Thursday, April 30, 2009

Standing in the shadows of love

I started to play bass in 5th grade. I had really wanted to play sax, but that didn’t start until a year later. I was heartbroken when I couldn’t make a noise out of a sax but ended up playing trumpet because I wanted to be in band.
One day in 7th grade, my father took me to see the documentary Standing in the Shadows of Motown. This was the film about the studio musicians for Motown. Collectively they called themselves The Funk Brothers. The movie talks about their lives and playing under all those big names. Together, they have played on more number one hits than the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Rolling Stones, and Elvis…combined. Throughout the film they get together to play with current RnB singers taking the place of the Motown artists. This was an amazing film. I am quite positive my jaw was dropped the entire film. I really took to the bass player, James Jamerson. He is without a doubt the best bass player to ever have lived.
After I walked out of the theatre I asked to buy a bass guitar. I wanted to be Jamerson. We also ended up grabbing my dads old PA system from when he was a kid. This led to many family jams down in the basement.
Later on that year I got to see the Funk Brothers live at Summerfest. Here were 10 guys in probably there 70s and 80s still jamming away. They were probably the best concert I have ever seen. This was the epitome of RnB, of Pop, of soul, of a generation.
Here is a clip of my favorite song. I hope you get a chance to see the full movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gA0GcXV2njY

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