Two Bass guitarists??

[Mr. C]

There are bands w/two or more guitarists, two keyboardists, two drummers, but has there ever been one with two bassists? If not, why not? Just one of those "I'm wondering" questions.

[Mark7]

Yes....

I just wish I could remember who

[timmerman]

Yes indeed, but also forgotten the name, all I can remember is that it was a heavy rock band, and they did not use any guitars, just two basses and drums.

Thinking about it it may even have been a local outfit, but yes people do try these line-ups.

Eddie

[Outlaws]

Because its hard enough to find one bassist that realizes he is not playing a guitar, let alone two of them.

[TexRoadkill]

If I could find two bass players who would show up for practice I could rule the world.

[lpdeluxe]

Spinal Tap "Big Bottom:" THREE bass players!

[-=¤willhaven¤=-]

Spinal Tap - Big Bottom. 3 bass players.

[scottboyher]

Lynard Skynard had 14 Bassists, 12 Guitarist, 22 Drummers, and 15 Keys.

[jojomellon]

In the mid 90's, King Crimson had two bass players.

[EdWonbass]

Ned's Atomic Dust Bin

[Gonny]

In the early/mid '80s there was a band in Detroit called Slaughterhouse that had two bassists, but one of them only had three strings. I had the misfortune of seeing them twice - the experiment failed miserably, but probably not because they had two bass players. More likely because the singer spent more time fondling himself than singing, and the guitarist chose to play with pliers most of the time.

We played a show with them once. After their set we had to go out to the parking lot and tell people it was safe to come back inside for our set.

I'm sure this post didn't help...sorry.

[faderbug]

there was a band called dog eat dog in the nineties, they had two bassists and a drummer.

[MadAudio]

Black Mountain from New Orleans, LA. Two bassists & drums, no guitar.

[AlChuck]

King Crimson is correct, the so-called "double trio" had two drummers (Bill Bruford and Pat Mastelloto) and two guitarists (Robert Fripp and Adrian Belew) as well as two "bassists"—Tony Levin and Trey Gunn. If you want to be a stickler they weren't really bassists. Tony Levin plays bass but on some number of KC tunes he played the Chapman Stick, though often filling the bass role anyway. Trey Gunn technically plays something called the Warr touch guitar, which is a Chapman Stick-like instrument. While often in the bass role he also plays melodic and harmonic stuff too. And of course the material was carefully arranged to keep the parts distinct and out of each other's way.

Stanley Clarke had a group for a while where he had another bass player to fill the traditional bass role sometimes while he played up in the guitar's range on his so-called piccollo bass.

Speaking of Stanley, he was on a 1971 recording of Pharoah Sanders' called Live at the East with a second bassist, Cecil McBee, though here we're talking uprights, not electric bass guitars. There's a fantastic passage where the two of them play an incredible improvised duet, one of the best things SC ever recorded, IMHO, though it's little-known. A couple of years later and Stanley got busy becoming the prototypical fusion electric bass monster, but his upright playing was always what I liked most from him.

[jbratch]

the chicago-based post rock band tortoise recorded two bassists on their s/t and some i think on millions now living will never die and also tnt . very good band.

also check out dianogah (also from chicago?). this band consisted of two bassists and a drummer. no vocals.

i might come up with more.

[oh_the_blood]

my bloody valentine records their guitars 100 times without tuning them, and im sure they do the same with the bass

[gibsonguy09]

Originally Posted by scottboyher

Lynard Skynard had 14 Bassists, 12 Guitarist, 22 Drummers, and 15 Keys.

this is true. Wouldn't it be f unny if the tried all doing it at the same time? Kinda makes ya wonder?!?

[treymonfauntre]

a diy hardcore band from virginia called pg99 had 2 bassists, 3 guitarists, 3 vocalists, and 1 drummer. their recordings are generally a nightmare (i think they had 13 or 14 releases) but they did one with kurt ballou of converge and it was fantastic

[Fletch-X]

Though not a band, Victor Wooten has done a number of recordings with multiple bass players. I'm going to see his show tommorow

[Rickson Gracie]

the most popular one would definitely be Neds Atomic Dustbin from the 90s..awesome songs but they probably did not need the two bass players

[dr.colossus]

There was an Aussie band called "Pre-Shrunk" that used the 2 bass 1 drum approach. one bass would be playing the groove while the other did stunt bass. They were around in the mid ninties, their last few releases went in that "trans-am" eighties electro-rock direction, but the early stuff was good organic rawk.

[Clive Hugh]

A British group in 70's Showwaddy Waddy has 2 bass players, had a very tight bass sound, read an article where they said they had to keep it simple to blend.

[Mark7]

Good old Showaddywaddy


*wipes nostalgic tear from eye*

I never noticed the two bass players when they used to appear on TOTP. Probably because I didn't know what a bass guitar looked like back then.