Has anyone here ever heard of the musician named James Jamerson?

If so what do you know about him (without googling)?

I think i just had a beer with him last night.

ok sorry, I had to google him. I did not have a beer with him last night that was someone else.

Bob wrote:If so what do you know about him (without googling)?

I think that is the same dude I used to play three dimensional Chinese checkers with.

Bob wrote:If so what do you know about him (without googling)?

...............

Is he really a Jammer, son...?

I know James Amerson...does that count...?

Roddy wrote:
Is he really a Jammer, son...?

I watched one of the most amazing music documentary movies I have ever seen today. And Jamerson figures into it very prominently. Jamerson and the other Funk Brothers made a truly phenomenal contribution to music and never got recognition for it. I would have gone the rest of my life without ever having a clue about this story if I hadn't happened onto that 2002 documentary which aired on The Movie Channel today.

This is the documentary...

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/standing_in_the_shadows_of_motown/

This is the Funk Brothers...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Funk_Brothers

And this is James Jamerson...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Jamerson

"he is now regarded as one of the most influential bass players in modern music history. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. He performed on 30 number-one hits, more than any person or group in music history, and on more than 70 number-one R&B hits, also the most ever."

Bob wrote:

Roddy wrote:
Is he really a Jammer, son...?

I watched one of the most amazing music documentary movies I have ever seen today. And Jamerson figures into it very prominently. Jamerson and the other Funk Brothers made a truly phenomenal contribution to music and never got recognition for it. I would have gone the rest of my life without ever having a clue about this story if I hadn't happened onto that 2002 documentary which aired on The Movie Channel today.

A Motown bassists with a unique style of playing the bass.

The studio musicians who comprised what became known as the "Funk Brothers" were mostly jazz musicians who Berry Gordy found playing in clubs around Detroit. Most of them had migrated up from different parts of the south to get work in the auto factories.
When Gordy opened his studio in the basement of a house in the West End of Detroit in 1959 he began assembling these amazingly talented musicians who working together created a brand new unique form of popular music.

Here's bass player Pino Palladino with a short tribute to Jamerson who influenced Paul McCartney and so many other bass guitar players who followed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDv1aThJKYA

Jameson died broke at age 47. He was never compensated for what he did and never received any recognition for it while he was alive.

a scene from the documentary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVfF5wKF3Kg

Another name you've never heard of is Benny Benjamin. Or Eddie Brown. Or many others.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYUYTlLeplU

Another name you've never heard of is Benny Benjamin. Or Eddie Brown. Or many others.

..................................

Are you posting from a smoke filled room with indirect lighting...?

I'm posting from a space that I have no words to describe. But I can smell the smoke and the scent of alcohol. And the lighting in this dump is always indirect (as you know). lol

It was a metaphor Bobby.

But you knew that. LOL.

Put yer phones on and listen to this a little amped. And yes, it has a good base line. Subtle and effective.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amCsfY8RvNA

Actually I'm now remembering the very best time of my whole life.
I think I was 15 years old (give or take). And my memory is fading now but I was at one of those old cinder block houses on the south side of Ariola (P'Cola Beach). I'm sitting on a sofa with an old Wurlitzer electric piano in front of me.
There's a bass player, a guitar player, a drummer and a singer in the room with me and a slew of drunk college kids. It's an FSU college fraternity party and we're getting paid $15 each and all the alcohol we can drink to play. They're all older than me. The singer is probably 25. And I'm now remembering we're doing "Louie Louie" for probably 15 minutes. And I'm getting drunk and I'm playing my heart out.
I have no other memory of that until I'm on the Bay Bridge in the singer's Mustang and he's taking me home going 120 mph on the bridge.

Imagine how different your life would have turned out if that friend had crashed his Mustang, going the wrong way on the 3 mile, into a van full of tourist headed back to their beach rental...?

The shit we all did scares the hell outta me now.

Signed:

Danny Downer

.......

in edit:

Sorry Bob...

That was inappropriate.

I can't put the shit back in the donkey, as it were.

Roddy wrote:Imagine how different your life would have turned out if that friend had crashed his Mustang, going the wrong way on the 3 mile, into a van full of tourist headed back to their beach rental...?

The shit we all did scares the hell outta me now.

Signed:

Danny Downer

.......

in edit:

Sorry Bob...

That was inappropriate.

I can't put the shit back in the donkey, as it were.

Nah, it's not inappropriate. It just moves on to a later part of my life.
I have another vivid memory much later in life. It was the day I picked up a Pensacola Journal (that's what it was called then), and the headline story was about a drunk going the wrong way on the bridge resulting in a death. But the newspaper writer focused on the human side of it. I think it was a young couple whose very young little girl had died.
I thought about all the times I'd drove drunk. From the time I got a license until that moment. Finally I had at least become responsible enough to want to stop doing it.

Bob,

Standing in the Shadows of Motown has been around for 10 years.

There are several encounters which bring tears to my eyes. If you watch the extras concerning Pistol Pete, raising his 12 year old daughter alone, with home videos of her drumming. Knowing he died BEFORE the film preview and his daughter being left alone....is hard for me.

Robert White, eating BBQ chicken, while My Girl is playing in the background.

I loved the songs with Bootzy, with Joan ( who has a song called Pensacola on an album), and Chaka Kan (sp).

You might check out the Chess Records story, it's fan-damn-tastic.

Nanook,
I'm familiar with the Chess story and watched Cadillac Records.
But even though Motown was such a part of the music scene when I was a teenager I never really gravitated to it like I did the Memphis and Chicago R&B/soul stuff of the same era. It just didn't grab me that same way.
But this unbelievable documentary reconnected me with it. And in the span of a few hours I have become to appreciate it really for the first time.

And, Nanook,

When they did the Detroit concert and placed the photo placards of their dead comrades beside them on stage, I cried too.

Bob,

You're talking about the Stax/Volt sound. Spend a week in Memphis and act like a tourist. You would be surprized at the people who recorded at Stax/Volt.

Meanwhile, another Rock-n-Roller has died. I'm a YES fan.........