About one hour into the fascinating, just-released documentary Nathan East: For The Record, there is a quick scene of the bassist sitting on a sofa, quietly perusing his old calendar books from the mid-nineties. “I love keeping these around,” he says as he scans his life-at-a-glance in the little black journals. “It’s like a time capsule and I can go back and see what I was doing.” The entire scene lasts no more than forty seconds, but it is a moment in the film that seems to perfectly capture Nathan’s life and career. As the camera gently pans across and zooms in on the open pages, we see his clean meticulous handwriting, his attention to detail. The names of music stars and legends scatter across the calendar days that are filled with sessions to make and gigs to play, reading almost like a pop music history book. The man is in demand by the very best in the business. But an even closer look also reveals his self-reminders about those who aren’t the stars, written with as much care. Mom’s operation @ Sharp Memorial, right kneeis inked in on the 4th, just above Herbie Hancock at Pyramid Studio on the 11th and Natalie Cole and George Duke at Ocean Way on the 18th. He has Mom and Dad’s anniversary on the 28th, the same day as a 9-hour Phil Collins big-band rehearsal in France, one box down from a session for the Escape From LA soundtrack. A flip of the page, more of the same. Sting, Elton, James Taylor, Don Henley. Aunt Doris and Uncle James. Birthday reminders about friends and relatives.

Perhaps one of the most telling things about this scene is that Nathan East has many people in his life, they are all important to him, and somehow he makes time for all of them. After watching the wonderfully crafted 80-minute documentary, one gets the sense that he is so well-grounded, so rooted in family, and so able to connect to others that he probably could have succeeded at anything he attempted in life. Of course, we are all the better for it that Nathan chose the bass as his calling. He has not only become one of the most recorded bassists of all time with more than 2000 record credits, but more importantly, he has graced every one of those records with his soul and spirit.

For The Record traces Nathan’s journey from his early days growing up in San Diego, picking up his first big gig at age 16 with Barry White, arriving on the bustling 80’s LA studio scene, landing even bigger gigs playing for presidents, popes and Beatles, and the creation of his jazz quartet Fourplay. The film is not your standard start-here-and-end-there music doc, but rather two separate timelines simultaneously, perfectly edited by Spencer Glover and aided by a well-thought out storyline by Sara Bachler. It seamlessly cuts back and forth between the making of Nathan East the solo album, and the making of Nathan East, the life. Throughout the whole affair, there are numerous heartfelt testimonials from many of the greats he has worked with, and they are more than happy to offer their feelings about Nathan or tell a story from their shared past. They have all shown up here to support him and his musical legacy, because he has spent his last 35 years showing up for them and supporting theirs.

When I recently caught up with Nate, it was nearly a year after I spoke with him last, just before the imminent release of his solo debut (Click to read cover interview). At that time all we really knew about his new career-to-be was that he had just recorded a brilliant album. How it was to be received by the public was the part that had not yet been written, and he had admitted to a bit of nervousness before stepping out in front of an audience to perform four tracks from his album for the first time. Looking back now of course, it seems clear that Nathan’s tale of 2014 could not have turned out any less amazing than his first 35 years in the business. In any terms you want, any scale of your choosing, Year One of Nathan East the Artist was an absolute slam dunk. The critically acclaimed album hit #1 on Billboard’s Jazz Chart, spent an unparalleled 36 weeks at #1 on SmoothJazz.com, and last month was nominated for a Grammy for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album. So how does he feel, now that he’s finally come out on the other end of 2014?

“Man, I tell you, it’s been a sprint,” says Nathan. “I love every second living the dream. I couldn’t have imagined all these great things that have come from this event. You figure at this stage of your life you’re just kind of repeating things that you’ve done, but it’s been a year of firsts and new experiences and it’s been unbelievable.” I ask him how he likes all the attention. “You know, that’s a little crazy,” he says with a laugh. “It takes getting used to, just because I’m usually just slipping in under the radar. But actually I’ve come to grips with it, that I have this new personality as an artist now instead of a sideman.”

Of course it’s one thing to be an artist, as Nathan takes center stage in this new phase of his career, but what is it like to watch a documentary of your life? “It’s difficult!” he says, laughing again. “I get embarrassed, I want to say ‘Take out all these valentines, you know, I got it!’ But in the spirit of what it is, it’s actually about something that we all do. You can name any kind of person in my position that’s been a behind-the-scenes sideman. Guitar, drums, bass… it’s the same, it applies to everybody. I happen to be the poster child for this particular one, but it’s kind of like the film Twenty Feet From Stardom in that it spans the base of all the people who do what we do.”

And with that answer it occurs to me that for all of Nathan’s accomplishments, for all of his experience and success and travels, there is one thing that he pretty much misses out on. I don’t think he fully realizes the impression he makes on others. It’s the thing that has brought everybody together for this documentary project, and they all echo the same sentiment. “Nate is the bass player’s bass player, and the musician’s musician,” says keyboardist David Paich in one scene in the film. Quincy Jones concurs in another: “I feel very blessed with the people I’ve met in my life, and Nate is at the top of that list.” Yes, there are many bass players, and there are many people that do it well, but there is only one Nathan East. It’s a theme that becomes evident in this film, and that’s what makes it so interesting to watch.

Early on in For The Record we see a shot of a quick flipping of about 40 record covers, all of which are albums that Nate played on, and all of which were major hits for major artists: Whitney Houston, Madonna, Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, Aretha Franklin, Chaka Khan, Bob Dylan, Beyonce, Stevie Wonder, and on and on. As I watch it, I begin to think that his career and level of success as a sideman is possibly unprecedented. But I’m reminded of a particular bassist from a generation before him, and if there is a precedent for Nathan’s success as a studio bassist, perhaps it was James Jamerson. There are parallels in their careers; the constant demand for their playing, the countless sessions, the hit after hit on radio. But there is also a major difference, in that Nathan’s career took off in an era when album credits were king, when the record-buying public knew your name and would look for it. Jamerson, and the Funk Brothers he played with, knew none of that and remained anonymous. So sidetracking, I ask Nathan his thoughts about Jamerson’s life.

“Jamerson was the genius of our time,” says Nate. “To not get the recognition was probably a very depressing scenario for him. One of the things that made me so sad about Jamerson was that he died a drunk, and probably didn’t have too much in the bank account. I only met him on one occasion and he was actually so intoxicated that he couldn’t even carry on a conversation. It was one of those things where I was just heartbroken because I was about to meet my hero. But I get it, you know? Those guys got taken advantage of, and gave all that up for nothing, basically. But Jamerson was a genius of the bass, and Jaco too. Those guys did things on the bass that will never be done again. I think Jamerson must have been frustrated not getting his just due.”

Fortunately, Nathan’s career is largely documented, and it’s been a long and mind-boggling career at that. Of course, it takes more than just musical talent to deliver at that level for so long; it’s obvious that he has a great work ethic. I ask him where he gets that from. “It comes from a lot of places,” he explains. “First of all, my parents were nine-to-fivers, I watched them get up and go to work every day, rain or shine, to support a family of seven kids. So right there in the home I realized that, yeah, you have to go to work. But I’ve also been fortunate enough to be hooked up with people that have amazing work ethics, like Phil Collins and Clapton and guys like that. They’re the first guy there, the last one to leave, and when they’re at rehearsal or at the studio they’re full on. There’s no kind of hanging out. So for me their work ethics became a bit of a role model. I would think, okay, they obviously didn’t get to where they are by slacking. They became role models, because when you see the results of their hard work, you start to say hey, maybe there’s something to this.”

For bass players in particular, there is much to marvel at in For The Record, particularly of the studio scenes shot during the recording of Nathan’s debut album. There are many great close ups of him playing as well as a nice look at his equipment. It’s clear that Yamaha is an important component of his music. Gear-wise, he plays several Yamaha basses, including his signature BBNE2 5-string, a TRB-6 and the electric upright Silent Bass. But production-wise, Yamaha is also the company that has thrown its weight behind Nathan’s album and documentary, as he is signed to their newly formed Yamaha Entertainment Group label under the watchful eye of Chris Gero, who co-produced the solo album and directs For The Record. Nathan is just one of a handful of artists signed to the new imprint.

