The Lows and Highs of 2020 

Bass Family,

You don’t need me to tell you, but what a wild year this has been! I sincerely hope that everyone who is reading this is healthy, safe, and well. The COVID pandemic has taken a toll on everyone, and with tours, concerts, and performances of any kind on hold indefinitely, I know that all of our musician brothers and sisters are being heavily impacted by the repercussions of this seemingly endless situation. But to no one’s surprise, one big ray of sunshine throughout all of this has been the love, support, and sense of community that has been generated from the music world, and most pertinently to us, the bass world. Bass players have been more accessible than ever, taking to social media and their inboxes to interact with their fans and followers in providing hope and guidance through so much uncertainty. Unexpected albums and artist collaborations have been dropping, bringing some much-needed relief in edifying all of us. And bass players of all genres, levels, and walks of life have been checking in with each other to simply make sure that everyone is okay. The bass community has always been a tight-knit, loving, and supportive institution, and nothing has proven that more than this time when we needed it the most.

Here at Bass Magazine, we’ve been keeping extremely busy in fulfilling our goal of unifying our readers in providing content to help further your playing, bringing you closer to the artists you love, and in some cases, just providing some enjoyable articles to take your focus away from the endless barrage of hardships that have made 2020 such a trying year. Starting on April 1, shortly after the lockdown, we started running daily Bass Magazine Check-Ins with artists to catch up and see how they’d been coping with the quarantine and what had been inspiring them to persevere in their craft. By October, we had published just under 200 of them. We launched our Nashville Lowdown video series, where our own Rod Taylor spotlighted bassists in Nashville by hosting live webinars that included solo performances, audience questions, and in-depth interviews. We’ve also partnered with both the Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp and the Los Angeles College of Music to provide live video masterclasses with a slew of legendary bass players to keep the passion alive. We hope you’ve been enjoying everything we’ve been doing over here, and we’re fiercely committed to continuing our efforts for you, our readers.

Another development, as you may have already noticed, is how we are now presenting our issues. In order to bring you the best reading experience, we are doing away with the old template of print magazine-styled issues (formerly released on Issuu) and are now unveiling each new edition directly to our website. In offering issues that ran upwards of 120+ pages, we realized that a lot of the great content was getting lost in the mix. Now you can read all of our articles in an easy format directly on our site. Our previous issues have been converted and you can view them all here. We have also welcomed two new members to the Bass Magazine family in bringing our new advertising managers Marc Najjar and Greg Sutton. A huge thanks to them and all of our amazing staff for the tremendous work that they so passionately do to make Bass Magazine your ultimate resource for everything bass.

We couldn’t be more excited to bring this issue to you. With Thundercat on our cover, E.E. Bradman (pictured above with Thundercat and myself) brings you the most intimate and in-depth look inside the life and playing of Stephen Bruner as he navigates the chaos of 2020 and delivers his opus album, It Is What It Is. Also, dUg Pinnick discusses his new release with KXM, Steve Harris talks his latest with British Lion, and we dig deep with Mike Gordon, Laura Lee of Khraungbin, Ida Nielsen, and Tanya O’Callaghan, along with our usual reviews, lessons, and transcriptions. As always, hit me up with any questions and feedback at jon@bassmagazine.com. Enjoy the issue, and cheers to the future of bass!

Jon D’Auria, Editor-In-Chief

Editor-In-Chief: Jon D’Auria

Senior Editor: Chris Jisi

Editor-At-Large: E.E. Bradman

Copy Editor: Karl Coryat

Art Director: Paul Haggard

Writers: Jim Roberts, Jonathan Herrera, Freddy Villano, John Goldsby, Rod Taylor, Patrick Pfeiffer, Stevie Glasgow, Vicky Warwick, Jody Miller

Sales Managers: Greg Sutton, Marc Najjar

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copywritten Bass Magazine, LLC 2020