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00:01The following program contains strong language.
00:10What is a bass line?
00:12What is a bass line?
00:14No, a bass line to me is something that has groove
00:17and that carries the song that makes you want to dance.
00:22A bass line is one note that leads to another note
00:26that creates perfect painting.
00:28I'm in the right place at the right time.
00:31The bass is the flavor.
00:33It's the juice, it's the seasoning, right?
00:38It's a melody down low.
00:40It's the roots from which the plant of the song grows.
00:46If you were from space and you wanted to know what a bass line was...
00:50It's the hands on the wheel of the car.
00:53Sexy, rude, low notes.
00:57Bass is a physical thing.
00:59It kind of hits you in the gut.
01:02My palms are shaking, my nose is tickling.
01:06I say yes.
01:07I like that.
01:09Fog horns.
01:10This boop...
01:12...booms and it carries for miles.
01:14Well, if anything, bass, I don't know what is.
01:16It's all about the groove, baby.
01:22I'm Melissa Oftemauer and in the 90s I played bass in Hole and the Smashing Pumpkins.
01:27It was a raw, defiant decade of too much drugs and fame that took down many of my peers.
01:35But I came out alive and forged a solo career, a redhead bass-playing warrior committed to putting more females on the male-dominated landscape of rock.
01:45Melissa Oftemauer, she's like one of my biggest inspirations.
01:48I think she like became so iconic really for the way that she played her bass and the sound it had.
01:54You hear her play.
01:56When you see her play, it's very primal.
01:59She was out there, of course.
02:00I mean, she was so badass.
02:02I have mad respect for her.
02:03I saw her playing the pumpkins, but she was killing it.
02:06If you can get the instrument to speak the way you want, there's no rules.
02:14Melissa's great.
02:15I don't know if you know much about redheads, but apparently redheads are like a phenomenon.
02:19She's a power horse.
02:22After a bass sabbatical to become a mother, I'm now on a journey to reconnect with my instrument and the bass lines that fueled my musical adventures.
02:30I'm going back to the studio, visiting my rock roots, playing loud, and along with a cast of bass explorers, I'm going to uncover the magic, mystery, and sonic power of my beloved bass, the mother of all instruments.
03:00Montreal is a city that makes you.
03:10Its soul or its spirits, whatever it is, are so deep that it forms the very people who live here, especially if you're a creative who's trying to be in the flow of what the universe is trying to teach you.
03:22And I have always listened to the city that made me.
03:28I was born here in Montreal, Canada in 1972.
03:32My parents were intellectual bohemians and somewhat rebels in their own ways.
03:37I'm visiting my childhood neighborhood, the Plateau Montréal, and I come here whenever I can as a touchstone of inspiration.
03:45We are on the corner of Saint-Urbain and Duluth in Saint-Paul Cafe.
03:54It's a healthy hippie cafe that I've been coming to since I was a kid, around the corner from my family's home.
04:00The neighborhood was a bohemian utopia.
04:05So the French cheese shops, the Polish fish markets, the bagel shop, these places have just been here since everyone first arrived.
04:14It always feels like I'm going back to the womb of the place that loves me.
04:19It makes me want to cry, actually.
04:20And it's hard for me to not live here, but that's why when I visit, my family is here, my friends are here, my cafe is here, my neighborhood is unchanged.
04:32The loyalty and love I feel for it expands every decade.
04:37We grew up in a very traditional grey stone triplex.
04:44It was where my teenage bedroom was and where all of the magical things that happened when I listened to the music and I found my calling and I wrote in my diary and I cried.
04:52Ah, the sadness and the melancholic power of the UK.
04:57All of my favorite music of the 80s, people I worship, Joy Division and The Cure and The Smiths.
05:05The bass is huge in the high melodic bass thing.
05:09That's a very unique style.
05:10Actually, the bass player for The Cure is really great.
05:13I mean, that whole genre of 80s melodic, melancholic vibes, they all have really great high bass playing notes.