“I think that since they’re so new at this, they actually don’t realize that they’re one of the only ones really putting this kind of energy into a record,” Nathan says. “That’s the old school way, like when Fourplay first came out almost 25 years ago. There were posters and events, and it was a big deal and you wanted to tell the world. The A&R guys would call the stations and almost jump in front of traffic to let everybody know about your project. But now, with the change in delivery methods and everything, labels just sort of put it out there and hope for the best. So Yamaha, having just started this label, is coming to this with that kind of old school marketing and energy, like ‘Oh, isn’t this what you’re supposed to do?’ After you’ve spent all this time trying to make this product, they say, ‘okay now let’s tell the world about it.”

Even with the completion of an album and a documentary, and all the work that it has entailed, Nathan is writing an autobiography as well, which makes his launch as a solo artist somewhat of a trilogy. How does he do it all? He gives me an answer that seems to explain it perfectly. “I run on about four hours of sleep,” he says. “Then I get up and just try to keep it going. I figure, how many chances in your life do you get to do this? So I just do it.” I ask him how the book will differ from the documentary. “Well, the documentary had to fit into about an 80-minute time frame. We had cameras rolling for over a year and a half, and so there were a lot of things that we talked about but couldn’t get everything in. The book starts from the beginning, the early days and events that happened in school, some personal anecdotes.” He mentions that the book is nearly finished, just a few tweaks shy of being ready, and I ask him to promise me that if he does an audio version he won’t just hire some guy to narrate it. “Ah, exactly!” he laughs. “No, I have to do it myself. Like I love Quincy’s, because it’s him reading it, you know? No, I’m definitely right with you on that one. It’s just so weird to have somebody else’s voice up there saying, ‘and then my mom went to…”, Nathan says with a laugh.

So as the Nathan East hot streak rolls into 2015, he already has his plate full with projects for the year, not the least of which is completing the follow-up to his debut album– made easier by the fact that the initial sessions for the first record yielded nearly 30 songs. “We have it half-finished,” he says. “We’ll probably still have to record 6 or 7 more songs just to bring it up to date, so that will be my next phase, trying to get in and figure out when I can do that because we want to do a 2015 release. Also, Fourplay is doing a 25th Anniversary album this year as well. And then Bob James and I are doing a duo project for Yamaha, we have time booked for that.” As for live performances as a solo artist, Nate says there will be some of that as well this year. “We just did some dates in Korea and Japan last month,” he says. “Really great turnouts and the gigs came out great. Michael Thompson came over and played, Steve Ferrone played drums, my brother James played. And I had a couple of musicians from Asia, like Jack Lee from Korea on guitar and a couple of keyboard players from Japan. Man it was so much fun! We all left there saying this is what we want to do.”

As if that weren’t enough, Nathan continues his online electric bass school for ArtistWorks. “It’s coming along really great,” he says. “The thing that’s really rewarding is when people will say to me that they had actually given up the bass, but are going to start again because the online school seems like a good idea. I like being able to have a one-on-one online with people from every corner of the globe, and it’s fun to meet someone in Japan or Russia who will say ‘Oh, I’m one of your students online.’ So it feels like a concept that’s working. I think the guys atArtistWorks have done a great job, that this is actually an educational venture that works.”

For Nathan, the ArtistWorks education is not just a one way street; he also learns from the experience. “Sometimes guys that send their videos to me have done some creative and clever loop, or something like that, and I’ll say wait, why didn’t I think of that? And I’m able to take what they do and send it back to them, and then have something new for my arsenal. Whenever I teach—and I’m not really a teacher as much as I am a performer—but whenever I do, I learn and I feel like it’s a chance for me to kind of grow with the students as well. It’s always fun to get feedback from people that say something like ‘I’ve been with you for six months now and I’ve improved a lot’. I mean, that’s the mission of the whole thing.”

What about his own internal process as a player, how he is able to find that perfect bass part for a song? Obviously there are limits to interpretation if he’s handed a notated piece of sheet music, but where does Nathan come up with what he plays if he’s handed a simple chord chart, or maybe not even that? “First of all, just open-mindedly, I realize that there could be several parts and several approaches,” he explains. “So you want to first get a feel for what they want. Like the other day I was working with an artist and his music had a Supertramp kind of feel, and I was approaching it with a McCartney-esque bass line. Then he said, ‘Okay now I’d like to go a little more hip-hop as opposed to McCartney,’ you know, so he realized what I was doing,” Nathan laughs. “So for me that opened up a whole floodgate, and I started playing just these big fat round low notes. So I like to just find out what concept people have, if they want to go for what you would normally instinctively go for, or if you want to do exactly the opposite, play on the beat, off the beat, there’s just so many variations. And what I end up doing is just trying a few things until we get something that sounds like the ultimate part. Daft Punk was a lot of that kind of experimenting. We’d have a Pro Tools on loop and then get a good groove and say okay, what else do we have here?”

Obviously the Daft Punk experiment worked. It was a giant success, winning five Grammy Awards in 2014 including Record Of the Year for the monumental “Get Lucky”. It’s no coincidence that Nathan was a big part of it, as Vince Gill talks about in For The Record. “I love that record,” says Gill in the documentary. “Before I could put two and two together, who everybody was, and who was playing, all I knew was that that song felt great. And then you go look and see who’s playing and you go, oh, well no wonder.”

It would seem Gill’s comment nails it on the head. The song felt great. It’s the very foundation of Nathan’s career, but on a deeper level it’s really the hallmark of who Nathan East is: he makes people feel good. And that’s the main takeaway from For The Record. Whether he’s playing a bass, not playing a bass, anytime, anywhere, he is just in the business of making people feel good. I say this to Nathan as we wrap up our conversation, asking him if he agrees. I’m looking for a bit of “Eastern Philosophy”, and he gives it to me beautifully.

“Absolutely. I’ve always analyzed life. When I run into people that just don’t feel good, and there’s a problem, I think, well, why don’t you feel good? How can I help make you feel better? Several years ago I bumped into [motivational speaker] Tony Robbins, he came to one of our concerts with Phil Collins. He invited me to seminar after seminar, and I couldn’t make them. Finally I made one, and the next thing you know we ended up being good friends. Whenever I see him or talk to him, I feel like, now there’s a guy that’s just lovin’ life and living the dream. And so sometimes I feel like maybe I could be a catalyst for somebody, you know? If I was ever completely successful and had more money than I knew what to do with, I’d still be dissatisfied with the fact that I’m driving past the guy with a sign that says he doesn’t have any food. I can’t imagine that in this country we have people that are starving. I really appreciate what Bill Gates does, and people like that, that really say, you know, it’s not an equal world. And if we can help make it that way, it’s gonna be better. If everybody feels good, we might all feel better.”

Featuring Lionel Richie, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins & more, the film debuts in December.

Nathan East — longtime bassist for GRAMMY-nominated smooth jazz quartet Fourplay — is set to release his self-titled debut solo album on March 25. Ahead of the album’s release, GRAMMY.com has your exclusive first listen to his instrumental bossa nova take on the Fourplay track “101 Eastbound” and his melodic string-laden rendition of “America The Beautiful.”

Stream Nathan East’s album in its entirety

Co-produced by East and Chris Gero, Nathan East features 13 instrumental and vocal compositions, including covers of the Beatles’ “Yesterday,” Stevie Wonder’s “Sir Duke” and Pat Metheny’s “Letter From Home.” The album also features collaborations with keyboardist Bob James, GRAMMY-winning singer/songwriter Michael McDonald, guitarist Chuck Loeb, and GRAMMY-nominated singer/songwriter Sara Bareilles.

