Amid the barrage of keyboard synthesizers, drum machines, and other digital wizardry, many a bass player in the 1980s pop music medium had to further explore the instrument to maintain its relevance.

Enter Talk Talk’s founding bassist Paul Webb who worked the fretted and fretless, abetted with effects, rendering counterpoint and soulful grooves aplenty in the service of Mark Hollis’ compositions.

Dig Talk Talk “It’s My Life” https://youtu.be/cFH5JgyZK1I

A producer, writer – nowadays Webb works under the moniker “Rustin Man” with two slabs to his credit.

Paul as Rustin Man “Judgement Train” https://youtu.be/IgBs42v3l0k

February 2019

We weep when any venue which affords a stage to performers goes dark.

This deceptively humble setting, however, was a venerable non-stop circus of poets, crooners, rockers, bikers, folkies, freaks, attention seekers, winners, losers, jazzers, avant-garde ‘aven’t got a clue artistes, flakes, floozies, boozers, bohemians, loners, bon vivants, rappers, painters, pouters, shouters, raconteurs, and writers of every conceivable genre and permutations thereof – among others – who celebrated the fringe – and perhaps not realizing that they too were a part of the show!

SideWalk was my de facto Huff Post hub, and the site of scores of interviews ranging from Vh-1 to Amplifier Magazine, Shout New York, Pop Smear, Spin, No Depression, to cite a select few.

Aside from the gigs, my most treasured wee hours of the morning memory here was in April ’97 dining at a table adjacent to the Spice Girls, still in uniform and at the apex of their fame following a Saturday Night Live appearance.

No one fawned over them other than their waitress, who was decidedly non-plussed!

 New York City is a much, much poorer metropolis…  

Godspeed Side WalkCafé!

By Graham Maby

I knew Doyle Holly as the tour bus driver. He was a good driver who kept the bus fastidiously clean. He could be kinda grumpy, but I liked him.

It was around 2001 and we pulled up outside a college somewhere in the Midwest. There was a fan standing with a 12” album cover and a Sharpie, and as I got off the bus this guy asked me if Doyle Holly was on board. I was confused and curious. Doyle got off the bus and graciously signed the cover. It was an album by Buck Owens and the Buckaroos. That’s how I found out about Doyle’s illustrious career and impressive history. Over the ensuing weeks I hung with him a lot, we became chess buddies, and he shared a few stories. I wish I could remember them all.

Originally from Oklahoma, Doyle Holly held it down on bass during the heyday of Buck Owens’ Buckaroos, progenitors of the “Bakersfield Sound,” who had more than 30 Top Forty singles on the country music charts in the 1960s and early 70s and were a hugely influential band of fine musicians. During Holly’s tenure, the Buckaroos won the Academy of Country Music’s “Band Of The Year” award four years in a row from 1965-68, and won as “Instrumental Group of the Year” twice, in 1967 and 1968. Holly himself was nominated several times as “Bass Player of the Year” by the ACM, receiving the award in 1970.

The band recorded a live album at Carnegie Hall in 1966, which Holly said was his favorite recording as a Buckaroo. It is widely regarded as one of the best live albums in country music history. The Beatles famously recorded one of the Buckaroos’ hits, “Act Naturally,” on their 1965 album “Help!” Wikipedia states that “while on tour in London in 1969, Holly, Owens and (guitarist) Don Rich met up with John Lennon and Ringo Starr.”

However, Doyle himself told me a different story: Owens had told the band that the Beatles wanted to meet them during a day off on tour. Doyle and Don Rich had already planned to rent motorcycles and go riding that day, so that’s what they did. They weren’t so impressed by the Beatles that they were willing to miss out on a day’s riding!

After he finally left the Buckaroos in 1971, Holly formed the Vanishing Breed and recorded two albums and some of his own songs, such as “Woman Truck Drivin’ Fool,” “Queen of the Silver Dollar,” and “Lila,” which reached number 17 on the country music charts in 1973. Holly continued to record throughout the 1970s and scored a minor hit with “A Rainbow in My Hand” and a jukebox hit, “Richard and the Cadillac Kings.”

