drums and I think
I am about 95% successful. If
there is a blemish, depending on how small, I probably will be more keen to
leave it. Since playing live is music, it only makes sense to me. However, a
bigger flop, like missing the string altogether or just playing the wrong
bit, then I have to go in and do some surgery. It sux, but I figure with
music that is as long as ours, if I went in and kept rerecording tracks
because of one mistake, we would eat up a lot of clock. Plus I like to play
with the drums, and if I had to keep recutting lines, Bob would start
throwing empty beer cans at me and sooner or later he would get to some full
ones and those would probably hurt.
What did you do to keep the bass prominent in the
mix? Did you need to sonically sculpt, so to speak, the bass sound, or did
you let the sounds fall where they did without modification?
Well, when we did the new album, it was a new
experience for me. Sanford kinda kicked us out of the room while he mixed,
and then told us to come in to hear the final version of each song. We would
probably suggest something here or there but for the most part, he kinda did
all the mixing of the album
that way. It came out really awesome, though on my own end, I would have
liked the bass to be a lot more present on this recording than it is. But at
the end of the day, everyone wants what they do the loudest, don’t they?
Thanks, Jason!
Thanks, John, for asking me to do this. It is an
honor for sure!!
The Gates of Slumber new album "CONQUEROR" out
May 2008!
Available through: I Hate for the EU/UK, Profound Lore for North America
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