Best known for his work with Fourplay, East has also performed on recordings by artists such as Eric Clapton (“Tears In Heaven” and “Change The World”), Phil Collins (“Easy Lover,” which he also co-wrote), Michael Jackson (“Bad”), Whitney Houston (“Greatest Love Of All” and “Saving All My Love For You”), Beyoncé (“Listen”), and Randy Newman (“I Love L.A.”), among others. Most recently, he was featured on Daft Punk’s GRAMMY-winning hit “Get Lucky,” which he performed on the 56th Annual GRAMMY Awards telecast with the duo, Nile Rodgers, Pharrell Williams, and Wonder.

In addition to the First Listen, GRAMMY.com conducted an exclusive interview with East regarding the making of his first solo project, recording with his son Noah, and performing on the 56th GRAMMY Awards, among other topics.

How gratifying was performing “Get Lucky” on the GRAMMY Awards ceremony?
It was probably the most exciting moment ever in terms of being at ground zero, the center of the musical universe. It was surreal, a “feel-good” moment that connects all of us. I bumped into Paul McCartney in the hallway, then I looked out there to see Yoko Ono and Beyoncé dancing. It was five minutes of [my] life where [I said], “It does not get any better than this.”

How did you end up playing on Daft Punk‘s Random Access Memories?
They approached me. Apparently, they’re scholars when it comes to who’s doing what. They’ve been studying the music going on in the States for a long time. With Giorgio Moroder and Nile Rodgers, I felt very fortunate to be among the list of people they felt were worthy to call for their project.

You pay tribute to them on your album with “Daft Funk.”
It was just an opportunity to celebrate our collaboration, a fun way to keep the party going in the spirit of that sound. It was [a] little retro action, the two guitarists, Michael Thompson, who wrote it, and Ray Parker Jr., opening the track with that funky feel.

How did Sara Bareilles end up singing “I Can‘t Let Go Now“?
She’s also a Yamaha artist. They sent it to her after we recorded the track. Her management turned it down at first, said she wasn’t available. Just as we were about to move on, she heard the track and said she had to sing on it … and was able to do it within the month.

Have you worked with Michael McDonald before?
I’ve known him for 30 years and he’s been a dear friend. I [played on] both of his Motown albums. When he found out I was doing this, he said, “I’m in for whatever you need.”

You recorded this album for the Yamaha Entertainment Group label.
I’ve been playing their bass for more than 30 years now. Chris Gero, who runs the label, and I have done many live shows together, including their NAMM 125th anniversary show last year with Elton John; Earth, Wind & Fire; David Foster; Chaka Khan; [and] James Newton Howard conducting the orchestra. It was a natural progression to bringing that kind of energy to a record. Bob James, my colleague from Fourplay, has been pounding on me for 20 years to do a solo album.

“Madiba” sounds like an epic party song.
It ends up having a world feel, sort of a South African/Brazilian/gospel mashup. [It’s] a tribute to Nelson Mandela. Madiba is his tribal name. We didn’t care that it went over eight minutes.

It must have been a thrill to play with your son, Noah.
It’s a moment that forever will be one of those things in my life that [is] special. He came in and nailed it on the first take. I was so proud of him. Noah came to visit in the studio straight from his piano lesson and Chris asked him what he was working on. He played “Yesterday” and Chris said, “That has to go on the record.”

There‘s a tremendous orchestral version of “America The Beautiful.”
We wanted to have something that could potentially become an anthem. We said, “Let’s go big or not at all.” It really turned out great. I was doing the Jaco Pastorius solo bass version that I really loved. I just wanted to take it a little bit further, just pick up where he left off.

How do you feel about singing?
It’s something that I love to [do], but I consider myself a bassist first and leave the rest to the real singers.

(Roy Trakin, now a contributing editor for The Hollywood Reporter and Billboard, has written for every rock publication that ever mattered, some that didn’t, and got paid by many of them.) 

STUDIO CITY (KCAL9) — Award-winning bassist and composer Nathan East stopped by KCAL9 Tuesday to tell viewers about his debut solo album.

“Nathan East”, which will be released March 25, is a mix of soul, funk and jazz.

The album features Sara Bareilles, Michael McDonald, Stevie Wonder and Eric Clapton. It also includes a song called “Daft Funk”, which is an ode to his experience recording “Random Access Memories” with the band.

For more information, click here.

NEW YORK, March 18, 2014 /PRNewswire/ — Nathan East, America’s preeminent bassist, is readying his eponymous solo debut and will be sharing music from the album on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Tavis Smiley. The album features appearances by many of Nathan’s friends and past collaborators including Sara Bareilles, Eric Clapton, Michael McDonald, and Stevie Wonder. The album epitomizes Nathan’s time as a go-to player in the funk, soul and jazz world. ‘Nathan East’ is available March 25 on Yamaha Entertainment Group.

“Daft Funk,” Nathan’s ode to the Grammy-winning album he helped record with Daft Punk, is the album’s first single and has reached #3 on the Billboard smooth jazz charts. The song features legendary session guitarist Ray Parker Jr., and uses a talk box to channel the French funk auteurs. Bass Musician Magazine called the song a “groove-heavy Daft Punk-meets-Michael Jackson ‘Off the Wall’ original.”

The album already has more than 4,500 pre-orders and release week will see Nathan performing several times on the late night circuit. Nathan sits in with The Roots on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (March 26), in addition to an interview and performance on Tavis Smiley (airing the week of March 24).

President of Yamaha Entertainment Group Chris Gero, who co-produced the album with Nathan and co-wrote the song “Madiba” said: “It’s been a privilege to work with Nathan on this album. We at Yamaha Entertainment Group are all honored to be able to work with Nathan on this labor of love, the release of his debut solo album.”

Advance reviews of the album have praised “an absolutely unparalleled performance of Van Morrison’s ‘Moondance'” (Music Connection), and Bass Player’s Chris Jisi concluded, “This album is packed with blinding brilliance!”
Following the release, Nathan East will kick off a national Guitar Center tour, offering bass clinics and meet and greet opportunities in select cities.

Nathan East Guitar Center Tour
Tues., April 1: Rockville, MD
Wed., April 2: Towson, MD
Thurs., April 17: Seattle, WA
Tues., May 6: San Diego, CA
Thurs., May 8: San Marcos, CA
Tues., May 13: Charlotte, NC
Thurs., May 15: Dallas, TX

Pre-order ‘Nathan East’ on Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Nathan-East/dp/B00I1XYDUQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1393431696&sr=1-1&keywords=nathan+east
Purchase single “Daft Funk” on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/daft-funk/id827331293?i=827331412&ign-mpt=uo%3D4
For more information on Nathan East, please contact Elizabeth Lutz (elutz@shorefire.com), Dani Frank (dfrank@shorefire.com) or Rebecca Shapiro (rshapiro@shorefire.com) at Shore Fire Media, 718.522.7171.
Photo – http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20140318/NY85538
SOURCE Yamaha Entertainment Group

RELATED LINKS
http://www.yamahaentertainmentgroup.com

Chances are you’ve spent your entire life listening to Nathan East. You just never knew it; until now.

A founding member of the chart-topping contemporary jazz group Fourplay, East was 16 years old when he got his first break and found himself on the road with Barry White. The next time the phone rang, Quincy Jones was on the line. The calls kept coming and for the last forty years, East has been churning out hit songs with artist as legendary as Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Michael Jackson, Phil Collins, Whitney Houston, Beyonce, Barbara Streisand, and Stevie wonder.

His genre-crossing groove has earned him both the recognition, a Congressional Record for his contribution to the worldwide music community, and the boundary-busting respect of his peers illustrated by his current appearances on two hit records as diverse as Andrea Bocelli’s Passioneand Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories.

Communing with friends is a theme for East so it was only natural that he team up with Yamaha Entertainment Group, with whom he has a professional relationship for over 30 years. “They have had an undeniable world presence, so when Chris Gero started this label and hared his vision, I was in from the first ask.”