Holly is honored in the Rockabilly Hall of Fame and in 1980 received a block in the Walkway of Stars at the Country Music Hall of Fame. Tiring of the road, Doyle opened “Doyle Holly Music” in Hendersonville, Tennessee in 1982, finally selling the store a few years before his death in 2007. He also continued to play a handful of gigs across the United States and Canada, and as Wikipedia states, “for a time Holly even drove tour buses….”

That’s when I had the good luck to meet him and know him—thanks to that fan with the album cover. But dang, I wish I could have seen and heard him play.

Doyle Holly Sound & Vision…

Doyle Holly / The Buckaroos “He’ll Have to Go” (Live / Video) https://youtu.be/hnXziQKI8vk

“Streets of Laredo” (Live / Video) https://youtu.be/_f2T4zGxcok

“Queen of the Silver Dollar (Live / Video) https://youtu.be/Zo3YLPAwkgQ

“Woman Truck Drivin’ Fool” by The Buckaroos (Album Cut) https://youtu.be/frKanRCRIEk

“Truck Drivin’ Man” Doyle, Buck Owens, Don Rich (Live Video) https://youtu.be/uP3tkWz_aX8

“Richard and the Cadillac Kings” (Album Cut) https://youtu.be/AAjOBn9aZCI

“Lila” https://youtu.be/ix64h-4QiX8

“A Rainbow In My Hand” (Single) https://youtu.be/P5UflOnN0nc

“Act Naturally” (Live / Video) https://youtu.be/gUGc5hANR3U

“The End!’ Well, it started as kind of a joke – the project was taking soooo long, I thought it was going to kill me!  It’s called ‘The End’ – as if this is going to be the last thing I ever do! Of course, the alternate meaning of that name is that ‘The End’ represents a goal…”  Donnie Nossov 

You don’t meet many humble folks in the music business however Donnie Nossov is that rare exception.

Though the name may not resonate with individuals outside the recording industry, his work as a side-man and session bassist is legend: Cher, Pat Benatar, John Waite, Lita Ford, and Genya Ravan, to reference an extremely select few. I hereby put forth the declaration that in the past forty years and counting – Donnie Nossov’s bass is being heard nonstop somewhere, anywhere on internet and broadcast radio, streaming services, via various formats including vinyl, CD, cassette and 8-track; on bandstands, and DJ turntables.

Some dude wearing a Hawaiian shirt is playing Donnie’s basslines in a classic Top 40 band right now. Another cat with a backwards oversized Ed Hardy baseball cap is sampling Donnie for the dancefloor. Tuxedoed pros on the wedding, Bar Mitzvah, corporate event circuits render Donnie Nossov basslines every day and every night amid Kosher chicken-fingers and horseradish.

And that’s not counting his work on film and television soundtracks as a composer and performer.  If there is ever a time when Donnie Nossov’s bass playing is not being heard or replicated; life as we know it on planet Earth no longer exists. Scratch that, even after humanity is destroyed – and we’re getting close – whatever life form exists will find a copy of The Graces’ Perfect View and dig Donnie’s bass parts.    

At present Mr. Nossov is the composer/ producer / bassist / multi-instrumentalist / and occasional lead vocal mastermind behind The End and their remarkable debut – Imaginary Life. “It wasn’t intentional, I didn’t say it’s time for me to make my own record – let me write all these songs…” laughs Donnie from his Los Angeles home. “I’d been writing songs for a long time – and I’d be recording them as I go.” 

Experience counts for everything in Imaginary Life. “I’ve worked with great people in my career, but it was also my coming of age period where I was steeped in all the great bands and writers of the 1960s and 70s – from Brit rock, American folk rock, blues – those influences permeate everything I do.”

Waxed at his home studio and various locales at his own deliberate pace, Nossov enlisted vocalist extraordinaire Gia Ciambotti to carry The End to the finish line. 