05:22The hypnotic bass line that kicks off The Cures Just Like Heaven captures it all, brings back memories of teenage longing and joy that still have me crying and dancing all at the same time.
05:38It's an amazing bass line that you could listen to forever.
05:41Where does it end? Where does it begin?
05:43It's just one of those brilliant loops, it's just always at a good moment and always you're waiting for the next good moment.
05:48That idea of like the trance, that idea of like the spell you cast someone out under.
05:57Those were like the songs that I would sit alone in a bathroom stall avoiding going to class or walking home from a bad day at school and just thinking, oh, thank goodness these guys are here with me.
06:12I think it's trying to take four chords that sound kind of blocky usually if you're playing them and make it sound like a big circle. Like it'll never end. Like that snake that eats its own head or its own tail.
06:29That was a big influence on us for I love you. I was thinking I'm going to hold down the melancholy and keep that trance going.
06:45If I played the normal root notes, it'd be like, it feels like everything's going up all the time. I get to kind of keep everyone under the spell a little bit and it ties the sections together to keep what I'm doing.
07:03I think it's really nice for that more jangly, cure-ish verse, you know, to just be like.
07:12I could have, you know, by right, if I really wanted to follow that in an obvious way, I could have tried to make it very hard for the harder part and go like.
07:20Or something. But I just felt like, no, I'm going to hold it. I'm going to keep it pensive and then try and glue it all together some way.
07:27I don't want to like completely give up the melancholy when it's getting rageful. Do you know what I mean?
07:33This is, as I was growing up, called the sex district. Downtown is right on the other side of that street. From here down, it's the history of sex cinemas, prostitution, and the gay village is right beyond.
07:56In the early 90s, Montreal's alternative music scene was fierce and thriving. So where better to get my first weekend job as a ticket girl than the city's haven for all the punks, goths, and headbangers?
08:10Electric buttocks, legendary rock venue in Canada, Montreal. This is where all the magic and all the punk and all the dark began in my heart.
08:22This venue was living on the edge. It was everything to me.
08:26Travel back in time, circa 1991.
08:29In 1991, I could feel this like wave of something happening in our generation because I was working as a teenager at pretty much the CBGB's of Canada.
08:47And it was that summer that I saw both Hole and the Smashing Pumpkins in the same month.
08:56I got to witness the pioneers of the new alternative rock scene, which literally changed my life. The Smashing Pumpkins playing for a dollar to 20 people felt like the initiation into a new sonic universe.
09:07Even in a shitty club in front of 20 people, there was a grandiosity. It felt like this like universe, like an ocean wave vibe of like, wow, I want to like bathe myself in these sounds. So I was instantly excited and they fucking kick in into the song. I am one.
09:32And it starts with the bass, and then the drums come in, and then the wailing guitars come in.
09:47The epic guitars and drums are mind-blowing, but it was the bass, the heart of the song that captured me.
09:54Point being is that that bass line did change me. I felt like I needed to play that type of rhythm, that type of heavy, and that was it. I'm like, okay, now you're talking. Now I have something to live for.
10:14All right, all right. Three girls and a boy.
10:21This awesome bass player on stage, like me, owes it all to the wave of kick-ass women who made the instrument their own in the late 80s and 90s.
10:35Amazing. Never before or since have so many women carried the low-end heartbeats of the coolest bands of the day.
10:44I had begun to notice girl bass players, of course, you know, Kim Gordon, obviously, and then Kim Deal from the Pixies.
10:51And like I said, all in one week, I saw the Pumpkins and Hole, and they both had girl bass players who seemed really cool and stoic.
10:58They were just fucking cool girls who were like me, wallflowers who just wanted to be in a band.
11:03I don't even know if I looked at their fingers. Those women seemed like they could be me.
11:11And the moment I discovered what it feels like to teach yourself a fucking riff that you love, I was hooked.
11:18It's like feels like you're riding the universe, like you just, you're in with the magic.
11:26I always enjoyed female players when they emerged, partly because they don't have that testosterone macho-ness in what they do.
11:37And, you know, I think as, you know, bands have progressed, it makes a lot of sense to have more female energy around.