Less obvious to east was how to approach stepping out as a lead artist. “I always felt, especially as a bassist, that a solo album was a very difficult thing to try to come up with. I’m used to a more supportive role playing as a sideman, which is why it’s taken me this long to actually get my head around what kind of record to make.”

But the uncertainty stopped there. “Chris said,  ‘I don’t want to just make an album that you’d predict you would make. I want you to come away from it with that feeling of “what just happened?!’ He has all these ideas going on and he’s hearing symphonies in his head. It’s like Quincy Jones, where he has a knack of putting ideas and people together. Chris comes with an exceptional production value and wants everything to be epic, so we’re trying to bring that spirit to this record.”

And spirited it is. Joined by a veritable who’s who of fellow musicians and vocalists, East immersed himself in the studio experience. “The thing I love most about the recording process is that you never know exactly whist’s going to happen. I always leave room for that element of surprise because so often it’s what you didn’t plan on that turn into the focal point – that magic moment – on the record.”

One such moment is the triumphant re-imaging of Pat Matheny’s Letter From Spain, where soaring orchestration contrast poignantly with the track’s pensive mood. It’s exactly the kind of narrative in which East gravitates. “I tend to lean toward passionate ballads and I’ve asked Michael McDonald, one of my favorite singers, to join us on the record. There’s just so much emotion and heart in his music.”

Destined to capture every heart is East duet on Yesterday with his 13 year old son Noah, who plays the piano. “Noah came to the studio, put the headphones on and the sound was so beautiful his face just lit up! It’s surreal to play with your son. You are changing his diapers one minute and nest thing, you’re making music with this person.”

East keeps it in the family with one of four co-written songs on the album, 101 Eastbound, a tune penned along with his brother Marcel East. Originally released over 20 years ago on Fourplay’s debut album and newly imbued with an exotic flair, the track captures the vitality of East’s diverse range.

Glowing with meticulous attention to detail, east tackles the anthemic America the Beautiful with a ferocity befitting its title. “I travel around the world visiting many different countries but I must say, I always look forward to coming home.” East continues, “I kiss the ground because even on a rainy day, America is till beautiful.” One thing is certain – the world is listening to Nathan East. “Now that I have an association with Get Lucky, a song that has been played around the world, we thought it would be fun to celebrate that part of my playing on the record. Why not keep the party going?! So Michael Thompson wrote a fun song in the spirit of that music and we called it Daft Funk.”

In the spirit of Nathan east, the album is energized with relentless generosity as he leads –and cede – the way for his friends and fellow musicians to shine. As a result, “You can tell a difference in the way the music feels, East explains, “they’re calling it a solo album, but I consider it everybody’s record.”

East admits, he’s been blessed with a gift. And it’s one that we’ll gladly accept

The long awaited self-titled album by Nathan east will be in stores March 25, 2014 and features longtime guest collaborators Sara Bareilles, bob James, Eric Clapton, Michael McDonald, Stevie wonder, David Paich, Ray Parker Jr., Chuck Loeb, and many others.

Nathan East, the album like the man, is the bomb. It’s cool, it’s smooth, with plenty attitude. Every track is a gem … great compositions, fantastic arrangements, and fine musicianship … it doesn’t get any better than this! Highly recommended, the must have CD for jazz lovers! ~ ABYSSJazz

Pre-order Nathan East today at Amazon … aight!

The Yamaha Entertainment Group presents Nathan East, the debut self-titled recording by the award-winning bassist/composer /bandleader.  Produced by Chris Gero & Nathan East, the 13-track album showcases East’s awesome bass skills that have made a huge impact  with such groups as Fourplay, Eric Clapton, Beyonce, Whitney Houston, and Stevie Wonder,  just to name a few. The recording itself is a marvel and is something that combines a music scholar’s precision with a showman’s sense of delight. With his expansive style, melodic soloing and creativity, Nathan East dropped the standard formulas often used when producing a new album and raised the caliber of his debut by sequencing priceless pop standards such as “Sir Duke,” “Moondance,” “Yesterday,” and “Overjoyed,” with  several of his original songs including “101 Eastbound,” “Letter From Home,” and the  hit “Daft Funk.”

These cultural and generational distinctions make Nathan East worth listening to time and time again.  Gero and East also brought in special guests (all well-known musicians in their own right), to share the spotlight and to deliver their creativity. After just one listen, their fans can tell that the results came naturally and with seemingly breathless ease for such artists as Bob James, Michael McDonald, Stevie Wonder, David Paich, Ray Parker, Jr. and Chuck Loeb.

A special performance by newcomer Sara Bareilles also makes the album memorable. East’s very funky “Daft Funk” is riding high on the radio charts and is proof that the bigger challenges associated with developing a debut recording for a young record label had been overcome because of Gero’s and East’s formidable knowledge, their sense of responsibility and from East’s more than three decades as a music star.

East’s awesome work on the live version of “Mandiba” will excite you due to its united chorus and his lively vocalese while the concluding song, “America The Beautiful,” will give you  many reasons to appreciate his solo expertise, musicality and pensive interpretation of this anthem. Yamaha Entertainment Group definitely has a hit on its hands and Chris Gero’s vision to establish a boutique, one-stop-shop, record label has afforded Nathan East the opportunity to find his way to an exciting home for his multitude of talents.

Buy Nathan East here.

It’s late January in New York City and we’re in the middle of the worst winter in two decades. It’s so bad that weathermen are using words like “polar vortex” and offering bone-chilling forecasts of sub-zero wind chills. But for one night, one brief beautiful night, on the third floor inside the Yamaha Piano Salon on Fifth Avenue, I find a reprise from the icy depression. No thanks to mother nature of course, but rather the fact that Nathan East is here and he’s about to heat up the room with a live performance of several tunes from his long-awaited debut solo album. A small crowd is in attendance to hear Nathan with a 7-piece band that includes drummer Omar Hakim and guitarist Oz Noy. I see a handful of friends and acquaintances in the room of writers, musicians and publicists. Will Lee is here, as is my brother-from-another-publisher Chris Jisi, and other familiar faces, and we’ve come to witness something special. After spending the past 30-plus years gracing everyone else’s project (and in the process becoming one of the most recorded session bassists in history), and after two decades as a quarter of the massively successful group Fourplay, Nathan East is– for a moment at least– about to put down his usual role as supporter-in-chief and will finally take his first turn as a solo artist.

But more on this in a moment. First, let’s back up a few days.

The Sunday before this Manhattan showcase, an interesting thing happened in Nate’s life. As a member of the latest incarnation of Daft Punk, he performed live with the French electro-pop robots at the Grammy Awards, where they were on hand with five nominations for their latest album Random Access Memories and the breakout hit “Get Lucky“. The live group, aided by special guest Stevie Wonder, featured much of the group that actually recorded the retro-sounding record. Before the night was over, Daft Punk– along with Nathan, Hakim, Nile Rodgers, Pharrell Williams and Paul Jackson Jr.– scored wins in every category they were nominated for: album of the year, best dance/electronica album, best engineered album, best pop duo/group performance, and song of the year for “Get Lucky”, which features Nathan’s perfect, propelling, in-the-pocket groove. Without him, the song might have been a great dance tune; with him it’s become a bonafide classic, topping the charts in over a hundred countries.

So back to the NYC event where, from the time I was invited to this performance and tonight, Nathan has become five Grammys richer and is now the hottest bassist on the globe. Wielding his white Yamaha TRB 6-string bass, he kills on a four-song preview of his upcoming album, which includes a beautiful interpretation of Pat Metheny‘s introspective “Letter From Home” (Nathan announces that Pat is one of his favorite writers), a groove-heavy Daft Punk-meets-Michael Jackson’s “Off the Wall” original titled “Daft Funk”, a brilliant instrumental reading of Stevie Wonder‘s “Sir Duke”, and a stirring vocal cover of Blind Faith’s “Can’t Find My Way Home”, which is a classic that he’s performed live with Eric Clapton over the years. I briefly have a chance to say hello to him after the set, congratulate him on the Grammy wins, and remind him that we‘re set for an interview the following week. Of course, by the time I’m able to catch up to Nathan in his fast-lane life for a decent chat, it’s now actually two weeks later and he’s halfway around the globe, getting ready for a run of shows with Clapton in Japan and other parts of Asia. He will return to that continent yet again in April for a tour with Toto, a band he is also a member of.