“One evening my wife Nancy and I were just sitting around and she asked me ‘why don’t you play me some of the songs you recorded?’  I played her five or six songs in a row and she said ‘you know, why don’t you make this into an album!’ It was kind of a cross between ‘what are you f’n crazy – and a light bulb moment! I thought, ‘yeah well they do kind of fit together…so then I started to listen to them in that context…and I came to the realization that ‘yeah I can do this.”   

Classic rock fans will dig the diversity of Imaginary Life – which, in the classic rock era, was the way things were done. Every track is unique with regard to tempo, feel, and execution, however it all hangs together perfectly. The acoustic and electric guitars meld ala Petty / Campbell, the melodies soar, the song-craft is timeless, and the rhythm section swings. And it’s a song-cycle that won’t ever sound dated as long as there is an audience for human musicians playing “real” instruments. Scratch that again, even if you remake these songs on computers, the hooks will still shine through the bleeps and boinks. Note to Beyonce, Taylor, Rihanna, Madge, Nicki – call Donnie Nossov! 

And Imaginary Life is no mere collection of tracks. Playlists be damned! Nossov’s all-important album track running order takes the listener on a journey. Tight cuts, no filler. The band and the album have a unique character – much like the artists Donnie has anchored. The End sounds like… The End!    

“The process started out with me and a basic musical idea; and building a track from the ground up. I would get a basic drum feel, throw on acoustic guitars, add bass and get it to ‘feel right’ – and then call Gia as early as possible so I could really hear the song! Largely I asked the other musicians ‘what do you hear?’ Unless I had a really specific idea, I trusted them!”  

Soulful and sensual, among Gia’s most riveting performance appears on the opening track. Notes Nossov “she came in to do the vocal on ‘Like A Drug’ and seemed distracted.  She nailed the vocal and told me she felt like she was coming down with something.  She later told me that she had bronchitis.  She was able to not think about it and connect with the song.  I think it may be the most emotional vocal on the record, for a 40 second bit!”

For the record, pun intended, Nossov’s extended posse aka “The End” is quite impressive: co-writers Lorraine Feather (acclaimed jazz writer and artist), Eddie Arkin, Chrissy Shefts, Laura B.,  Mark Aaron, Julia Goode, Risa Duff, and Gia; guitarists Gary Myrick, Storey Scheinberg, Ritchie Fliegler (“the only guitar player to have played with both Lou Reed and John Cale”), Brian Ray (Paul McCartney’s touring band), Marc Daine Dannenhirsch; keyboardists Michael Skloff, Daniel Crawford; and percussionists Dame Crawford, Rudy Richman.

Nossov would like to bring a touring version of The End onstage in select cities, however, at the moment, plans are up in the air.     

And in an age wherein most album art affords the impression of a mass transit ad, Nossov brings back depth to the format: “that’s a photograph I took in a hotel room in Paris about five years ago. I was searching for a cover when I decided to call it Imaginary Life. There’s a certain loneliness to it. If you look at the chair, it appears as if someone sat in it! But they’re not there anymore…there’s an imaginary person – and I had the ends flipped on the graphics just because I liked the way it looked.”

Even the self-producer’s chair suited Donnie Nossov quite well.  He boasts “I never had any arguments with my client!”

Imaginary Life by The End is out now and available here:

Bandcamp: https://theend4.bandcamp.com

Spotify:  https://open.spotify.com/album/7FN6xEbwKJq376HRXZBLKp

iTunes:  https://apple.co/2MIJvbS

Apple Music: https://apple.co/2LgHbnT

Google Play: https://bit.ly/2MplnvU

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07GC2TCBF

Deezer:  https://www.deezer.com/us/album/70435312

Napster: https://us.napster.com/artist/the-end-pop/album/imaginary-life

Tidal: https://tidal.com/browse/album/93397671

Facebook:  https://facebook.com/ImaginaryLife1

Photograph of Donnie Nossov and Gia Ciambotti by Christopher O’Brocto.

