I always give a different answer when asked who my favorite bass guitarists are. Like most of these attempts to encapsulate some sort of Top Ten List, it usually just depends on my mood or what I’ve been jamming to that week. I don’t give the obvious answers like Flea or Jaco or Victor Wooten. But it does fluctuate, and I can’t really say there’s ever been one above all that I strive to emulate.
Today I read the news of Andy Rourke’s death. As far as bass players go, he is not a household name or one of the obvious answers I try to avoid giving. Really, only fans of The Smiths know the name. There’s a lot of those, but even then the average, non-diehard follower of the band probably can’t name the two members who make up the rhythm section— they just know Morrissey and Johnny Marr.
If asked the question today, in the wake of the news of his passing and my subsequent diving into the classic catalog and listening to his versatile basslines glide their way in and out of the Anglo-leaning alt-rock post-punk semi-folk grooves that his former band laid down, I’d have to say it was Andy Rourke all along.
*\*
I learned how to play acoustic guitar one summer, between sophomore and junior year in high school. A friend lent me a copy of the Louder Than Bombs songbook and over the course of those three months I learned how to play the rhythm guitar parts to nearly every song. And that also meant listening to my copy of the album constantly to make sure I was at least somewhere in the neighborhood when it came to playing them correctly.
Johnny Marr is a magician on the six-string. It wasn’t until years later that I realized half of the tricks and techniques he employed during his Smiths tenure: open tunings, capos, different types of guitars, studio effects, pedals… he kept you guessing, he was hard to nail down. He refused to give up his secrets.
But I began to hear Andy’s playing more, at first to distinguish between the guitar and bass parts. Then, it became a matter of Andy’s parts just standing out. I once read a review of a Smiths album (or maybe it was a bio of the band) that described Andy Rourke’s bass playing as existing on its own if the rest of the music and vocals were stripped away, as if they were completely different songs woven into the fabric of a Smiths tune. That’s a pretty apt description of Rourke’s style, and it has stayed with me for decades.
Andy’s playing complemented Marr’s because he achieved the opposite of what Marr was doing: Andy didn’t keep any secrets with his basslines. They were out in the open, unafraid. He wasn’t guarding anything. You could nail them down. They were (and still are) accessible.
But they were amazing all the same. Maybe more amazing, because they lived under cover of the rest of the band. So in a way he was hiding… but he wasn’t holding back either. He wanted to be heard, and the best way to be heard while competing with loud guitars and drums and wailing vocals is to become the throbbing pulse that ties everything together.
*\*
It’s a theory that the majority of bassists started out on another instrument. Very few bassists started out wanting to play bass, the theory goes. It often became something that was foisted upon an aspiring guitarist when there was no bass player available and the other guitarist in the band was very very good.
The kid who lent me the Smiths songbook is the only musician I’ve ever met who started off on bass. I think he gave me the book so I could learn the guitar parts and we could jam. I did learn them, but by the time we were in a band there were others involved who had more experience and who didn’t want to cover Smiths songs. Then he quit the band and I ended up taking up the slack. Eventually I ended up in a slew bands where I was the only person who was available to be the low end. But I didn’t own a bass. I borrowed them from people, and in one case in particular I never gave it back. Shame on me.
Come to think of it, I don’t think I ever purchased a bass on my own. They were always gifted to me by generous people. The kid with the Smiths songbook eventually sold me an imitation of a blonde Rickenbacher later on, but that was stolen out of a band mate’s house at some point. My replacement was an old Fender Precision bass that was— you guessed it— given to me for free by someone else. I still have it. I play it all the time. It’s my main bass guitar to this day.
Bass players are in demand, always. That’s because everyone wants to be the singer or the guitarist or the drummer. So I never run out of opportunities to jam.
I think Johnny Marr persuaded Andy Rourke to play bass when they were young and starting out, and the world is a better place for that.
*\*
While listening to old Smiths songs this morning, I realized how much I owed to Rourke. I have been subconsciously stealing from him for as long as I’ve been playing bass. Certain licks of his are instantly recognizable to me because I repurposed them for songs over the years. Usually they were other people’s songs, and they were none the wiser. They liked what they heard but no one ever said to me, “You just nicked Andy Rourke for that part!” And since I wasn’t doing it deliberately, I guess I felt comfortable with doing it repeatedly.
After a while, you find your own style. But it is always indebted to the player whom you based your style on. And now, after realizing that he was only ten years older than me, I also realize that Andy was the one who I modeled everything on. I didn’t know it, but it’s true. More than James Jamerson of Motown’s Funk Brothers; more than John Entwistle of The Who; and more than the legendary Bootsy Collins of James Brown and P-Funk fame, Andy Rourke was the main source of inspiration for me, when I was a teen all the way up until now, and beyond.
He was the sad, mysterious member of the band. Morrissey was the voice and POV, Johnny was the roar, and drummer Mike Joyce was the engine propelling the vehicle. So what was Andy?
He was the person driving in the car, the one Morrissey sang about, the one who never ever wanted to go home. Because he hasn’t got one. Anymore.
*\*
“There Is A Light That Never Goes Out” is a classic, of course. And it’s my all-time favorite Smiths song, right up there with another lengthy title (“Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want”) and also the first Smiths song I learned the bassline to. Thus, every consequent bassline I’ve ever played has trace elements of that one in it.
But my favorite bassline from The Smiths? “Stretch Out And Wait”, by far.
That song is in my Smiths Top Ten, for sure. But that bassline is Number One in my book. It’s so good, and it’s the one that kept playing in my head even when I wasn’t driving listening to a Spotify playlist this morning featuring every song The Smiths ever made.
It’s a little melancholy, like all good Smiths songs are. But despite their depressing reputation, I have never actually cried while listening to them. That’s because the music has always been upbeat and happy-sounding. That’s one of the things I truly love about the band: that contrast between ridiculously somber words and sunny, shimmering melodies. Often times I get cheered up when I hear them, because unlike the rest of the world I refuse to take Morrissey seriously. I find him to be hysterically funny, actually. Much like my answer to the favorite bassist question, I don’t go for the obvious answer. I love The Smiths because listening to them makes me happy.
And this morning, while listening to “Stretch Out And Wait” on repeat in the car, I shed tears of sadness and sorrow for the first time in my Smiths fandom. And it wasn’t because of Morrissey’s words or Johnny Marr’s composition. It was because my bass hero died, and I didn’t know he was my bass hero until he was gone.
*\*
This has been a rough week.
My brother AJ passed away eleven months ago, and my uncle Joe died a year ago this week as well. Their deaths were separated by exactly a month. So I am especially tender right now.
Andy Rourke dying hurts, because even though I never met him and didn’t know too much about him as a person, I feel like I knew everything. Because he didn’t hide his secrets. They were there, out in the open, embedded in the notes and scales and pops and licks and plucks and picks and slaps and runs.
He didn’t want you to not know how he did it. He explained it all with his hands on the strings. He gave away the tricks of his trade unabashedly. And what’s truly amazing is that even when he told you how he did it, you still couldn’t believe he did it. It was that good.
Andy Rourke was that good.
And if you decide to listen to him play, you’ll hear how obvious it is.