For Nathan East, traveling and performing is simply his way of life, as are the accolades and awards. He has recorded and played with the biggest names in music, a list that includes Michael Jackson, Beyonce, George Harrison, Whitney Houston, Sting, Phil Collins, Barbra Streisand, Stevie Wonder, Quincy Jones, David Foster and countless others. He’s performed at major landmark events like Live Aid in 1985, the Obama Inauguration in 2009, and a million more. So I find it a bit humorous that the publicity campaign assembled for his debut solo album refers to him as “Daft Punk bassist Nathan East”. But then again, hey, why not? You can’t argue that the robots are on fire, and a new generation probably has no idea whose bass is kicking them in their collective butt. But we bassists know full well who Nathan is, his background and his long musical history, and what he’s achieved in his career. Daft Punk is only the latest chapter in a long book, and there is much more to be written– starting with the imminent release of his debut on March 25th on the Yamaha Entertainment Group label, entitled simply… Nathan East.

If you have any preconceived notions of what a Nathan East solo album might sound like, you may be in for a surprise. The record is a daring, head-turning, cinematic journey from start to finish, and will take you places you weren’t expecting. Co-produced by Chris Gero, it’s a remarkable collection of originals and well-known covers, wrapped in dramatic arrangements that at times feature a 26-piece orchestra, a big band, even a string quartet. Special guest artists turn up all over the place, a testament to the many musical friends Nathan has made over the years; Michael McDonald, Stevie Wonder, Eric Clapton, Bob James, Sara Barielles are on hand, as is an A-team of session players who all work their magic. Notably, the studio group includes the great drumming of Ricky Lawson in one of his final outings; his sudden and unexpected passing was just two months ago. But what a way to go out, and what a performance he gives. Nathan dedicates the album to Ricky.

Throughout the whole affair, it’s always Nate’s superlative bass work that glues it all together, whether he’s playing his Yamaha 5-string, 6-string, or upright. As always, he has an uncanny knack of finding not only the perfect part to play, but the right sound to communicate it. Sure, I could try and elaborate on what makes him the great bassist he is, but I thought why not ask two of his longtime musical friends– both of whom contributed to this record– to describe Nathan’s uniqueness from their first-hand perspective.

“He represents all the highest qualities that you could ever hope for,” says Bob James. “A true and loyal friend first of all, but also a consummate musician who serves the music and never loses sight of the big picture. He has seemingly unlimited virtuosity covering an amazingly wide range of musical styles, but only uses it when the music requires it. He’s not afraid to give a compliment when he feels it, and when I’ve been lucky enough to get one, it has been a big boost to my confidence. I’m excited that he’s finally gone public with his first solo project, and very happy to be included on it.”

Tom Scott echoed Bob’s sentiment as well. “He and I have worked together since the 70′s with the late great Victor Feldman,” says Scott. “Nathan is a truly wonderful musician. He’s also a charming person– always greets you with a smile. That’s a pretty outstanding combination.”

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Hey Nathan, how are things going over there in Japan?

Hey Rick, so far so good!  We’re having a good time rehearsing, getting ready for Clapton at the Budokan. This is actually my 66th visit here.

You certainly have a large fan base there.

Oh man, its incredible. It’s almost like family.

Japanese people are so passionate about jazz and everything that you play, they’re so knowledgeable about great music.

Well, that’s what I discovered when I came over here in 1980 or ‘81, I think the first time I came here was with Lee Ritenour. They knew all the music, they knew everything I was playing on, and were very savvy listeners. Which is great, you know, because sophisticated music is getting to them.

How has the week of rehearsals gone with Eric?

Really well. I told him yesterday I’ve never enjoyed rehearsing as much as I did this week. First of all, it’s just great music, and then you‘ve got Steve Gadd and Paul Carrack, it’s just… [Laughs]. It’s pretty good.

Willie Weeks has done a bunch of the recent Clapton tours, so for you does it kind of feel like something new, coming back with Eric now and going on tour?

Yeah, actually it’s been about ten years since we toured together. Eric is one of those guys that likes to try different sections, like a lot of leaders do, so I was just glad that he came back to this section.

You’ve been with Clapton since the mid-80′s, so that’s quite a lasting, musical relationship.

Oh man, we’ve got well over 30 years together hanging out. Even if we’re not playing we always get together, if I’m in London I’ll go by the house and hang out, or when he’s in LA he comes by and has dinner with us and the family. He’s like a brother.

Well listen, I want to congratulate you again on your Grammy wins.

Oh thanks! The Daft Punk stuff was just a shocker. You just never know, and I’ve learned not to get my hopes too high because anything can happen. But when the band swept all five nominations and won all five categories, I thought, you know, that’s good.

That’s really good. The track of “Get Lucky” is so ingrained in everyone’s head, but when you played it live on the Grammys you got a chance to stretch out on it. You were playing some great lines.

Well, we were talking about the fact that they wanted the exact band that was playing on the record. I actually had to move a gig to get to do it, but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. And so what happens is that when you have the guys that played on the record, any liberties you take are ok. [Laughs]

How did it feel to be performing live on the Grammys in front of all those people?

It felt amazing. It felt like you were in the center of the musical universe. When you’re playing and you look out and you see Paul McCartney and Ringo, and Yoko Ono, and Katy Perry, and then you look at the very top row in the nosebleed seats in the Staples Center and see people dancing, it was like, you know what? This is why I got into music.

That’s pretty surreal.

It’s pretty surreal, is what it was.

Speaking of Paul and Ringo, did you get a chance to watch them together out front when they were playing, or were you backstage?

Well I was actually backstage when they were playing but it was great, I mean, those guys couldn’t be more gracious. To me they invented the wheel, in terms of what we do today.

By the way, how did you get involved with the Daft Punk recording?

Funny enough, I just got a phone call when they were putting their Random Access Memories album together. I think they made a conscious choice to kind of go outside of whatever their normal way of recording was, and they picked a list of their favorite people that they had been following and listening to. And I was just happy to be on that list, because I got to go in there and make music. Obviously I had known of them, and had seen what they did on the Tron film. I was honored to get the call, and it’s great to have been able to make that album with those guys. You think about this song “Get Lucky”, alone, has been number one in 102 countries.

Just amazing. And hopefully you’ll be back again at next year’s Grammys picking up a few of your own. As my wife was telling you before, we’ve been playing your solo album non-stop around here, we just absolutely love it.

Well, thank you, and I appreciate Camille’s sentiment, I’m hoping that a large majority of the people feel that way when they hear this record. It’s definitely been something that we’ve poured a lot of love into, and I’ve really tried to represent what my musical fingerprint is on this record.

You played four tunes from it live at the Yamaha release event a few weeks ago. Describe what it was like being up there performing your debut album. You had mentioned on stage that it was one of the highlights of all the things you’ve done in 35 years in the business.

You know what? Again, it was surreal. It’s been one of those years where I’ve had multiple surreal experiences, where I’m doing something that’s basically considered a first. I mean, there aren’t very many firsts when you’ve been around this long. So it was refreshing, but I had butterflies, because now all of a sudden I’m responsible. The buck stops here, and I’m responsible for every note that’s coming off the stage.

Are you comfortable being in the spotlight, after spending a career making others comfortable in the spotlight?