Coda: And on the topic of bass player royalty, Gia’s late father is another icon of the instrument: you’ve heard John Ciambotti on Elvis Costello’s My Aim Is True, Lucinda Williams’ Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, as the bassist in celebrated Bay Area 70s ensemble Clover, and on slabs by John Prine, Nick Lowe, Norton Buffalo, Carlene Carter, and Jim Lauderdale, to cite a few.

His sound and vibe is unmistakable…and instantly identifiable!

Among the most influential contemporary bassists in the 21st Century, Joe Dart darts up and down the fretboard with flawless fluidity in the service of fun funksters Vulfpeck – who prove that bands can actually reach the masses in the post album era.

Inspired by Michael Peter Balzary, EWF’s Verdine White, Francis Rocco Prestia, and the immortal Jaco – Dart, with his treble tone dominating, is a dexterous player whose passages quote Motown / Philly soul classics whilst pushing a harmonic and rhythmic envelope or two.

Dig Dart doin’ his “Beastly Solo” https://youtu.be/I8eUyaF_RcI

And his “Beastly Solo ll” https://youtu.be/WwbVFYWNyqc

In fact all the ‘pecks are clever instrumentalists- and they support each and their frequent guest collaborators with reverence and expertise.

Iaquinto w. ’66 Fender in 1978…                           Steele w. ’66 Fender w. The Bangles     Iaquinto with S.D. Curlee in 1980….               Molly Tentarelli with S.D. Curlee in 2019

I have owned countless electric basses in the 48 years that I’ve been playing, which is weird, since I’m only 25 ????. 

When I left New York City in 1978, I sold all but one bass: a 1966 Fender Precision Bass that I bought from Manny’s Music, which is where I was working.

The bass was white that had become yellowed over the twelve years it was around, and it had a rosewood board and a beautiful tortoiseshell pick guard. Being the knucklehead I was, I stripped the paint off of it (lighter fluid, matches, and a scraper, and I caught my drapes on fire. Knucklehead). I was a huge Peter Cetera fan so I wanted my bass to look like his, which was natural with a maple neck. One of the guys I worked with at Manny’s happened to be selling an early-70’s maple Fender P-Bass neck so I bought it and installed it on my bass. Voila! It looked great and sounded even better than it did before. That was the bass I moved to L.A. with.

It was my only bass until I bought a back-up at the end of 1978. At that time, I was the bass player in a magnificent original band called “Hit N Run.” We were right there at the flash point of the whole “New Wave” scene in L.A., playing all the iconic clubs in town. We were mainstays at Madame Wong’s, The Starwood, The Whiskey (BEFORE they made you pay to play!), The Troubadour, The Roxy, and many more. We were always doing gigs with bands like the Bus Boys, The Motels, 20/20, The Pop, and a lot of other L.A. greats.

After my Fender started having issues at one of our gigs, I knew I needed a back-up bass so I went to a music store in Santa Monica and fell in love with a bass made by a company called S.D. Curlee. I had never heard of them but out of all the basses I tried, it was the winner. The bass looked like a cross between my old Gibson EB-3 and my Fender, and it had a medium-scale neck, which was very comfortable and easy to play. I bought the bass and it immediately became my go-to, leaving the Fender as the back-up.

I did a lot of gigs and recording sessions with that bass and it rocked! Right around this time a friend of mine had gotten into a car accident and her bass, a Music Man Sabre, was destroyed. She was playing with a couple of very cool bands and needed an instrument, so I sold her my Fender, which I had painted red, sanded back to natural, swapped out the original pickup for a DiMarzio, added a Jazz Bass pickup to, and then removed that pickup and filled the hole with wood putty. Being an old Fender, it still sounded great and was unbeatable.

I sold her the bass for next to nothing because she was my drummer’s girlfriend and she was a wonderful person and a fantastic bass player. Her name was Mickey Steele. She wound up becoming the bassist for the Bangles, where she used the name “Michael Steele,” and I was blown away to see her using that Fender, with its wood putty scar and everything, in the band’s first MTV video!

