Bass | blog of funk

On Stage with Peter Gabriel

DW on 6 April, 2009

Wonderful footage from Tony Levin, one of my favourite bass players, from a camera mounted on his bass guitar at one of Peter Gabriel’s concerts. Gabriel inspired me hugely as a young songwriter and budding producer. A remarkable singer-songwriter, innovator and champion of world music, with Genesis, he was renowned for his dramatic live energy and love of costume. These days Uncle Peter looks more like he’s wandered in out of the garden shed for a gentle potter through the back catalogue, but I still love him to bits, and his oeuvre is well worth checking out in depth. Biko is the classic, Sledgehammer was the Big Hit, Don’t Give Up with Kate Bush the heart-wrencher.

The music in this video is totally dominated by the bass – you can pretty easily make out the song, but this recording is not a candidate for a live bootleg. But I love these unusual, fly-on-wall recordings, and this is a great one.

BassCam view of Sledgehammer in Monterrey, Mexico from Tony Levin’s Road Diary.

Thanks to Ian Shepherd for the steer.

Tweet this Share on Facebook

Welcome to my music…

DW on 15 February, 2009

I’ve been making music since I can remember, but this is the first time I have attempted to provide a complete overview of my musical activity. This is a start… there’s a lot here and this site is as much an attempt to assemble my musical output in its entirety, as it is to present my career in some kind of logical order.

What might you find here?

As well as pop songs which have enjoyed the benefit of commercial release, I have a largely unpublished back catalogue of songs which is currently known to a small group of friends. Since 1994 I have been observing the ongoing paroxysms of the music industry as it collides with internet technology. Now that broadband is widespread, podcasting a norm, DRM is pretty much dead in the water, there are half-a-dozen ways to self-promote, self-publish and reach a sizeable audience, and having been heavily involved in many of these developments on behalf of media corporations, organisations and a small selection of famous people, it seems churlish not to do the same for myself.

I truly love funk music, have written numerous bass-driven groovy tunes. I even produce a funk music podcast, but I when I write it is regardless of style, and in most instances style is determined by the song as it arrives from the musical universe. Though I’m very happy to accept commissions, or as with the Daily Song project, write around subject matter provided by current events, songs tend to arrive by and of themselves, and it’s always been that way.

At the end of 2008 I decided to move my old blog to a new home on the WordPress platform, and to utilse funk.co.uk, my most famous domain, for a music website – not before time. Welcome to my music.

Tweet this Share on Facebook