11:52Melissa Aufdemauer and Kim Gordon, they were like my biggest inspiration being female bass players.
11:58Cool Thing by Sonic Youth was actually one of the first songs I learned to play on the bass,
12:03because it's super simple, but it has like such a strong drive to it and such a strong character.
12:11And I love that Kim plays like the bass almost as if it was like a guitar,
12:16so the riff is like super simple, but super distorted.
12:27That's kind of the main part of the song, so it's just three notes, but they have a lot of attitude.
12:33I love that she's just like there hitting on the bass.
12:50Cool Thing written by Kim Gordon was their breakthrough hit,
12:52and with lyrics that flipped the script on the misogyny that was so prevalent in pop culture.
12:56I just want to know, what are you going to do for me?
12:59I mean, are you going to liberate us girls from male, white, corporate oppression?
13:06The lyrics and the whole like meaning of the track is something that of course resonates a lot with me.
13:12I just want you to know that we can still be friends.
13:16It's such a cool way of like talking about female empowerment,
13:20but not having to do it in a super polished and low key way,
13:24but saying it like with anger even, you know?
13:27And I think that song just expresses that and it's such a strong message.
13:31I think that the bass was always the thing I felt the most.
13:41It really is about feeling.
13:43It's not about thinking. It's not about technique.
13:46It's not about anything but feeling.
13:49So it was probably building in me for years subconsciously.
13:55The whole world or universe of a song is what I wanted to live in,
13:59and the closest, the easiest place to occupy the whole universe of a song is a bass.
14:05In the clubs where I was working, these sort of older dude mentors
14:09who were all in rock bands, just like cool dudes who love music,
14:13like, oh, this young girl is interested, let's educate her.
14:16And they brought me to a rehearsal space to like plug into my first giant bass amp,
14:20the Ampeg 8x10 cabinet.
14:23And that's when I really felt the power and understood,
14:26okay, I need this in my life all the time.
14:29My 21st birthday was around the corner and they said,
14:33you know, we'll bring you to a pawn shop and just see, you know, what they have.
14:36And then there she was.
14:38She was just sitting there, well, hanging there.
14:41And I was like, what about that one?
14:43They're like, oh, that's a great one, classic.
14:45Sunburst, precision, and it's a squire, which means she'll be cheaper.
14:50So this is her.
14:51And within two years, this was with me at the Reading Festival.
14:55I had only played six concerts with her ever.
14:58So it worked out great.
14:59I definitely consider her to be the first support animal that I needed to get me started.
15:06Every time Blur get back together, I try every combination of bass and amplifier just to see.
15:18And I always end up with this and this.
15:21And this was basically, Fender Precision was basically the first bass guitar.
15:25And the first one they made was the best one.
15:28Are we plugged in here?
15:29I am devoted to the Fender Precision.
15:40I have never strayed from the ultimate rock bass.
15:44There is nothing like this classic icon.
15:48You don't need six strings.
15:50You don't need to be fretless.
15:51You just need a Fender Precision and a nice big amp with a lot of warmth at the bottom end.
15:57Me amp, me lead, and a Fender P.
16:01You know, volume and tone.
16:03That do me.
16:04There was something about the precision.
16:06It was like four strings, two knobs.
16:09What could possibly go wrong?
16:11I've tried out quite a few different basses over the years.
16:14I end up with the precision.
16:16It's kind of reliable.
16:18Yeah, simple.
16:20It's basically a tool to getting on in the world.
16:27Me, my new bass, and my camera found ourselves thrust onto the world stage when I was plucked from Montreal obscurity and joined Hole alongside Courtney Love in the summer of 1994.
16:39I have obsessively documented my life, and I photographed every day of my life.
16:46With Hole, I actually, on the rider, it was a roll of 35mm film.
16:51I set timers, foot switches, and I took a photo of every single audience we ever played to.
16:58I knew I was witnessing rock history in the making, and I knew I would have no time to really process it then.
17:04I just knew collect, collect, collect.