She even used it for the Bangles reunion concert years later! So there I was, with my S.D. Curlee and my new back-up bass, a modified Gibson G-3 (which we don’t need to talk about). Long story short, I sold the S.D. Curlee to my friend, Franklin Odel and he used it in his studio and that was that.

The Fender got famous with the Bangles and the Curlee had a new home. Life happened, years passed, etc., etc. Fast forward to today, February 3rd, 2019. I see a post from the daughter of the lead singer of Hit N Run, whose name is Linda Stevens. Her daughter, Molly Tentarelli, who is a phenomenally talented singer-songwriter, is sitting and playing an S.D. Curlee bass which looks exactly like the one I had. After several back-and-forth posts, I find out that it is, in fact, my old S.D. Curlee Bass.

Linda got it from Franklin and now Molly has it. Me = Mind Blown!!! After four decades, it does my heart and soul good to know that this beautiful bass that was an important part of my life and that I made so much great music with, is alive and well and in the family, so to speak.

Thank you, Franklin Odel, Linda Stevens, and Molly Tentarelli for making my day. My face hurts from smiling so much. And everyone needs to check out Molly Tentarelli on Facebook and make sure you buy her music, which is fantastic!  

He is from the “First Family” of American jazz.

Chris Brubeck, son of Dave, is a Grammy nominated composer, multi-instrumentalist (electric bass, trombone, piano), recording artist who has worked stages and studios with a remarkable array of artists spanning The Brubeck Brothers, Chris Brubeck’s Triple Play, Willie Nelson, B.B. King, Gerry Mulligan, Bela Fleck, Bobby McFerrin, Stephane Grappelli, Patti LaBelle, Larry Coryell, and Bobby Womack to cite a very select few!

Plying his craft on a fretless Rickenbacker – Brubeck is a multi-genre master who was quoted in Bass Player opining that “composing is selective improvisation!”

Dig “Change Up” with the Brubeck Brothers https://youtu.be/uj0w_iJMAfI

Dig Chris’ Triple Play ensemble https://youtu.be/HkJ71G4Zcug

From Chris Brubeck Com:

Grammy-nominated composer Chris Brubeck continues to distinguish himself as an innovative performer and composer who is clearly tuned into the pulse of contemporary music. Respected music critic for The Chicago Tribune, John von Rhein called Chris: “a composer with a real flair for lyrical melody–a 21st Century Lenny Bernstein.”

In addition to creating an impressive body of work, including several band pieces, chamber pieces, 3 concertos for trombone, a trombone quartet, and several concertos for stringed instruments and other ensembles, Chris maintains a demanding touring and recording schedule playing bass and trombone with his two groups: the Brubeck Brothers Quartet, with brother Dan on drums, Chuck Lamb on piano and Mike DeMicco on guitar (www.brubeckbrothers.com); and Triple Play, an acoustic jazz-funk-blues-Americana trio with Joel Brown on guitar and Peter Madcat Ruth on harmonica and Chris on bass, trombone and piano (www.chrisbrubeckstripleplay.com.)

Additionally, Chris performs as a soloist playing his trombone concertos with orchestras and has served as Artist in Residence with orchestras and colleges in America, coaching, lecturing, and performing with students and faculty. Once a year he tours England with the group Brubecks Play Brubeck along with brothers Darius (on piano) and Dan as well as British saxophonist Dave O’Higgins. Chris had been a long-standing member of the Dave Brubeck Quartet, writing arrangements and touring and recording with his father’s group for over 20 years.

Dave and Chris co-wrote the orchestral piece “Ansel Adams: America” which has received dozens of performances and in 2013 was a Grammy finalist for Best Instrumental Composition.

Photo by Big Solid Silver 60

When you’re a bass player who plays in a great band that writes great songs with a great singer, you play to the song!  Which is exactly what Mike Hogan did during his tenure with The Cranberries, working the pocket and flexing his harmonic chops when necessary.

Dig Mike’s pulse beneath their final single “All Over Now.” https://bit.ly/2HbbAHh