Have your influences hurt you?

[Schmidt_Rubin]

I started playing the bass in 1985, my main influence? you got it, Steve Harris. We started writing our own stuff in late 1986, got some good compliments but one thing I always heard was "hey you sound like Steve Harris"
So I started learning a wider variety of players from Bob Daisley to Geddy Lee to Stanley Clarke. I finally broke out of the Harris mold around 1990. Actually it was pretty difficult to do. We did original metal for years after that and I had finally broken my habit.

Now what I hear from other bassists is "hey you sound like Stu Hamm"

Is this a problem?

 

[BichMaker]

um, no - that's not a problem!! When do we jam?

I did get told that I sounded like that "Adrian dude in Queensryche", but I was playing a Queensryche song at the time and the dude was quite toasted. uke:

I've also been told I'm "too 80s" - HELL YEA!!

 

[Schmidt_Rubin]

There's an Adrian in Queensryche?

 

[spideyjg]

Now what I hear from other bassists is "hey you sound like Stu Hamm"

Is this a problem?

If you have Stu's chops that is not a problem. If you are sounding like Stu then it is. You are back in a similar boat as when you were said to sound like Steve.
Granted a more versatile boat but still a boat.

If you are on that level far be it for a hack like me to advise you.

If anything style wise is recognized it is a Geddy/Harris/Entwistle influence with a lot of clams. More a lack of natural skill and discipline made me the hack I am.

Jim

 

[Schmidt_Rubin]

I'm not on Stu's level by any means, I can play a half dozen songs, three are Satch tunes. And I learn some chops from songs we can't complete as a band. Some of it is way too much to even try learning a whole song. I've been getting into Marcus Miller lately, "Silver Rain" is a cd I'd recommend to any bassist.

 

[Ironjose]

i guess that you could say that your sound is supposed to be like your influences, coz you grew up with that, i mean your ear is moulded to what you hear...
JJ

 

[Lord of Delusions]

So if someone were to say to you "Hey, you sound like shit!", does that mean that you suck, or your influences suck?

I would think that you can't help but be influenced by what you listen to. However, you can take that too far by focusing on one particular performer. I remember listening to a kid in a guitar store burn through "Eruption" like he wrote the damn thing. When he was done someone asked him what else he could play. His responce was "Nothing. Thats all I know how to do." Now you know he spent a great deal of time practicing to nail it as well as he did, and I'm sure he learned a ton of different techniques doing it, but as he said, he can't do anything else. That won't get you very far or impress too many people more than once.

Another example would be me. Although I played for the better part of 10 years, I never really developed a tone of my own. I would always emulate the tone of whatever song or band I was playing along with. Of the 50 user presets I had on my Digitech pedal, probably only 10 were original sounding, and half of those were so rich in reverb or echo etc. etc. that they weren't really good for much more than adding in a layer under an existing track.

 

[Rendclaw]

I'll bet Wanda doesn;t have any problems sounding like Steve Harris.

Seriously though, we do tend to sound like our influences early on. I was obsessed with trying to emulate Adrian's sound from Powerslave. Being a rhythm player and on an extremely limited budget, I wasn;t entirely successful. As time went on I noticed that with this pedal set here, and the pickup selector set there, sounds can can approximated.

As to playing style, my last teacher said that I had a heavy jazz influence somewhere. I don;t know how, as I picked every note I played and I would go somewhere else when I would really get into it, to the point where one time he looked at me and said, "that was pretty good. Play it again", and I couldn't. Playing chrods and rhythm, I get locked in and am conscious of almost everything, but when playing lead, I zone the hell out.

One the subject of albums of bass players, I have yet to find something by a bassist that comes close to Stu Hamm's "Kings of Sleep".

 

[Schmidt_Rubin]

Kings of Sleep is awesome, we do Call of the wild and Black ice, the best we can anyway

 

[War_Blade]

Some people say i sound like paul gilbert, the other half say i sound like yngwie malmsteen. I can't really argue though, those are my biggest influences. Although i have recently adding alot of other stuff to my playing and vocabulary.

 

[Air Raid Siren]

Is this a problem?

Not in my opinion!!!! I feel my many and varied influences have only served to make me a better musician and singer.

 

[DREAMASTER]

Not in my opinion!!!! I feel my many and varied influences have only served to make me a better musician and singer.

Hi. Did u received my PM's ?