17:06When Courtney asked me to join Hole, my initial reaction was, no thank you, death, drugs, destruction, what?
17:14But as the offer sort of landed in me, and I understood being committed to putting female on a male-dominated landscape is the foundation of my relationship with this instrument.
17:28That's okay, Torbos.
17:30And I understood that our generation was entering this sort of, like, higher and higher mainstream platform.
17:37I had a role to play that was just an obvious, like, fine.
17:41Now I get it, that's what this is doing, this is what the bass wanted me to do, this is what these weird messengers in this band want me to participate in.
17:49I joined Hole in the wake of death.
17:54The original bass player, Kristen Pfaff, had just died of an overdose, and Courtney had just lost her husband, Kurt Cobain, to suicide.
18:01This was no ordinary experience for a bass player.
18:09Anyone who ever saw Hole play, the shows were very unpredictable.
18:13Chaos was real, and, you know, there was also a lot of animosity often from the crowd, shotgun shells being thrown up on the stage, you killed Kurt.
18:22I mean, this is, like, not a chill band to be in.
18:26More surprises.
18:29So, this is a typical day.
18:33A day in the life, backstage with Hole, I was doing my vocal warm-ups.
18:37First time I've seen this footage since I shot it in 1998.
18:41Bands are like families, so you fit into certain roles within a family dynamic.
18:51I was the replacement, healer, visitor.
18:54The foremost role was, I have to help keep this band alive, and the light after the death.
19:01So, back to my, the bass is the mother of all instruments theory, is that a bass line connects and supports everything.
19:11And whatever is happening around it is what it has to respond to.
19:17So, it's, you know, a power of something unseen in a way that's, I obviously love that mystery of it.
19:24I think the bass is a very feminine instrument.
19:28It's like the mother.
19:29It's the thing that holds and nurtures the music.
19:32And I don't mean that in a, like, it just has to be a soft sense of feminine.
19:36Feminine can be very powerful.
19:43I feel, you know, Larry in our band is very much the masculine force.
19:48And I'm, I'm a sort of feminine force.
19:51So, he'll dictate the rhythm, the terms.
19:54And, you know, I, I arrive a little bit late sometimes.
19:58I arrive a little bit early sometimes.
20:00But as long as he's right in the right spot, you know, it kind of works together.
20:05The bass leads the band.
20:07Because, uh, if we look at the elements of music, harmony, melody, and rhythm,
20:13the bass is really at the cornerstone of all three of those in a way that other instruments may not be.
20:19It requires very strong listening skills.
20:23Because you are in charge.
20:25And so, you have to be, you're responsible for everybody else in a sense.
20:30I'm listening to everyone.
20:32I'm listening to the drummer for the, you know, for the, for the pulse.
20:36I'm listening to the piano player to, to, to understand what harmony he's using.
20:41I'm listening to pretty much everybody in the rhythm section.
20:44If the guitar player's comping, I'm listening to what he's doing and, and trying to find a way to, to glue all those things together.
20:52The bass, as mother, selflessly takes care of a band.
20:57But as players, we all need to satisfy our own musical desires once in a while.
21:02If I isolate just the music, the most powerful experience of music I had in whole was making celebrity skin.
21:09There's a song on the album that, um, it's called Use Once and Destroy.
21:14I think it was called on the board forever Melissa's song that stemmed out of a bit more like the way I described that if I was in my own band with a drummer, me and the drums would start, uh, a song.
21:25And it would, you know, go something like this.
21:27So then Patty the drummer came in with like rolling toms and then Eric came in with glassy textural guitars and we were able to make a song, a cool rock song, one of my favorites on the record, out of a drum and bass tune.
21:45In Use Once and Destroy, you're like using the space in between as a jagged rhythm addition.
22:02Tracking my bass on that record was when I actually stepped into my power and I understood, wow, if I really am given proper attention, I will achieve great things.
22:16And I expanded my palette in being more of an artistic bass player within pop music.
22:21Well, that's just about it for Channel V's Big Day Out coverage for $19.99.
22:30It's been absolutely awesome.