I’m comfortable in that role. I’ve had a lot of experience being musical director at many functions, Yamaha uses me for all their corporate events, I’ve done the NAMM shows and lots of big concerts, so that role is a pretty comfortable position for me. But I must say, that afternoon I went over there to sound check and run the tunes with the guys and I was a little bit like, in this place where my feet were shaking just a bit in my boots. [Laughs]

Well both you and the band sounded great that night. Speaking of Yamaha, let’s talk about your relationship with them, which goes back a long way. In fact, I remember that you said it started when you heard Abe Laboriel playing a Yamaha bass in a studio. Take me through how it went from that point to developing your signature bass with the company.

Well he was, as I’m sure he is to most bass players, sort of a hero and a bit of a mentor to me as well. Back in the days when he would invite me to come to a session, I would listen to him and, although it’s obviously in his chops and in his fingers, his bass sounded so pure and warm and fat and I loved everything about the sound. So he said, “Oh yeah, this is a Yamaha bass”. I was getting ready to go to Japan with Lee Ritenour, so he gave me the name of Hagi, who was the A&R guy for Yamaha. I called Hagi and he brought one to a gig, I think it was the BB1000, and it was everything that I wanted in a bass. I remember saying I have to go home with this, because it’s too good. And from that day on I’ve been playing Yamaha basses. Obviously the relationship has developed, we started doing a lot of R&D in LA and came up with the 5-string. It’s gone through very many incarnations and we’ve ended up with the Nathan East signature version, which I play all the time.

One thing that’s really unique about your signature bass is the mid-cut parametric EQ, which originally had been the outboard NE1 box Yamaha built for you. That circuitry is now built right into the bass.

Yeah, I figured how come what’s in the box can’t just be in the bass, you know? So they put that in for me.

And the interesting thing is that it cuts the mids at a selectable point while it boosts the mids surrounding that frequency you’re notching out. Do I have that right?

Right, that’s absolutely right. And it kicks in just a little bit of the lows and you get this kind of hi-fi sheen on the top and the bottom.

And you always have that switched on when you’re playing?

Yes, I might as well not have a toggle switch. [Laughs]

When you’re playing live, do you prefer to EQ from the bass or from your amp?

I start with the amp, but then as I’m playing I tweak from the bass. A lot of times I’ll just do a little tweaking as we go, because if I’m looking for a little more pointed sound, I’ll add maybe a bit more mids from the bass. It’s a very simple configuration, with just bass, mids and highs, and I start flat. And then as I’m playing I just kind of dial in what feels natural.

And what strings are you using?

I’ve been using the Jim Dunlop strings, I like those. I use the regular gauge on the 5-string, and I think it goes from a .45 to a .130, if I’m not mistaken.

Lets talk about your album. Chris Gero of Yamaha, who co-produced, was an important collaborator with you on this project. How did you find the concept for what you wanted to do for your solo debut?

It was kind of a methodical process that we used. I think his corporate sense and his musical sense, and a lot of the sensibilities that he brings helped me out a lot. We started with a whiteboard and just started naming favorite songs that we both liked, songs that would be contenders for the record. So we had a list of all these songs, and then we started dwindling it down. It was a thought-out process to at least get the list honed, and we actually ended up cutting about 26 songs. Getting the other tunes out will be in the works very soon.

Where did you do most of the recording?

We did all the tracking at Ocean Way studios in LA.

Let’s go through some of the tracks. The first tune on the record is “101 Eastbound”, which was also the first tune you wrote for Fourplay, some 20-odd years ago. Why did you choose to open the album like that?

Well, that song is one we continue to play. After a couple of decades, it’s still one of the chestnuts that Fourplay plays. And so, in an effort to try and keep it different, I sometimes start out on our live show and play that intro feel thing. I was doing that one day and my buddy Steve Quirk from Jazz FM London said, “Man you should record that version!” And I thought okay, if I ever go back, you know, that could be something. So I started fooling around with that sort of Brazilian thing in the studio, and then Michael Thompson went into this Earth, Wind & Fire kind of pattern and I said “Oh, what’s that?” We started fooling around with it and then Ricky Lawson starts this really funky, fatback groove. The next thing you know we were off to the races. It was the first song we cut, and I remember recording that in Ocean Way studios over 20 years ago, so it was like returning to the scene of the crime.

Returning full circle, kind of.

Returning full circle with a piece of music that I knew already has been accepted so, I was like, okay, I can’t go too wrong with this one. [Laughs]

Speaking of 20 years ago, has your concept of playing changed at all since those days?

You know, not too much. I think about that sometimes. You look up and you’re the same player. Obviously there are some things that you work on, and now that Chuck Loeb is in Fourplay he always writes songs that have these chop-buster be-bop lines that we all do together, so those challenging kinds of things I end up working on, but really there has always been that fire in my belly as a bass player to just try and do what’s right for the music.

As a bass player it’s kind of a balancing act between serving the song and inserting your own personality into it. How do you find that balance?

You know, for me the guy that is the best at that is Pino Palladino. Take a song like “Every Time You Go Away”, where the genius of what he does, and was able to do, was to know where the lyric comes and he sticks that incredible bass line in there. For me, he could be a co-writer on that because that’s what everybody walks away singing as well. So I kind of use him as a role model for trying to come up with lines that pay tribute to what the song is and everything, but still be able to sneak something in there that’s going to be memorable.

Back to the album, you have a couple of Stevie Wonder tunes on there. On “Sir Duke” you brilliantly changed up that long horn line by jumping the key up a minor third  two bars in, and then back down by half steps. When did you decide to record that tune, and how’d you come up with the idea for the horn line?

I actually was inspired to record that having played it in Norway with this 18-piece big band that was playing at a wedding, they just happened to be playing at the hotel we were staying at. I stuck my head in there and they invited me to come play with them, the bass player handed me his bass and that was one of the charts. And the thing that struck me was how much fun everybody was having and they were singing along, and I thought, you know, here I am on the other side of the planet with this universal song and this feel-good energy going on. So while I was recording it I was thinking I can do the exact cover, because it’s Stevie Wonder, and again, you can’t reinvent the wheel. But right in the middle I decided that when we do the line, it doesn’t have to be in the same key every time. It was literally trial and error. I didn’t want to try to reinvent it and reharmonize it, but I thought this would be fun, and I wanted to try and do something that I thought Stevie would find fun to do as well.

Did Stevie hear your version of it?

I don’t think he’s heard the version of it we recorded, it would be interesting to see what he thinks. One of my dreams would be, like, if he did that version. [Laughs]

Stevie of course plays on your version of “Overjoyed” on the album. His phrasing on harmonica on the tune is just phenomenal. Tell me about that one.

Well, it started at a sound check at Carnegie Hall for one of Sting’s Rainforest benefits. There was a break and I was just kind of fooling around with those chord changes, and all of a sudden I hear a harmonica come in. And I didn’t even know Stevie was in the room. So Stevie’s playing along, and I’m up there figuring out the changes as I go, and we get through the whole tune and everybody–Sting and Bonnie Raitt and Elton John, James Taylor, all these people– are listening and they start applauding. And then Stevie comes over and says, “If you ever record it, let me know. I’d love to play on it.”

Well, there you go.

There you go, come on! How can you pass up an invitation like that? And so sure enough, he let me take him up on it, and I had goose bumps when we recorded it. What you’re listening to on the album is basically the first take. The beauty of it is that he’s the writer, so he doesn’t have to learn it and he can phrase it any way he wants to. [Laughs]

Another highlight on the album is what I call the Michael McDonald segment. He’s singing Van Morrison’s “Moondance”, which is then followed by his own song, “I Can Let Go Now”.  First of all, he did a great job on the vocal on “Moondance”.

Yes, and as a matter of fact, after he sang the song he kept calling and saying “Is it ok, is it ok?”,  and I was like, “Are you kidding? It’s incredible!”

Tom Scott‘s big band horn arrangement on the song is also phenomenal, it’s like Van Morrison meets Count Basie.

