Caleb Green of Australian folk/grunge band Daisypicker told us about his love for a Tortoise bass lick...
Caleb Green: My choice for the bass line that blew my mind is Tortoise’s "Spiderwebbed" on their self-titled album from 1994. I distinctly remember when I first came across it, I spent the entire week just scrubbing back to replay the first 16 or so bars, on repeat, and on repeat again, and on repeat... It fascinates me as it never peaks anywhere, and it never lulls, it simply exists as the centrepiece for the song. The drums come and go, the secondary bass joins in for the ride, but that riff you hold on to, as the rest of the instrumentation swirls around your head.
How Doug Mccombs came up with it will always baffle me. The home base of the phrase lies at the very end, when it finally lands on a double-stopped E, with a twisting ravine of harmonics and hammer-ons pushing and pulling at you along the way, and that instantly made my ears prick up.
‘...how do you write something that feels like it begins at the end?...’
Mccombs’ basslines, whether in Eleventh Dream Day, Toe 2000, or Tortoise, continue to inspire me to use the bass guitar as a melodic force and not to settle for mediocrity when it comes to writing music, especially within Daisypicker, and how important it is to strive to develop your original sound as both an individual, and within a collective.
The piece serves as a reminder for me that rules are only imposed to those who don’t want to bother to think otherwise. You know, who says each member of a band needs to play the role of the instrument they hold? Why can’t a drummer’s snare be the melody, or the viola part to drive the piece rhythmically? I find that rules in music will drive your creativity to an early grave, and that’s why Mccombs is such an inspiration, and Spiderwebbed to remain firmly on repeat, and on repeat, and on repeat, and on repeat.
Daisypicker's Mess Around LP is out now.
Photo by Ari Jamieson
