No, not by a long shot. I started on piano at about 5 years old, studying with the same teacher that taught my mom many years before. Mrs. Phillips was her name, and she prepared my mom for Julliard, although Mom decided not to attend. That was in San Antonio, Texas. When we moved, we couldn't find a teacher that would let my older sister and I continue at the advanced level we'd achieved, so that kind of fizzled out.

I took up Euphonium [Baritone Horn] in grade school and played through high school. I dabbled in guitar and, later, drums. But none of them seemed to fit quite right. But when I discovered the bass at the age of 13, I knew that was the instrument for me.

Q: Why the bass?

Because it rumbled my stomach. (Laughs.) It thumped. I sat in this little local music store, playing a cheap bass through a guitar amp, and it still sounded like the voice of Spirit. It all came to me in an instant, the role of the bass in a band, the things I could do with it. All of a sudden, I knew what I had to do, what I wanted to be.

Q: Are you self-taught?

Yes and no. I took lessons from my sister's guitar teacher for a few months right after my parents got me that bass. That was 1967, I think. And years later, in about 1981, I studied with Carol Kaye for several months while we were both in Monterey, CA. Those were the only lessons I took. The rest was learning on my own or from other musicians.

Q: What about the guitar teacher? Did he know his stuff?

He was pretty amazing, actually; he played everything from classical to Hendrix - and played it all very well. He'd been teaching a long time and knew how to break things down for younger players. That summer he taught me the basic Rock & Roll riffs and a few songs. But the main thing he taught me was how to learn from records. After maybe a dozen lessons he said, "that's all I can teach you. Now go join a band." It was kind of shocking that he'd kick me out on my own so quickly, but he was being honest. He was a guitar player, not a bassist. And he'd reached the end of what he know about bass. It was probably the best thing he could have done for me.

Q: Did you follow his advice and join a band?

Oh, yeah. My first paying gig was less than three months after that - I made ten dollars and got a free dinner. (Laughs.) Thought I'd hit the big time. When that band broke up - the two brothers that started it got into a fight and stopped speaking to each other - I joined another one right away. Being one of only two bass players in the area helped. (Laughs.)

Q: How did you continue your studies of the bass?

I wore out a ton of great records, listening to them over and over again to learn the bass parts. For instance, I went through four or five copies of Goodbye Cream. I also managed to get hold of some of Carol Kaye's early lesson books. The records helped me learn parts for songs, and Carol's material helped me analyze parts to understand what made a good bass line. And, of course, every band was a learning experience. Then, a few years later, everything changed when I saw a documentary on Cream.

Q: What happened?

Jack Bruce, whom I already idolized because he was the King of Busy, like a lead guitarist down low, talked about his classical training, and paid homage to Bach. I remember the interviewer was a bit shocked by that, and Bruce said, "oh, yeah. Bach is the gov'ner of all bassists." I was floored, but also very intrigued. I immediately set about studying Bach again.

Q: What do you mean "again" and how did you go about it?

Well, I'd studied Bach back on piano.

Q: Wait a minute? At age 5? You're kidding, right?

No, I'm not. I told you, Mrs. Phillips was a phenomenal teacher. She worked with my mother her entire young life and helped her pass the Julliard auditions. She was still phenomenal when my sister and I studied with her. I'll never forget our first recital. All the other kids were playing Polka Dot Polka and things like that. Kathye and I did Bach two-part inventions. I remember I also did a Rachmaninoff piece - don't remember which one - but it had tenths in the left hand and I had to learn to rock my hand in such a way that I could play both notes. They weren't simultaneous the way they were written, but they were darn close. So, yeah, we were playing some serious work for young kids.

Q: OK. So you went back to Bach as a teenager. How did that go?

We still had all those books, plus lots more. My mom had continued on piano, and had added organ. So she had a lot of Bach, in addition to stacks of other stuff. I rummaged through everything and took all the Bach books up to my room. Even though I had two real keyboards in the house - piano and organ - I chose to draw a keyboard on a big piece of cardboard. I sat at my desk with a book in front of me, and that keyboard cartoon, and a bass in my lap. I went through each piece analyzing the melody, chord structure, counterpoint and bass line. Everything. I looked at how it all interrelated, how it all fit and worked together.

I did this from the time I got up until the time I went to bed for more than two months. I was so focused on it that my mom forced me to come down to dinner and spend a half hour with the family. Otherwise, I wouldn't have seen anyone at all that one summer.

Q: You spent the whole summer doing that? What about hanging out with friends? Going swimming? All the things a normal kid does?