And he wrote every note that you hear basically. He wrote the rhythm charts, the horn charts, and I didn’t change a thing. Tom is a phenomenal musician, and again, if you surround yourself with good people, good things happen. We kind of had this vision for a jazzy-meets-rock-and-roll-ish thing, kind of Brian Setzer, Count Basie, just a little bit of everything. Chris Gero was really instrumental in describing what he wanted to Tom, who was able to go home and come up with that arrangement. Chris had this idea about starting it with just bass, nobody knows what’s going to happen, and then all of a sudden you hear this voice come in and people are like, okay what’s that? And then all of a sudden this big band takes your head off, you know? [Laughs]

That’s exactly how it hit me. And I wasn’t looking at the credits, so of course after I heard Michael McDonald singing “Moondance” I just assumed that he was going to be singing the next one because he wrote it. So that was another surprise, because you have Sara Barielles singing that.

Right.

I think “I Can Let Go Now” is one of the greatest tunes ever written.

Period. And when I go see him, and he sings it, you know, you just can’t stop weeping. [Laughs] The song is so emotional, I’m sure everybody can connect on some certain level, as Sara Barielles did. Actually her schedule was pretty crazy, and her management passed on her singing on it at first. We had sent her over the track that we cut with the orchestra, and when she heard it she called back and said “I’ve gotta sing on this. Let me figure out a time.” I think it was about a month later we were able to get her in the studio.

The song is so perfect, and it sounds like you kept the original string arrangement.

Yes. David Paich’s father, Marty Paich, did the original arrangement. I think one of the stories to the original was that the song was a demo, and that demo went on the album. So yeah, there’s like all this kind of connectivity, and of course when you say Michael McDonald, here’s a guy that can do no wrong in terms of singing. For me, he’s one of my all-time favorite singers, and musicians, and writers, and I can’t get enough. So when he said yes to doing the album, that’s when I first started thinking, okay this is gonna be great.

You recorded the Beatles’ “Yesterday” as a duo with your son on piano. What was that like, playing with your son and putting him on your album?

Chris Gero and I were in pre-production and Noah came by the studio, he had just come from piano lessons. Chris said to him “What did you learn, what are you working on?”, and so Noah went over and played “Yesterday”. As soon as Chris heard him play he said “That has to go on the record”. We went in the studio and he had practiced, and I tell you what, I couldn’t have been more proud. He went in there and nailed it. I think it was the first take.

Wow, he sounds great. How old is he by the way?

He’s 13.

How long has he been playing?

He’s been playing for about 6 or 7 years. Let me see, he started when he was about five. Boy, the years go by quicker than I can keep up. I discovered that he had perfect pitch when he was about five. You can literally bang out any chord and he’ll tell you every note in the chord.

The tune “Madiba“ is one of my favorites on the album. At one point it breaks into a huge choir chanting thing, and then seems to cut to a live section. First, what is the chanting? What are they actually saying?

Well, the chanting part is kind of Latin, and I have no idea what they’re saying. And the sing-along scat part is like a soft African-feeling thing. Chris Gero, unbeknownst to me, went in with his whole staff and started singing that, and doubling and tripling it, and he made it sound like it was in this big stadium. When I heard it, it just brought a smile to my face, it was so much fun. And of course, Madiba was the tribal name given to Nelson Mandela. I wanted to have that because the song had this soft African-Brazilian world feel to it, so I thought it was appropriate. The song becomes this 8-minute-plus journey.

It is a journey, and I think you have three separate bass solos going on.

[Laughs] Again, you know, this is why having a producer really makes sense because Chris had to beg me just to do the second bass solo. I was like, “No, you know, I’m already playing a solo.” I played one on the tracking date, and then I came back and overdubbed one, and then he said, “Well just put some solo down, and see if you don’t like what I put together”. And so he put that together, and I thought, man I can’t argue. My brother Marcel heard it and said if you put Earth, Wind & Fire, Weather Report and Pat Metheny in a blender, that would be the song. [Laughs].

You’re soloing on both the 5-string and the 6-string in the tune.

Right, exactly. And the third one’s actually from the tracking date on the 5-string. I like the way the tune takes you on this journey and then it morphs into this live thing, and pretty seamlessly as well. You know, you start out with this nice studio track and it was fun to be able to say, okay… there are no rules so let’s do this.

Are your Yamaha 5-string and 6-strings basically the same sound-wise, or are they distinctly different?

Sound-wise, they are distinctly different. My 6, which is a TRB 6, has a very pointed sort of Jaco-esque sound that I can get on there, and whenever it’s time to solo that’s what I like to play, it’s got all the warmth. In theory I should be able to match sounds on either one of those instruments if I tweak everything the same, but on the 6-string I‘m able to get a little more pointed punch out of it.

Speaking of Jaco, you end the album with “America The Beautiful”, and it’s so beautifully done. When I first heard the tune start, I was thinking, well Jaco did this, he already did a solo bass version. But then you just took it to a whole different place with the orchestra. Tell me what it was like recording that one.

It was again surreal and like a dream to sit in the center of this orchestra. I love Jaco’s version, so in fooling around with that I was thinking okay, where can I take it, you know? What can I do that takes it to another level? And so we were in pre-production and started to think, wouldn’t it be great to have an orchestra play this lush string part. So I just started coming up with a lot of those different sections and modulations and ideas. It was me, Chris and Lendall Black, a great string arranger who’s actually doing all the string arrangements on the record. And so we just kind of talked through where it would be fun to go, without any type of rules or regulations. As sort of an afterthought, because I was running out of stuff to play for the very last chorus, I thought, hey wait a second– choir! [Laughs] It was beautiful. I just wanted it to be very anthemic and reverent, and hopefully be able to find its own space like Ray Charles’ version did.

I mentioned to Chris Gero that listening to “America The Beautiful” was like imagining closing credits at the end of a movie. You go through this whole journey of the album, and then you have that come in, and I can envision the credits scrolling down the screen. In fact, Chris said to me that he envisioned every song on the album as a mini-movie.

He just had this big cinematic vision in his mind and that these things should be epic, it should take your breath away. I was just appreciative that he had that kind of high standard because when you go in and do a record you want to nail it and make it good, you know, but he wasn’t going to stop at that. He said “Nope, I want your breath to be out of your body after you hear this thing.”

Are you going to be going out promoting the solo album and doing gigs?

Absolutely, I already have a couple of offers right here in Japan, which is great. And we’re talking about putting together a Fall tour and recreating some of the record.

A fall tour in Japan?

Actually, a States tour. That’s the next logical phase. Sometimes I think about it like a Quincy Jones album, where you have all these guests and so how do you recreate it live? But at least there’s enough musical stuff that I’m playing on there that we can play a lot of the things live, and if I’m able to get Michael McDonald or Sara Barielles or somebody to show up at one the gigs, that would just be a bonus.

I have one final question for you. On your website you have a link to Lancair, and I had no idea what that was before I clicked on it.

[Laughs] And you’re saying, wait, why does he have a Lancair link on there?

Well, then I clicked on the link and I remembered that you’re also a pilot. Tell me about that part of your life, because that’s something most people will never experience.

Yeah, I’m a Lancair IV-P owner, and it’s a beautiful little pressurized 4-seater single engine that goes 330 some-odd miles an hour. I set a speed record in it back in 2003 that still holds as the fastest single engine piston, and I did Phoenix to San Diego in one hour at 312 knots. So you’re streaking through the sky pretty quickly.

There’s no chance of you being late to a gig anywhere, I guess.

[Laughs] Exactly. You’re early! It’s like a little time machine actually when you think about it.

Do you get nervous when you’re up there flying?

No. I mean, you have to be respectful and diligent in your pilot skills, but it’s something that as soon as you pull the thing off the ground and you’re up there, it just takes your mind into a whole ‘nother space and it’s fantastic. It’s something very, very special.

I guess the same discipline that you apply to becoming a great bass player also applies to being a great pilot, right? I mean, the two experiences appear to be polar opposites, but maybe not.

