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Jazz veteran Stanley Clarke returns to acoustic mode in latest performances
If you think of Stanley Clarke, the image usually includes an electric bass guitar.
But the man who, starting at age 20, was the musical bottom upon which the legendary fusion band Return to Forever was built, is more proud of his acoustic bass playing these days.
“I’m playing the best acoustic bass I have ever played. The electric bass, because I never studied it the way some guys did, it was always a second instrument for me. I’m really an acoustic player who got famous playing some crazy stuff on the electric bass.”
And when Clarke, 63, returns to the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival on June 22, he’ll demonstrate his skill on both during his set at the Vogue Theatre.
That aside, “I am really happy and proud of the stuff the older electric bass players have done. When I first started out there were four guys with record deals as bass players. There are hundreds now. There is a real liberation there. You can go to school now and learn how to play electric bass. It’s become a serious instrument and that’s a great thing.”
Here is a man content with his lot, in the main, and enjoying his career.
“I’m actually for the first time very calm as an artist. The big- gest thing I am so happy that I don’t have to worry about is f---ing radio. That used to be a real pain. The record companies used to pound everybody to do something they could sell on the radio. It’s nice that doesn’t exist anymore.
“For me this is the best time for instrumental artists. You can do what you want when you want.”
The backdrop for the remark is the collapse of the old way of doing business in the music industry. Those were times when the labels had total control over an artist. But as the power of the labels crumbled the independence (read self-reliance) of the artists as self-employed busi- nessmen has grown.
Clarke remembers the old days very well.
“I don’t think the public is really aware of this but when Return to Forever was out there and Weather Report and all the great fusion bands that spearheaded all the stuff you have now, in the early ’70s, the record companies really embraced us.
“When we went in the studio you’d spent a month talking about the cover with the head of the art department at Columbia or Atlantic. The music would take another two months. When we finished the Romantic Warrior album (1976), Lenny (White, RTF’s drummer at the time) and I were hanging out with some guys from Yes. We took three months to make our album, they took a year.”
Today, Clarke says, if the performers making progressive music get more than a month to make their album they are lucky. And artist independence does have a cost. So why make CDs at all? “In a word — documentation. It’s a f---ing business card, man, that’s it.”
He says a CD offers something concrete that the artist can share with his public, even if song downloads have pretty much destroyed the concept.
“Albums like Dark Side of the Moon (Pink Floyd) would have never happened if they were made in this time. The album is a whole experience. Same with Bitches Brew by Miles Davis. My kids can’t remember the last time they bought a CD. I have gotten one son into old, old jazz, so he’s now going into used record stores and buying old Art Blakey records and used CDs for $4.”
Still, Clarke is putting out CDs even if he ends up putting as much of his own money into the album as the labels do. His eponymous 2010 album, The Stanley Clarke Band, won a Grammy and his latest, called Up, features some of his best musical friends along with his band.
They include guitarists Jeff Beck and Joe Walsh (The Eagles) and drummer Stewart Copeland (The Police).
“What it is for me, it’s the friendships. I have a lot friends and they span the whole musical gamut. It goes all the way back to the early 1970s.”
“Joe Walsh, we used to train at the same gym. And when the Eagles were going out on tour and Joe was in there getting in shape, I was in there getting in shape to go on the road with RTF.”
The one area where things are improving for him are live performances.
“It’s bigger than ever. I get more gigs now than I ever got. I actually am at the point where I turn down gigs. In the 1980s and ’90s you didn’t turn down anything. These days, older artists are being seen on YouTube by younger people and they want to come out and see us