Jet and Licorice chatting

[SJB]

Don't know if this has been posted before:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QIJbGM ... e=youtu.be

[Iain Purdon]

This was recorded by Jet’s then wife Janet at a meeting in Wales in 1997. It was her copyright and she sold it on VHS under the title “Remembering the 2Is”.

It would seem that somebody has bypassed the copyright and uploaded it to YouTube.

[abstamaria]

I had never seen that. It is very interesting, especially for me, living in Manila. Thank you.

Andy

[DustyShoes]

This is an interesting, "fireside chat" type of thing.
Very interesting and certainly revealing when the common narrative becomes personalized by Jet & Brian.
Jet is the speaker we see and hear more of as Brian takes more of a back seat about 4,5 meters to the left of
the original Shadows bassman.
Interesting also was Jet revealing that (Paul) McCartney's bass playing was his then current favorite bass player.
"I like McCartneys bass playing, don't you"? Jet Harris asked of Brian Locking.
Thank you to the Mrs., Janet, who videoed this conversation - I didn't know that before today, allowing
Shadows fans to view an excellent onstage chat with, Jet Harris and Brian Locking..

Simon.

[iefje]

Jet mentioned that he likes the bass player "to play the bass", not to be pretending he or she's a lead guitarist. To be fair, Jet himself did play something approximating a lead guitarist on a few of the early Shadows recordings: "Jet Black", "Chinchilla", "Kon-Tiki" and "36-24-36", to name some.

[Iain Purdon]

Jet mentioned that he likes the bass player "to play the bass", not to be pretending he or she's a lead guitarist. To be fair, Jet himself did play something approximating a lead guitarist on a few of the early Shadows recordings: "Jet Black", "Chinchilla", "Kon-Tiki" and "36-24-36", to name some.

Yes, true, although I see that comment as general wisdom rather than a mandatory rule.

The tracks you mention deliberately use the bass guitar as a solo or duetting instrument. I don't think they would work otherwise. At other times, Jet would do exactly as he said, play the bass to mesh in with the drums and rhythm guitar and provide the right degree of energy for the melody line.

Licorice was very much in agreement. Apart from performing the Shadows numbers you mention, he played the bass - simply, along with the drums, although with a fair amount of jazzer's syncopation. There are very few examples of him adding bass features. When he did, they were also to enhance the number: I'm thinking of Jack's Good and The Girls.

Alan Jones went on to give us all an object lesson in how to play the bass, adding twiddly bits only when they would fill a gap and not get in the way.

Mark Griffiths is a very good lead guitarist who moved down to bass. Listen to something like Moonlight Shadow and we're back to the bass almost duetting. I couldn't fault it!

[Timcooper555]

Never seen it before either, thanks for posting.
The story that made me smile was when Jet was talking about playing with Cliff at "The Event", on how someone was following him around before his appearance on stage with a walkie talkie, I guess to keep an eye on him to make sure he made it onto stage!
It surprised me to that he said that was the highlight of his career, I thought it would have been when "Diamonds" was no1 or something similar.

[iefje]

I agree that the bass guitar is mainly there to lock in with the drums and rhythm guitar, but there are pieces of music where fills on the bass and even solo sections on the bass are appropriate in my opinion. If you listen to for instance songs by The Who, you can hear John Entwistle play a sort of lead bass guitar style in addition to Pete Townshend's combined lead/rhythm guitar playing, which absolutely suits and really helps making those songs. Being an amateur bass guitarist in a blues/rock band, I mainly play 'accompanying' bass guitar, but there are lots of moments too where I can improvise on the bass and do some soloing. There are songs where the original bass lines are quite boring to play, so I always try to make it more interesting for myself to play and hopefully interesting for the listener.

[MeBHank]

Thank you so much for sharing this. I'm all emotional - it's so familiar hearing Brian tell stories like those. I've sat for hours smiling as he reeled off story after story, each of which had the potential to make your jaw drop. He always had tales to share which I'd not heard before.

Genuine, unassuming legends who were also 'the boy next door'. We shan't see their like again. Those of us who have shared time with them are so, so privileged.

[Moderne]

I'd never heard that about the Fender VI not being audible in certain parts of the audience before. Interesting! I'd often wondered why Jet didn't carry on playing it. Jet and Liquorice did a similar 'talk about the 2Is days' thing at one of Bruce's Shadowmanias. I remember being frustrated that I couldn't hear the questions...only the answers, so had to work out what the questions had been!

Re playing at Cliff's Event in 1989 - Hank has also referred to that as a career highlight. I remember being there...it was quite a special, er, event! To perform in front of that many people...all there because of Cliff etc. Quite something! Cliff has said that he got Jet and Tony to re-unite with him for Move It! because The Shads didn't want to take part in the Oh Boy! section.