Sounds of Heavy Metal

Ramblings of a Guy Who Loves to Play The Bass and Recreate His Favorite Songs

Cliff Burton and Why He Was The Best Bass Player Ever

In the three short years Metallica had Cliff Burton as their musical powerhouse, “The major rager on the four string motherfucker” (Mustaine, D. 1983) Metallica put out three of Thrash Metal’s greatest albums. Joining in 1983 after the songs for Kill ‘Em All were written, he only rewrote the bass parts, making them so much better and more flowing for the songs. With the year 1984 and the release of Ride The Lightning, Metallica shook the metal scene with their thrash, melodic goodness. It’s here on Ride The Lightning that the majority of Cliff’s musical influence can be heard, on all tracks but two. Harmonies were where he really stuck out, giving us the Creeping Death harmony, Fight Fire with Fire and Fade To Black, among others. 

    Coming from Castro Valley in the San Francisco bay, Cliff vowed to become the greatest bass player in the world at 13 after the death of his brother. He practised for an average of 8 hours a day on the Bass, and played a Hotrodded red Rickenbacker 4001. With these modifications, and his extensive usage of effects pedals, he joined Metallica after leaving Trauma and proceeded to shake the world with his thundering bass waves. He recorded bass on studio albums Kill ‘Em All (1983) Ride The Lightning (1984) and Master of Puppets (1986) until his death in a tour bus accident on September 27, 1986. He often said his favorite song to play was Master Of Puppets, and I believe his greatest works to be Master and Orion. 

    His influences in Metal bassists everywhere are still huge, and he was the one who got me into playing bass, alongside Jason Newsted, his replacement. The thing that really made Cliff Burton amazing was his unconventional use of effects pedals at the time. At the time, Bass guitar didn’t really need very much in the way of effects, as their main use was to keep a steady beat and fill the lows in the song. Cliff was not a fan of this. Songs like The Call of Ktulu on RTL, and Orion on Master of Puppets list him as “Lead Bass”, and Listening to the Live at the Lyceum Theater bootleg of Ktulu will tell anybody why. Another amazing thing is the use of a Wah pedal. I don’t think I know of anybody who used a wah on a bass before him, though there may have been somebody that I just don’t know about. Again, coming back to Ktulu, the main riff is laden with heavy usage of the wah to represent Ktulu calling out from the deep. His signature solo, Anesthesia (Pulling Teeth) was the greatest example of Cliff Burton’s musical magic. Recorded six different times, and done in one take each time, the album version was the one he liked the most, and never played the same way twice when played live. He always changed the solo a little bit, a different technique, a slightly different part, and it always sounded amazing. 

My biggest regret in life is the fact that I will never be able to meet the man, but am I ever glad that people snuck cameras into shows and recorded concerts, so that I may at least be able to witness the greatness.

Recent Trends In The Music Community

A couple of trend related to my discourse community are companies using digital tech in amplifiers and more artists releasing single songs rather than albums.

Companies are making new amps that have digital tech in them to satisfy users who may not be able to afford millions of effects pedals or want a specific tone. For example, Fender makes the Mustang GT amps which have a wifi connection so you can download new presets or in some cases, make and upload your own. You can even connect your phone with bluetooth and use it to control the amp while you play. I have yet to personally find a bass amp like this, but the specific tone I would love to recreate requires a couple pieces of inexpensive gear, and the main parts are multiple thousands of dollars. I have seen these guitar amps range in price from $350-400ish, all the way to $1000 from just what I have seen. Extra features vary with the price, of course.

Another trend is for people who make music is to release singles and build up hype for them rather than release an entire album. Especially for smaller bands or solo names, this is more cost effective and easier to do outside of a studio. Even for large bands. Take Metallica for example. They have been remastering and releasing huge box sets for their first four albums, Kill Em All, Ride The Lightning, Master Of Puppets and …And Justice For All. They do this and continue touring, due to how much more money they can make as opposed to making and releasing a new album. Bands now survive on tours, merch sales and hype more than album sales, due to things like Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Prime and the like. Though many people would love to see new albums, Bands seem to be financially better off if they can ride a hype wave on tours, singles and merchandise.

