FBO: 'Bass Bi-Week Ends: The Way to Go'

THREE BASSISTS WHO DIED IN PERFORMANCE
No one wants our bass players to pass on, but if they're going to it might as well be performing.

We wouldn't have the half-Duran Duran-based POWER STATION without BERNARD EDWARDS, a co-songwriter of the '70s slap-bass-driven band Chic. Bernard, who also put the backbone into 'Like a Virgin,' died just after a Power Station performance in Tokyo in 1996. He was suffering from pneumonia and refused to stop touring. As FBO fan John Jessejames Whitaker (who lobbied hard for Bernard's inclusion in the FBO Bass Bank -- thanks for that) says, "Without Bernard, one could make the case that there would be NO SUCH THING AS RAP MUSIC. That bass line on 'Rapper's Delight' is all Bernard, sampled from [Chic's] 'Good Times.'"

MARK SANDMAN, the principal member (and song-writer and singer) of Morphine, played a two-string slide bass and headed the three-piece band with a baritone sax and drummer. In 1999, Mark died on stage at a festival outside Rome from a heart attack. A sample Sandman lyric: 'Early to bed and early to rise makes a man or woman miss out on the nightlife.' Doesn't exactly rhyme, but we get the idea.

Double-bassist FRENTISEK KOTZWARA, a Czech composer of sonatas, died during a different sort of performance -- dying from erotic asphyxiation in the company of an English prostitute. That was back in 1791. One of his hits was 'The Battle of Prague,' most numbers had a military theme.


--> Bernard, Mark & Frentisek, we just want to thank you


FBO Admin
Mobile/Semi-Permanent HQ -- Brooklyn, NY

PS - There are many great and worthy bass players that didn't get tributed in the Bass Bank this time -- it will likely come back...