Top 5 underrated prog bassists

Randy George (Neal Morse Band)

Martin Turner (Wishbone Ash)

1. Ray Shulman

2. Ray Shulman

I didn't consider Geezer because I was trying to stay within core prog.  But across all genres, he may be the single most underrated bassist ever. 

I would also add John Paul Jones.  He's fairly well known, but rarely gets the credit he deserves. Plant, Page, and Bonham get all the ink, but I daresay JPJ is the best at his position of all of them and the group would never have been what they were without him. 

+ for Jon Camp

all the Tull bassists who toiled in anonimity.

I look at bass players, not always within the context mentioned here, which is closer to favorite music than it is ... real music ... and there is a difference there. Some folks listed here I would not consider since they were mere time keepers on par with the drummer, and not "musicians" on their own, "independent" track, that added so much to the piece of music ... think of Pastorius and his freedom moving around the music ... no one here goes around saying that he is not a great player. Think of Stanley Clarke and his forays into so much music, and no one here is going to say that he is not valuable and a huge force in RETURN TO FOREVER. Heck, think of BOOTSIE and how he told a riff to go get "fudged" by ripping it with effects!

Too many of these are just riff players, and riffs are not what "music" is all about ... there is a lot more to it, than just a riff ... where does it go? ... nowhere means you simply do not have the musical ability to extend what you are doing, and this is something that Europeans are "better" at mostly because of their history of classical music ... they are comfortable with long pieces of music ... over here in the "western world" (that is USA and UK), it's like these folks never heard classical music, and have no idea what to do with it ... other than talk about a guitarist doing the blues again ... and not showing us anything new.

If I have a personal favorite, it probably would be the late LOTHAR MEID ... whose playing was so different, and almost always "against" the melody and the main flow of the song, giving it a contrast that made the piece of music special ... and some of my favorite moments are in WOLF CITY where the transitions in a couple of places, are just simple, single notes ... that carry your feeling forward ... it's uncanny, and similar to Jaki Leibezeit in FUTURE DAYS and in the transition from CHAIN REACTION to QUANTUUM PHYSICS in the next album, where, it is the silent touch and feel that carries the music ... and there is no drummer I have EVER met, that can discuss SILENCE ... and how to work within it ... except BILL BRUFORD ... but this is about bass players.

There are others ... but not always within the rock context ... DAVID DARLING is just phenomenal. CHARLIE HADEN, specially with EGBERTO GISMONTI is just insane ... totally out of this world ... and, unfortunately, within the rock music context, I still think that JOHN PAUL JONES and JOHN ENTWISTLE are/were probably the most inventive of all, since they were not about the "riff", in two bands that specialized in expanding things and taking it far and away from just a riff ... which is what "progressive music" started being about, but nowadays, we seem enamored with returning to the riff and almost all the players are "riff'ers".

There are a few really special players out there for me ... RICHARD SINCLAIR is one of them. MIKE HOWLETT is the other, perhaps one of the steadiest and cleanest player I have ever seen, and in concert ... he's just clean and strong, and he can play with drummers like PIERRE MOERLIN, who were kinda known to go left and right and away from the "riff" to do something special to make the piece of music stronger. Very few people have the ear, to be able to ADD to a piece of music like that ... sort of like you can add a kazoo and make it sound fabulous!

One other one, is DON SCHIFF ... from THE ROCKET SCIENTISTS. He has never gotten the credit for the work he has added to this band, and instead other folks got the credit and attention for the playing of the CHAPMAN STICK ... but with all due respect to the other folks and the famous one, DON is not about the pyrotechnics of the playing of the instrument ... he is about adding to the music what it needs to make it better and stronger, a very under rated and ignored concept in music, because we spend so much time rating the "riff'ers" and not the music.

I like JOHN MYUNG, for example, and his playing is very strong ... but in the end, you get the feeling that all he can do is go around and round the scales and notes ... and NEVER get out of that to bring up something special because the guitar is just flying as it is ... and he needs to go fly his own kite for a while! That leaves JOHN underrated and not as strong and interesting as he might be, and seems to have the ability to do and be ... but won't get it, when he has to spend his time supporting the guitar ... and can't have time away from it. The death of a bass player ... within a band that does not know "music" ... only knows something about their own "style" ... and these folks are graduates of a music school? WEIRD!

Yes, Myung is fantastic, but seems rather hamstrung by his place in the group. I always thought he should be allowed to cut loose more often.  Geddy Lee gets equal musical billing with Alex Lifeson--Petrucci should to the same for Myung--it's probably the only possible way DT could actually get better than they already are.  

Excellent!  When I was first learning to play bass guitar, I started with Chas Cronk's amazing bass line to the Strawbs tune "Hero and Heroinne!"  Nearly 50 years later, I'm still at it!  

progmatic wrote: A couple of others: Chas Cronk, Tony Levin

Tony Levin is not underrated by anyone!