Yeah, I do think there’s a correlation between them. I’ve taken Wayne Shorter up, and a few of my friends and artists, and let them have a go, and it’s interesting. Artists are pretty smooth pilots, you know.

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PRODUCER CHRIS GERO TALKS ABOUT NATHAN EAST’S “AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL”:

(I had the opportunity to speak to Chris Gero at Nathan’s CD release performance. As we talked about the album, he happened to mention this fascinating back-story regarding Nate’s stunning rendition of the song. I did not even want to attempt to put it into my own words for this article, so I reached out to Chris. Thankfully, he was happy to share it again.)

We wanted to pay brief respect to Jaco’s version but then let it unfold to a very complex and gorgeous  production. The key to this was making sure that Nate’s performance was not overplayed. The bass is sure a delicate instrument to solo on and I needed him to express his emotion like walking on rice paper and really understate his ability.

Nathan is such a remarkable observer and absorber of the human experience. He is an amazing person. He accepts and views everything with an amazing childlike openness to all in front of him. He has such a positive attitude and spirit and it’s reflected in this record.

He is also incredibly patriotic and loves this country. He doesn’t take anything for granted and celebrates the hard steps walked by all in our collective pasts.

He is a huge history buff as am I. We often spoke over the phone about our pasts and how this country was shaped and all who fought to earn what we have today. So when “America The Beautiful” was being recorded, I wanted Nate to really absorb the environment he was going to make his statement in.

I’ve spent the last 20 years in Franklin TN, which was where one of the last great battles of the civil war was fought and where nearly 7,000 men died. I wanted to present the idea of hope and future and adversity over the idea of freedom.

I am an avid collector of American flags. One of my prized possessions is a beautiful and beaten 35-star American flag that was made during the war, which Nathan often commented on. I told him that at the time this flag was made, eleven of the states that were represented in this flag had left the union. He often commented that he was amazed by the belief that the union would prevail by the makers of the flag and the fortitude and beliefs on both sides of the fight.

I decided to take him to the museum of the battle of Franklin and subsequently to the largest private civil war cemetery in the US. Being from Canada, I myself have been fascinated by US history and the place I live. I wanted to introduce to him the idea that regardless of what we view to be right or wrong, these men fought against each other to protect their own freedoms, and although slavery is reprehensible, brother fought brother for the right to express their unique and individual rights and as a direct result of this conflict, this gradually paved the road in which Nathan walks today.

This was a pretty remarkable experience for the two of us. Nathan absorbed the full experience and walked the very ground where thousands fought to protect our future. Nathan and I have been brothers for 20 years and what is remarkable about him is his amazing ability to absorb all sides and represent all interests. He is a true ambassador of music.

From this I drove him to the studio where we recorded the remarkable solo of this song.

Nathan is the best of all of us.

Though they rarely share the same stage, bassists Nathan East and Will Lee have had strikingly similar musical journeys. Both came up through the then-bountiful studio scene (East in L.A. and Lee in New York) and became first-call sideman on their respective coasts. During that time both bassists developed a reputation for substance over flash while praying at the altar of Larry Graham and Chuck Rainey. Since 1982 Lee has held down the bass chair on David Letterman’s late night show while doing sessions, serving in the house band for the Rock ’n’ Roll Hall of Fame inductions, and issuing several solo albums. East is more of a road dog: For many years he served with Eric Clapton while recording and performing with everyone from Sting and Stevie Wonder to Phil Collins and Toto.

Both bassists recently added important new entries to their extensive discographies. Lee’s solo album Love, Gratitude & Other Distractions embraces everything from dirty NOLA blues with the Reverend Billy Gibbons to heartfelt jazz standards. For East, it was time to step outside of his longtime group Fourplay for his first-ever solo release, which boasts Stevie Wonder tunes, (with the man himself), orchestral textures, and a touching duet on the Beatles “Yesterday” with Nathan’s son Noah.

We decided to let the two bass greats interview each other about their respective projects. Naturally, they couldn’t resist talking shop, swapping stories, and paying tribute to some of their heroes. Let’s listen.

Lee: Well, it’s an honor to be considered in the same sentence as Nathan East.

East: Come on, man! You’re stealing my line! [Laughs]. I was thinking earlier today about the first time we met. When was that?

Lee: One of the first times I actually remember meeting you—and I’m sure it happened before then, because I have a history of being a drug addict and alcoholic, so there are parts of my life that aren’t clear—was at Live Aid.

East: Oh, wow. Yeah, that was ’85.

Lee: I’m sure we must have meet before then. That was the year I got sober. You were there with Kenny Loggins, and you were just as nice then as you always are.

East: I’d heard of you as far back as ’82. There was a session that [guitarist] Chuck Loeb and I met at for a Patrick Williams record at Clinton Studios. You were probably the only cat who wasn’t there—it was Steve Gadd, both Breckers. And I was like, “Why am I here?” because you were right down the street. [Laughs]. You must have been busy.

Lee: As you know, there was a time when sessions were rampant. And in New York, because of the proximity of everything, it was easy to do five or eight sessions a day. There was a lot of running around. There were times I’d head to a vocal session and leave my bass in the trunk of a cab because I’d be so frazzled. We should have had multiple basses and just left them at studios. But we weren’t thinking about that. We had our favorite bass, and that was the one we wanted to have with us.

East: What was your favorite bass during that era?

Lee: I bought a bass from Tom “Bones” Malone. It was a Fender Precision, and I didn’t realize how amazing it was until it burned up in a fire in 1975. I’ve been trying to replace it ever since. It had such a great range of sound that I ended up playing a Jazz bass on an emergency basis after trying out so many other P basses. That bass had all the harmonics. It had presence. It didn’t have that hollow Precision sound. It had a really nice, meaty sound.

East: I was a Jazz bass guy at the time, too. Then I had a cool Precision that just had that P sound. Then I jumped on the Yamaha train. Abraham Laboriel put the first Yamaha bass in my hands, and I was like, “What is that?” Of course, it’s the fingers, not the bass, but he just had the thing smoking. Thirty-some years later I’m still playing Yamahas.

Will Lee drops a low G with his thumb during a show in Japan. Photo by Sandrine Lee

Lee: It’s still pretty much a glorified Jazz bass, really.

East: Exactly! I just told someone that yesterday.

Lee: My question is: If Nathan’s first album is this good, how scary is the second one going to be?

East: I’ve been talking about this for a long time: literally more than two decades. Bob James and the guys in Fourplay give me such a hard time about it. I used to start making demos for a solo record, but then we’d go into making a Fourplay record, and I wouldn’t be prepared for that, so my tune would just go over there. Chuck Loeb pulled me aside in Montreux a couple of years ago and said, “Nate, what’s the holdup? You aren’t getting any younger. Let’s do this!” So we made a list of all the people it would be fun to include.

Lee: What was the holdup? Was there any sense of not wanting to commit to a direction?

East: Even when you make a plan, it comes out completely differently, so why even plan? But number one, Fourplay has been my solo spot because I get to write, blow, and pretty much do whatever I want. That’s taken a bit of the pressure off. The other thing is just being blessed with a ton of work. If you’re not on a Clapton or Phil Collins tour, or out with Herbie Hancock or Al Jarreau, you’re in the studio. I didn’t want it to be a weekend thing where I would go in and do two more tracks. I wanted to have some cohesiveness, and I’m glad I got a rhythm section for an entire week.

Lee: That’s pretty organized, man.

East: How did you plan the sessions for your album?

Lee: I was starting to explode with ideas to the point when I just had to get them out. I started with one song, and then I recorded a second song that had nothing to do the first one. I said, “Well, this looks like the makings of a non-album!” But I’m realizing that the content of my record is, so to speak, shit I like. So that’s what I went for. I didn’t care about a direction. I just wanted to have a great time and make each tune its own little journey.

For the full article view here: http://www.premierguitar.com/articles/20423-will-lee-nathan-east-bass-brothers