22:32But to finish off, absolutely, without a doubt, the undisputed queen of grunge, it would have to be Courtney Love and her band Hole.
22:38So enjoy.
22:43It was $19.99.
22:44Celebrity skin went platinum.
22:46We had achieved all we had set out to do.
22:48Top billing festivals, Grammy nominees.
22:51But the world was changing and so was the music.
22:54It was my last escapade in Hole when we were at the top of our game.
22:58We were co-headlining a lot of the big summer festivals.
23:01I remember setting off into a side dance tent on the big day out in Australia and New Zealand.
23:09And Fatboy Slim were on that tour.
23:12And that captured me.
23:18Right here, right now, grabbed my ear instantly.
23:21A live electronic person with a dedicated throbbing dance floor.
23:29And that was very powerful.
23:31I remember thinking, okay, the future has arrived.
23:34And then I found out it was the bass player of the Housewives.
23:36I'm like, oh my God, that's so cool that that guy, a bass player, a real musician, is offering the public a new way of experiencing live music.
23:46It was profound.
23:50There's a moment, hopefully, in most of my DJ sets where the whole crowd hits a groove.
23:57When there's like a strong bass drop, you really see the crowd's reaction.
24:04And it's all about, you know, keeping the suspense until that moment.
24:08So it's almost as if you're playing them as an instrument.
24:12The build is like their kind of foreplay.
24:14But when there's a point where you just see everybody dancing as one and the crowd becomes one big organism.
24:21That's when music unites us the best, the most perfect, purest example of a whole load of disparate people united by one nation under a groove.
24:35And it's interesting, I've only just realized, talking to you now, that on pretty much every fat whistle in the record, the only thing that's played properly is the bass line.
24:46I just realized, because all the drums are, you know, break beats that are programmed.
24:50All the guitars are normally just little loops of guitars, the vocals are all sampled.
24:55But pretty much most of the songs, I then played the bass line on a keyboard, or sometimes on a real bass.
25:01So, I don't know why.
25:04All that says probably says you're a bass player.
25:07Even though you don't want to be, you're still a bass player at heart.
25:13Hole had eclipsed and defined all that I was as a woman in music.
25:17And the time had come to break free.
25:20Just then, destiny came calling again.
25:25Complete coincidence, it had been the week I had decided I was done with Hole, and I had started writing my resignation letter.
25:35My rotary phone in Los Angeles rang, and there was Billy Corgan.
25:40Hey, the stars have lined up.
25:42It's time for you to join my band.
25:44Like, how the fuck did you know I was about to leave the band?
25:48There's the big Billy.
25:50Looks like we're about to go on stage.
25:53This is part of the big international tour.
25:56Great, and just the fact that I was walking up with this camera.
25:59Let's remember, someone is filming this.
26:01It is the bass player.
26:02I am filming this.
26:03Where have you just put it?
26:05I put it on my bass amp, as I do.
26:08Now I've picked up my bass, and I am about to perform.
26:14This is better than some YouTube footage, eh, that you could find.
26:18Makes me love the bass and my journey in it.
26:25Hole was my master's in humanity, and when I joined the Pumpkins, it was my PhD as a bass player and a musician.
26:33So I got to do the euphoria in the pocket, in the flow as a bass player once I joined the Pumpkins.
26:42I did it for the bass, 100%.
26:44I did it so that I could actually do what I had come here to do, which was play bass to the people.
26:52And I knew it would be the best music lesson in my life.
26:55Everlasting Gaze definitely, to this day, is one of my favorite Pumpkins songs.
27:13But mainly because it's all about how cool the riff is.
27:33Riffs that are heavy and rhythmic, I like to play along with.
27:37And that's what I got to do in the Pumpkins.
27:43The bass line is front and center of this track.
27:46And while the guitar riff doubles up and joins in and out, it's the steady bass that keeps you riding hard.
27:54And I got to play up to three to four hour shows a night just on bass.
27:59No backing vocal, no stage banter, just that was the best bass ride of my life.
28:08Low, heavy, driving bass riffs are my happy place.
