3. John Paul Jones
Solid. That’s a great adjective to describe what John Paul Jones brought to the table when he joined Jimmy Page to form Led Zeppelin back in the late 60s. He’s not a flashy player but certainly brings his own style and flair to the classic songs from the canon- just listen to his bass breaks in “Good Times, Bad Times”, the steady hand during “Dazed And Confused”, funky fills during “The Lemon Song”, and grooves during “Ramble On”. JPJ’s musicianship is on further display via his mandolin work on much of Zep’s acoustic material as well as featuring his keyboard flourishes on many of that band’s hits. Also, dig his work with Josh Homme and Dave Grohl as a member of Them Crooked Vultures!
2. Steve Harris
Steve Harris’ galloping and aggressive style puts him on a different plane than the rest of the bassists on this list, simply because he often plays ahead of the beat and is at the forefront of many Iron Maiden songs. Just listen to his playing in “The Trooper”, “The Number Of The Beast”, or “Run To The Hills”- throughout each song he is often pushing the rhythm, especially when playing live. Or dig the bass intros to classics like “The Clairvoyant” or spacy “Blood On The World’s Hands” for some cool histrionics. And note, this is all done with his fingers and not a pick! His songwriting skills and bass technique are one of the reasons why Iron Maiden continues to be one of the most loved heavy metal bands worldwide.
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Could I be any more dense, haha? JPJ is an obvious top 3. Knew I was forgetting a no-brainer. So, I know who your #1 is, and he’s mine as well.
How about doing a desert island list? You know, the top whatever records you’d simply have to have with you if stranded for the rest of your life. That’s gotta be the absolute toughest call ever with all the music we’ve accumulated over the years. I imagine yours and mine would be quite different, unlike your other lists from which I mostly was in tune with.
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Desert island list is a good idea! I’d have to go a top ten of that and it will be very hard, especially considering I’d probably go for an eclectic list versus just what my favorite albums of all time would be. Although I’m sure I’d have at least a few faves in there.
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Well, yeah, but you could always do a top 5 or 10 of each genre or something. Between rock, metal, blues, country, funk, R&B, or just straight up pop, whatever, it’s damn near impossible to do it, especially if you go Popoff style and disqualify best of compilations. Then it gets crazy difficult!
But, I guess if you had a gun to your head scenario, it could be done, haha. Sad thing is, this would be the kind of list you could likely change on a daily basis depending on your mood. Super tough call.
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