Throughout this Holiday season, I recorded this very special bass cover of “Rhythm Of Love”.
As you may know, the album Big Generator (1987) was yet another challenge for Chris Squire, as he used a 5-string bass for all of the songs. Yet Chris made several alterations regarding the tuning. On this track (and others, including “I’m Running“) the tuning was AEADG.
The bass tone, as Chris demonstrated on his Starlicks video interview, becomes really low and powerful. The album mix doesn’t put the bass at the forefront like in many of Yes’ previous albums. I did struggle to understand the notes played, especially in the aforementioned lower register. I like to think that this is a good example of Chris designing an apparently more conventional bassline, with elements of soul music that was one of his big early influences. Yet, one can spot many of those details, variations or simply the sheer bass playing expression which makes it sound unique, like only Chris Squire knows.
For the video illustration I was generally inspired by the original video clip, which is, for me, one of the best that Yes has made. Then I took a little help from my friend Milton Trajano, by borrowing his great artwork and adapted it, with lots of improvisation, to the several moments of the song. Thank you, Milton!
As a final fortunate coincidence, we recently celebrated both Tony Kaye and Trevor Rabin’s birthdays so this is for Tony and Trevor as well!
Bass: 1992 Warwick Thumb Bass 5-string
Strings: Rotosound Swing Bass RS66LD (45-105, stainless steel) and Warwick Red Strings (135, stainless steel) Tuned to low A. I especially boiled this string to regain some brightness.
Signal conditioning: Boss LM-2 (limiter)
Preamp: Sansamp Bass Driver DI (BDDI)
Signal path: Bass→LM-2→BDDI→PC