28:12But that is not the genre that many people associate with the bass.
28:15Oh man, a little thumb magic.
28:24Can I just quickly get my thumb tape?
28:33Slap bass is basically where you use your thumb to slap the bass or thump.
28:37The Americans call it thumping, we call it slapping.
28:40So how do you slap?
28:43Well, this is the secret.
28:45It comes from the thumb bone.
28:47The magical thumb bone.
28:49And what you do is you strike the string against the fingerboard.
28:55And then move away, allowing the string to vibrate.
28:59You know, different players do it in different ways.
29:03My way has always been to play it this way because where my arm is parallel with the strings.
29:07Yeah, lessons in love.
29:11So we've got...
29:13I'm not proud I was wrong.
29:17And the truth is hard to take.
29:20I'm not proud I was wrong.
29:21And the truth is hard to take.
29:22I felt sure we had enough.
29:23But our love went overboard.
29:25I had that riff.
29:26And that sort of chugging it along.
29:27And that sort of chugging it along.
29:31It was a really, really big hit for us, you know.
29:32It got us our first number one.
29:34All the dreams that we were building.
29:36I had that riff and that sort of chugging it along.
29:54It was a really, really big hit for us, you know. It got us our first number one.
29:58Mark King is especially awesome. He wasn't just slapping, he was slapping in his own way.
30:09He's playing not just slap, he's playing beautiful melodic lines and singing. Yes.
30:17Part of the success that Level 42 had with the Brit funk scene in 1980 when we came out was the
30:24fact that vinyl was only put out as a white label and it went around to certain DJs and so the DJs
30:30had no idea who you were, where you came from or everything and there was an assumption that we
30:34were an American band and that we were black guys doing this because it sounded funky and of course
30:42wrong. It's the same in America that they thought the same thing. It was no wonder there was confusion
30:49and that's because this style of bass playing is about as funky as it gets and until the likes of
30:54Mark King came along it had been the preserve of a small group of American funk players
30:59and the man whose thumb led them all. And there you have it. Larry Graham is the father of this style.
31:06Basically you know Larry Graham came up with this style because he was working with his mom and there
31:11was no drummer and his mom was playing keyboards I believe and so he came up with this very percussive
31:16style which kept the rhythm strong. Just basic. So he's famous for kind of playing the bass almost like
31:24it's a drum you know. Plucking and you know thumping and plucking but that technique we really do we give
31:36credit to Larry Graham about that. Now there are arguments that there were other guys who were doing it
31:41but he's the one who really popularized it and who we all looked at and went oh my god I didn't know
31:47you could play an instrument like that. Depending on your own personal taste you may be thinking
31:53nobody should be playing an instrument like that. You're either into slap bass or you're very much not.
32:02Don't don't do any slapping no matter what you do don't do not slap. It's not really something that's
32:07even in my wheelhouse anymore because the time has come and gone. It just became a very cliche sound
32:16and I would say that unlike Mark King and some of the other people we've mentioned it wasn't done
32:21in a really musical way. It's kind of like Seinfeld. Right? No.
32:30Cut his thumb off. No. Each to their own. It's got his place but that place isn't under my roof you know.
32:49The Basilica Hudson is a platform for innovative experimental music.
33:07We fell in love with the building with the infrastructure and the architecture
33:10and the first thing I deemed it was Temple of Sound.
33:13For 15 years this epic space of ours has showcased countless bands and artists.
33:20But now I want to use it to travel back to when I first expressed myself fully through my bass.
33:26In 2004 I cut loose from other people's bands to go it alone.
33:30But a bass player going solo was almost unheard of.
33:37Bass players don't usually step out of the shadows and I remember when I was signed to Capitol
33:42Records. The president at the time when he came to see my my showcase show in LA where I was playing
33:49to some labels the first thing he said to me is who knew who knew the bass player had anything to say.
33:55Interesting.
34:03I have a song called Follow the Waves which I wrote on the bass and then put on the guitar and then that
34:08became the lead riff of the guitar. But then I live played on the bass because I play bass live.