Recently, one of my favorite Musicians, Dave Mustaine has been diagnosed with throat cancer. We are all rooting for you Dave, wishing luck with the treatment.

Bass Guitars, Drilling, Blasting and the Skills That Go Together

I don’t think I have learned very many skills thus far playing bass or guitar. The way I have been learning isn’t the conventional way of learning the basics, chords, chord progressions, and on and on the way most people do. I don’t take lessons either. I started playing when I was little, trying to learn the “proper” way, and got severely bored doing so. Fast forward to 18 and going into college, I bought my beautiful Yamaha and a Rumble 15 amp for around $450ish plus a cable and a couple other goodies and I was off to the races.

I learned by searching up Bass tabs for songs I wanted to play, trying (and failing) at playing them and just kept doing it over and over. I have acquired a couple tabs books, a new amp, a poster that has guitar chords all over it and an Ibanez Gio with a factory paint deformation on the headstock that I love because it’s mine and only on mine. Added to my existing collection from when I was little of a package built electric guitar (which isn’t in the greatest of conditions electronically) and a couple acoustics, I am ready to make many different sounds.

I won’t lie to you and tell you that I’m good enough to give Geddy Lee a run for his money, but I am slowly making progress with multiple different songs, some of which I am content to just know a riff or two, and others, Like Orion, Anesthesia (Pulling Teeth), and The Call of Ktulu that I am learning the songs in their entirety.

The skills that would transfer over to my career choice of Drilling and Blasting would be determination, willingness to Learn and the ability to not get discouraged very easily. Drilling is definitely an industry you don’t want to quit in. Though it is hard work and sometimes can add up to long hours, it is an industry that can and will get you places.

Through Drilling, Blasting or possibly both, I would like to be able to work happily and safely, allowing me to keep all my fingers, hands, arms and legs to allow me to continue playing, acquiring and expanding my knowledge of basses, guitard, amps and pedals.

One day, I would love to own a Rickenbacker 4003 in cherry red. Wicked bass, with an Ampeg SVT head and some 4x12s to go with them.

Bass Guitar, and occasionally the 6 string (Blog 1)

The discourse community I have decided to blog about is the community of people who play Guitar and Bass guitars, focused more on Bass as that is the instrument that I choose to play more often.

The thing that I love most about this community is that every person knows different skills or methods to achieving something. Yes there are some musical greats, and yes there are experts or masters, but the ones that I believe to be the best aren’t these people at all. The ones I believe to be the greatest are the ones who forged their own sound, either by being in a band who started a new musical genre (Geezer Butler, Cliff Burton, etc) or by being a Jack-Of-All-Trades, master of none.

The community’s goals are to improve their musical skills, learn new songs, make new songs and for some people, to jam with others and have fun. My personal goals in this community are to play songs that I enjoy listening to, make sounds that are generally not associated with Bass guitars and slowly learn how to make music on my own, much like many others in the community.

To achieve these goals, I am starting by learning to play some songs by one of my favorite bands, Metallica. I use a Yamaha TRBX174 with Rotosound 30-90 gauge strings and a Fender rumble 25 amp. Together, this combination sounds wicked, but one day (Soon hopefully,) I will be playing with some extra pedals, like an Ibanez Tube Screamer, a Wah of some sort, and/or an EHX Big Muff compression pedal. I am trying to build a similar rig to Cliff Burton because I love the tone so much. Listening to his isolated bass tracks always surprises me, no matter how many times you listen to it. Also, we need an Isolated bass track for The Call Of Ktulu damnit!

Some of the main communication for these people happens face to face, between musicians at the guitar store talking to employees about new products, local shows and troubleshooting. The other large platform of communications is online as well. Groups on Facebook, forums, comments on internet magazines, Youtube videos about products and tutorials, and much more.

I hope many people realize that Bass guitars, while they are mainly to provide low end power to a song, aren’t lashed down to this role and can definitely shine on their own.

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