Herbie Flowers

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed

Deserves his own thread in the wake of his passing. Would make a claim he might as well be the sound of the Seventies as much as anyone else.

https://bestclassicbands.com/herbie-flowers-bassist-obituary-9-7-24/

Ned Raggett, Sunday, 8 September 2024 00:11 (one month ago) link

RIP

Doo do doo, doo do doo, doo do doo

stirmonster, Sunday, 8 September 2024 04:15 (one month ago) link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBXUP5GqYJs

^ the Walk On The Wildside bassline explained - worth a watch if you've never seen it

Bernard Quidbins (NickB), Sunday, 8 September 2024 16:45 (one month ago) link

^haven't listened myself though

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 17:50 (one month ago) link

Nor this but it seems like it might be better;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlJRMU1CHng

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 17:52 (one month ago) link

Hah, in a classic session man move, he only had the one 1960 Fender Jazz Bass since the beginning that he never ever swapped out any parts on. Didn't mention how often he changed the strings.

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 18:24 (one month ago) link

Tony VIsconti seems maybe to have forgotten that he assigned the "Space Oddity" session to Gus Dudgeon.

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 18:26 (one month ago) link

How did I never know all he did:

Flowers was always in demand as a bass player and created one of the best known of all hooks for Walk on the Wild Side. It has a brilliant, instantly recognisable ascending and descending twang, but Flowers was modest about it.

“People have often suggested that I should have got writer’s credits, but I just helped put an arrangement together,” he said in an interview. “Lou had the chords written out on a piece of paper and my job was to come up with the bass line.”

In another interview, he said: “You do the job and get your arse away. You take a £12 fee; you can’t play a load of bollocks.” The fee was actually, it has been said, the grand sum of £17, which was more than the reported £9 he got for a three-hour session on Bowie’s Space Oddity in 1969.

Flowers is said to have recorded more than 20,000 sessions, including for Dusty Springfield, George Harrison, Serge Gainsbourg and David Essex.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/sep/08/herbie-flowers-bassist-lou-reed-walk-on-the-wild-side-dies-aged-86

curmudgeon, Sunday, 8 September 2024 18:58 (one month ago) link

I always wonder about exactly which Gainsbourg recordings were his since I some I thought were by him were actually Brian Odgers.

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 19:24 (one month ago) link

Most thorough career survey I've seen, incl. standing up to/leading a band revolt vs. notorious cheapskate Bowie:
https://variety.com/2024/music/news/herbie-flowers-bassist-walk-on-the-wild-side-dead-1236137298/
Bowie didn't learn his lesson, or maybe forgot--cocaine is a helluva drug---and right before the Let's Dance tour, rising star Stevie Ray Vaughn discovered that he would only be getting union scale: couldn't get a raise, so he bailed. Said he could do a lot better than that even w/o leaving Texas

dow, Sunday, 8 September 2024 21:23 (one month ago) link

That SRV story isn't exactly true. They'd worked out a pretty sweet deal where Vaughan could bring his band along on Bowie's dime and do their own gigs in Europe between Bowie's stadium shows, but then at the 11th hour Vaughan's then-manager asked for a substantial pay raise (and who supposedly actually uttered the line about more $$ in Texas as a negotiation tactic) and Bowie's management balked without consulting Bowie (who claimed he would have payed up), so SRV & Co. got stranded at DFW airport & Earl Slick got the call.

Charlie Hair (C. Grisso/McCain), Sunday, 8 September 2024 22:23 (one month ago) link

Drummer friend of mine told me Earl Slick is his cousin, I think, and that he heard a lot of complaints about teh cheapness firsthand

The Zing from Another URL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 8 September 2024 22:55 (one month ago) link

I believe it's herbie on johnny harris's gorgeous "footprints on the moon", playing a similar groove to the one he plays on "the old man's back again".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIDs109Pjx8

houdinisaid, Monday, 9 September 2024 18:05 (one month ago) link


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.