34:20And in the song the guitar starts it and then the heavy bass low D comes in.
34:25And I basically alter between my high notes and my bass low notes of guitar and then the bottom low
34:38string of bass ends up just being the supports to it.
34:41As much as I identify as a bass player I really look for pushing the boundaries and obviously once I
34:55went solo and made a commitment to be a singer bass player which by the way is quite difficult. I am not
35:00only stepping center stage out of you know behind the shadows of huge Courtney Billy rock icons I am
35:07also staying true to my instrument which is not a traditional lead singer's instrument.
35:16It's not fun to have to rhythmically it's like a head cut off your head has to sing and be a front
35:21person while your body has to feel the rhythm.
35:24I would take my hat off to the dexterity of a lead singer who can play bass because if you're playing
35:38guitar you're just chugging along chords while you're singing. But it's it's a bit like that to
35:43play a bass line that isn't the same as the top line that you're singing. So Sting, Lemmy, all of you I'd
35:50take my hat off to you. Singing and playing the bass is so is an incredibly counterintuitive thing
35:55to do. Even if the bass part is the same as the guitar part it's still not as natural.
36:01You know singing and playing bass is is really not easy. Singing and playing bass is hard enough at
36:08the best of times but imagine being asked to play one of the most legendary bass lines in rock
36:14and sing like Freddie Mercury while you're at it.
36:21And on bass guitar who's actually going to join me on this next and join me is not the word
36:26takes this next song. Gayland Dorsey. It was more a matter of of really trying to
36:35nail Freddie's vocal and his phrasing is is kind of crazy on that song.
36:40And so you know so the this part was always you know it's not so let me see here.
36:50I haven't done this in a long time.
36:57Pressure pushing down on me. Pressing down on you. No man has fall.
37:04Under pressure. The guns are building down. The specs are framing too. It's beautiful sheets.
37:13It's beautiful sheets. It's beautiful sheets. I love that I said.
37:23It's beautiful sheets. It's beautiful sheets. It's beautiful sheets.
37:29Let me out.
37:31Where tomorrow takes me higher
37:35There's your own people, people on the streets
37:39Da-da-da
37:41So there's a lot of that that's just sort of long notes,
37:45but getting the phrasing around Freddie's verse
37:49goes back to...
37:55I don't know if I can do this anymore.
37:57Kicking around, kick my brains around the floor.
38:01He's talking.
38:03These are the days it never rains.
38:05Oh, see, it's hard.
38:07I haven't done it for a long time.
38:09Since David passed, I haven't...
38:11I don't do it anymore.
38:13I can't do it. I've been asked many times
38:15would I do it with another person, but I can't.
38:19It's special.
38:23When I went solo, I wrote most of my songs
38:25at home alone on a guitar.
38:27But for my second album,
38:29my concept was to write direct from the bass,
38:32alongside some of my favorite drummers.
38:34My second solo album, Out of Our Minds,
38:37that I actually honed in to
38:41what would a bass player write as a song.
38:44Let's just take it from the top
38:47so that you can help me get into
38:49that first change accordingly.
38:51So, you know, the totem and title track
39:12of that album, Out of Our Minds,
39:14which came, like, just out of me
39:18with a drum beat that Ben started playing
39:20and...
39:22Like a field of sound
39:24where you're just sort of, like, tripping through it.
39:30And we just, like, fell into a chorus
39:32and the words just came out.
39:35And I was like, oh, this is me.
39:47So, in many ways, it was also my most soulful return
39:50to my true sort of hippie nature
39:54where I really just want to get into the flow
39:57of what my calling is in this world.
40:00I'm a woman who connects with the warrior in me,
40:10just like the warrior dude in the metal band
40:12connects with the witch in him.
40:18The wielding of an object so big
40:21and chopping wood, wielding an axe,
40:24it's like a very physical engagement.
40:27It instantly activates my life force.
40:32I am alive.
40:33I am channeling the volcanoes,
40:36the angels through the instrument.
