[Tim Bowen]

...flock together! Hey brother, I hear you, and you're definitely not an idiot!

Playing bass is a contact sport. The last time I was "the full time bass player" in a project was with a pop rock band in the early-mid 90's; I did regular shows with them for a couple of years, felt pretty decent about my bass work in general, and was in really good physical shape, as to the specific mechanics involved with that instrument.

I did a pickup gig on bass about two years ago. It was a very spirited, high octane blues/blues rock/R&B sort of thing, about an hour and fifteen minute closing set at a club. No rehearsals other than talking through stuff over the phone in advance of the date, and the band was sort of thrown together at the midnight hour to honor a commitment that couldn't be met by one of the musician's regular projects. The drummer happened to be the touring drummer at the time for the band Arrested Development. Trying to keep up with that man's superhuman foot nearly friggin' killed me. Seriously, it took every bit of physicality I had to get through that set. All's well that ends well, I suppose, as the show fortunately came off quite well, but I was seriously hurting the next day.

These days, I do an odd session on bass now and then. I do a couple of covers live with my duo on an Epiphone "El Capitan" acoustic-electric bass. One of the covers is "It's Your Thing" by the Isley Brothers, and I segue into the synth bass lines on P-Funk's "Flashlight" and any other funk riffs that pop into my head over the course of the number. The rub(s): I've always been sort of a snob about playing fingerstyle; none of those bass lines would kick me around if I were working regularly as a bassist; I've had chronic hand and arm health issues for a long time. Long story short - I keep a thick Dunlop tortex pick in my jeans pocket whenever I'm playing bass live. It's a security blanket. I prefer to play fingerstyle, but if the hands are tensing up, screw the fingers, I'll grab that purple pick in a heartbeat.