(Laughs.) I wasn't a normal kid. Look at these eyes. You think I was good at sports? Man, think again. (Laughs.) I was the goofy-eyed kid that everyone made fun of. I didn't have many friends to speak of, mostly acquaintances, you know? And, besides, music was my best friend. When I was sad, or lonely, or bored…it was music that cheered me up. So it was "normal" for me to spend most of my time studying music anyway. I'd wake up, go downstairs and make a thermos of coffee, get some toast or something, and go right back up to my room. I'd study until dinner, fidget through my required half-hour and bolt back upstairs to study until I feel asleep. A lot of times, I just laid my head on the desk and slept there.

Q: Did it do any good? The studying I mean.

Oh, yeah!! A week before school stared again, I called all my musician friends and started going to jam sessions. They were blown away! All of a sudden, I had more focus and more melodic content to my lines. It was a real transformation. (Laughs.) Of course, I don't recommend that course of study to my students or anyone else, but it worked for me.

Q: Who were your other early influnces?

Anybody that was on a record I heard. (Laughs.) Seriously. Of course, I can rattle off all the big names of the time - Carol Kaye, Paul McCartney, Chris Squire, Greg Lake, Noel Redding, John Paul Jones, John Entwhistle. But then there were all these other players on all kiinds of different music, and I learned from all of them.

Q: What about your time with Carol Kaye?

I was in the Navy, and back in Monterey for the second time, studying at the Language School there. I was friends with one of the salesman at the local music store. He called me one afternoon and said "Get down here right now!" When I asked why he just told me to hurry up and hung up the phone. When I got there he stuck a bass in my hands and said "First door on the right," and pushed me along. I go in the first practice room and there sits Carol. I almost fainted.

It took a minute to find my voice and say hello. It turned out that she was auditioning for students. I felt like I really fumbled through the process but she took me on anyway. And those lessons were just such a gift, you know?

Q: In what way?

Carol is an amazing technician. I think that's one of the reasons she can play so many styles with authority. I mean, she can just play anything she wants - on bass and guitar. She taught me a lot about hand position and the proper way to fret notes. I'm very lucky to have had that time with her. I'm slowly losing brightness in my world, it's some weird degenerative thing with my eyes. So learning the neck the way she taught me helped me be able to make significant moves up and down the neck without having to look. She really cleaned up my left and right hand techniques.

She also taught me a lot about crafting unique bass lines. It's funny. Looking back on her career, students sometimes think she's just playing stock riffs. Well, in a sense she is. But she wrote them! All those lines you hear on the hits in the 60s and early 70s - she's the one that wrote the book on that style. Then there's all the work she did for TV and movies. And, of course, all the stuff she did for Motown when they started moving out to LA.

Q: What about that whole Jamerson controversy from a few years back? What's the straight scoop on that?

Well, I don't want to knock Jamerson; he's another one I studied a lot. He certainly deserves his place in the Low End Hall of Fame. But it's impossible for him to have been in LA at the same time he was in Motown, ok? We still haven't figured out how to be in two places at once. Look, Carol's got the paperwork to back up what she did. She's a sharp businesswoman, and kept meticulous records of her work. Also, the Union has paperwork to prove she did the recordings.

I know all about the Funk Brothers backing each other up when one of them claimed to have recorded something they didn't. Well, you know what? You get a bunch of guys in a bar or similar situation and one of them's bragging to some girl, trying to impress her. His friends are almost always going to back him up.

Like I said, though: Jamerson deserves a lot of credit for helping to create the Motown sound. He was a very intuitive bass player. But that doesn't take one little bit away from the phenomenal career that Carol has had. In my book, she's the best that ever worked LA, and certainly one of the finest bassists to ever record. Plus, she's an outstanding educator. She deserves her due, as well.

Look, you don't have to take my word for it. Ask Roy Vogt; he'll tell you. Ask about ninety-twelve other bassists who've studied with her. The lady can play anything she wants. She can read flyspecks on the wall. She can walk you through the most complex jazz theory you'll ever want to know. And, to this day, as long as she's been around, she can still play circles around most cats out there. She's just in a class all by herself.

Q: What advice would you give younger players?

Well, the same stuff I've been telling students for years: Practice makes perfect. If you want to play this - or any - instrument, you've got to put in your time. Most people can't pick a bass up and suddenly be soloing, you know? Learn your scales, learn about chord progressions. Listen to everything you can get your hands on, no matter what style. And play with others. Even if you just want to play for fun with your friends, you're not going to get very far if you don't start playing with others.

Don't worry too much about gear in the beginning because it all starts inside you. Listen to your heart, it knows. And keep an open mind as far as styles go. It's all worth listening to. And, by all means, keep thumpin'! (Laughs.)

^Top of Page^

Buy Dig the Hole on CD. While
you're there, check out other
cool stuff, like Deeper Blues T-shirts.

Download the entire album
or individual songs. Click
on the DigStation logo..

Lane's serving of Chicken Soup
to Inspire the Body & Soul®..