40:40And then if you have an audience
40:42that is then receiving you
40:43and you are in charge of the low frequency,
40:47along with the drums,
40:48that make people feel in their body...
40:57Being an unstoppable force to feel,
41:02not think, not watch,
41:05feels like the roar of the ocean.
41:07It feels like a gallop of a horse,
41:10that you feel power beyond humans.
41:17Music is magical.
41:18It's a universal language that we all connect with.
41:22I've been drawn towards the big bass reflex speakers
41:27and I couldn't believe it.
41:28It was like a power of the universe.
41:31It was more than just sound.
41:33You could feel it in your guns.
41:37I grew up almost thinking that God is music.
41:42It's a spiritual thing.
41:47When there's going to be an earthquake,
41:51there are some animals that pick it up before us.
41:54Now you imagine that frequency.
41:56It's one of the most frightening frequencies.
42:00That is bass.
42:02When the thunder rolls and that low frequency hits,
42:07especially if you're a weak heart,
42:10you're going to run and hide.
42:14I'm an escape artist.
42:15I like escaping into the wild unknown
42:18and the cosmic universe if I can,
42:20and the bass helps me get there.
42:22Today I'm picking up where I left off,
42:34before my motherhood sabbatical,
42:36and I'm heading back into the studio in Montreal
42:39to record new music for the first time in 15 years.
42:43I've changed, the musical landscape has changed,
42:47and I'm so excited to experiment
42:49with some new sounds and styles.
42:52Hey, Alex.
42:54You think I can fit here?
42:56Totally cool.
42:57Amazing.
42:58VIP parking without trying.
43:04This particular experiment was,
43:06I'm really trying to merge the future and the past,
43:09because, yes, I am a 90s lover
43:12of distorted bass and guitar and real heavy drums,
43:16but I also am a child of the 80s,
43:19and the sound of the 80s is really what seduced me.
43:23Processed things and beautiful glassy sounds.
43:26And then there's the 21st century,
43:28back to, like, the kids making music on their computers
43:31alone in their room,
43:32because that's their version of being punk in the garage.
43:35It's okay to just admit that you're jealous of me.
43:39And that's what I love
43:40about some of the best 21st century new music I've heard,
43:44is, like, you're mixing between synth and electronic,
43:47and you have gothy, but you also have poppy.
43:50It's, like, such a cool world now.
43:52I am very inspired.
43:54Like, I got invited to go see Charlie XCX,
43:58and, you know, it's this one woman basically karaoke-ing
44:03to shit she makes at home alone on a computer,
44:06and there's fucking heavy bass
44:08that makes me feel good.
44:14Charlie XCX is exciting
44:16and feels like she has fresh and urgent things to say
44:19to a new generation, just like we did in the 90s.
44:22But it's that huge, timeless bass line
44:26that drives her music and her message.
44:30There are distorted bass sounds on her songs
44:33that I am using as inspiration now,
44:36like, how can I play with that?
44:38Like, how can a 90s analog bass player
44:41play with that sound?
44:42I think that bass is the future
44:53of all cool, powerful music movements,
44:56because at this point, you've got to capture people.
45:01You can't just be a cool frickin' shredder
45:03or a person who, like, rehearsed a lot.
45:06So I think in a world full of garbage
45:09and distractions and endless content,
45:14too much information every second of every day.
45:17People are gonna be numb.
45:19People are numb.
45:21And they need to feel...
45:28That's an actual, not just for the cameras,
45:30good additional situation.
45:33That's when the mystery of music proves itself.
45:35Bass has a power to cut through
45:37that I don't think other things do.
45:39So the future is bass, okay?
45:43Definitely use that.
46:07That's a beautiful idea.
46:13easy on the future!
46:19What is this?
46:23How does this?
46:24Hell достаточно.
46:25Anybody else?
46:26I don't know.
46:27I love 권 ac nude non-polic.
46:28I do think some programme 쇼.
46:29I am feeling it while standing,
46:30I don't know.
46:31Many time will probably join me.
46:32I am on the screen.
46:34Please therefore.
46:35Why don't you devant?
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