Funkadelic – Friday Night, August 14th

The Temptations – Sweetness In The Dark

Smokey Robinson – Open

Rose Banks – Whole New Thing

Bonnie Pointer – More and More

Fred Wesley and The Horny Horns – Half A Man

Billy Bass + Eddie Hazel – I Ain’t Got Nobody

Introduction

It seems like I’m always doing my brother Billy Bass Nelson wrong. We sometimes just disconnect! I was going to connect with him this week and interview him on his long career. Missed calls, miss connections, we didn’t make it happen.

Besides being a warm guy and quite a personality (how many of you personally know Billy’s wicked / sly laugh?? – ‘a heh, heh, heh’), Billy Bass Nelson is one of America’s most important bassists. Billy came up with the name ‘Funkadelic’ and started the group with Eddie Hazel and George Clinton ; and he has a tremolo and slap bass style that is quite unique, though Billy will most rap at you about James Jamerson and his importance instead.

So yeah, I messed up and missed the opportunity to directly review with Billy some of his important post Funkadelic work as a session bassist for Motown Records, when he was recording for the likes of The Temptations, Smokey Robinson, The Commodores, Lenny Williams and Jermaine Jackson. I have some selections from that Motown era (1975 – 1978) though still here in this post. We’ll get a 1:1 interview up here with Billy Bass Nelson soon. And you know, I’m leaving off here a chunk of Billy Bass’s work for Holland Dozier Holland’s few record labels in the early to mid 1970’s. Honestly, I think Billy did so much session work for Motown during these years, it’s hard to tell exactly what he played on and did not play on.

I recommend you read the All Music Guide post on Billy, or the Wikipedia page is a quick one.

Funkadelic Period

I also thought it was significant to post this collection this week as one of Billy’s earliest songs for Funkadelic, you can hear him on vocals on this one, ‘Friday Night, August 14th’ – well low and behold it is INDEED, Friday Night, August 14th here in 2009.

One of my favorite Funkadelic jams, and Billy and Eddie Hazel trade lead vocals on this one – rapping about ‘buying all the good times’ with an ‘income tax return’ that just came in .. just a bad ass Funkadelic grinder from 1970’s Funkadelic LP ‘Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow’. The song demonstrates, Billy is no sluff of a singer, and actually he’s one of my favorite singers in P-Funk.

Billy’s work for Motown

Next up I went into Billy’s work for The Temptations. Here’s a grainy vinyl rip from the 1976 LP ‘ Wings of Love’ ; the whole A side features Billy Bass there locked in with drummer Ollie Brown.

My favorite jam on the A side is ‘Sweetness in the Dark’ It is so typical of Billy’s style, where he just rides a a really simple groove and then drops a little flair break / drop, tight in, just right before ‘the one’. I believe Freddie Stone is getting in some guitar duties here as well on this jam.

Regarding the Temptations, of course Eddie Hazel and Billy Bass are more well known for penning a monster hit on the 1975 Temptations LP ‘A Song For You’ – that’s the one and only ‘Shakey Ground’. (Here is 2009 version with Billy playing bass with a local group in Nashville covering ‘Shakey Ground’).

And Billy’s tremolo bass open is all over ‘I Feel Sanctified’ by The Commodores though he’s not credited as a writer.

You’ll hear Billy use this ‘drop it before the one’ riff device a lot, and the ‘Sweetness in the Dark’ riff seemingly turns up again, sped up a bit for Smokey Robinson’s ‘Open’. My friend Dwayne Wilson pointed this out to me. I was going to play it for Billy and ask him if he remembered it. The album credits for ‘Smokey’s Family Robinson’ LP from 1976 don’t cite Billy, but Billy tells me if Jeffery Bowen produced the album for Motown, he likely played a role. And this riff is so Billy! (even if it is watered down a little bit). Jeffery Bowen leaned heavy on Billy during his Motown period – more on Bowen here.

You can hear Billy’s boyant bass playing leading Sly Stone’s little sister Rose Banks solo LP effort ‘Rose’ also from 1976. Damn Billy, 1976 was a busy year for you!

Jeffery Bowen takes the writers credit again, but I know this track ‘Whole New Thing’ is a Billy jam. Darn, I wish I had caught up with Billy before he took off for a little trip for more clarifications. He’ll be back. Enjoy the cascading scales on this jam. Truman Thomas is credited with keyboard duties here, but don’t be surprised if that’s actually Billy Preston on those pianos and organs, as he offered another version of ‘Whole New Thing’ to be the lead / title track on an album for A&M in 1977 ; another talented bassist, Keni Burke (of ‘Rising to the Top’ fame) leads on that version.

Billy can be heard leading on bass on this ballad from 1978 on Bonnie Pointer’s self titled debut album, also for Motown. It’s called ‘More and More’. I think Eddie Hazel is playing guitars with Billy and it to me sounds like the ultimate late 70’s Funkadelic slow jam, except it’s not on a Funkadelic album! This one just nabs me. Drop us a comment on this one for sure, I want to know how ‘More and More’ makes you feel.

Even though Billy Bass was at Motown in Los Angeles in the mid to late 70s doing tons of session work, it isn’t like Billy ever left the Parliament / Funkadelic camp!!! You can find him on Parliament albums, Parlet, Brides of Funkenstein all the way into the eighties and beyond.

So on that note, I added a tune here he penned with George Clinton, called ‘Half A Man’ which wound up on ‘Say Blow by Blow Backwards’, the P-Funk thang, 1979 Atlantic LP by Fred Wesley and The Horny Horns.

All the things I mentioned earlier, the “drop it before the one” riff technique, the tremolo bass style, it all stylistically winds up on ‘Half a Man’ and it’s superb bass playing. One of Billy Bass’ finest moments. Eddie Hazel isn’t credited on the guitars here, he may have shown up for the session, but I think Billy Bass is also handling or at least writing a lot of the guitar parts on ‘Half a Man’. Maceo Parker handles lead vocal duties. Lyrically, the song is all about avoiding being cuckolded.

Billy Bass Nelson Solo Work

Has Billy Bass Nelson ever recorded any solo records, like Eddie Hazel did with his Warner Bros. solo album ‘Games Dames and Guitar Things’ (where Billy does appear)?

Well Billy does have an effort called O.G. Funk that he released with Bill Laswell’s help on Rykodisc back in 1994, and I suggest you cop it over here at iTunes (link). Maybe I’ll share more of that in a further post on Billy Bass when I get this interview with him done!

As I mentioned at the top of the post, Billy is quite the singer, so I’m including one more jam here where he shines in that regard. About 10 years ago, a CD came out called ‘Tamurinillis’ – George Clinton with Funkadelic. I’m not sure where the tracks come from really, but there are two Eddie Hazel / Billy Bass Nelson jams on the CD – ‘As Good As I Think I Can Feel’, and ‘I Ain’t Got Nobody’. Rodney Trotter put this CD compliation of P-Funk tunes out, and I don’t know much about Rodney Trotter other than what’s here at this link. I do know that Mr. Trotter did put bass overdubs on top of Billy’s work here on ‘I Ain’t Got Nobody’ so you can’t really hear Billy’s original bass work – bummer! But Billy sings like quite a mug on ‘I Ain’t Got Nobody’, lamenting the hell out of not having his old lady anymore! Check it! ‘As Good As I Think I Can Feel’, not posted here, by the way appears as a Funkadelic B side back from around 1970.

I promise to post an interview and more of Billy’s catalog soon.