“Bass is a function, not an instrument,” insists Sebastian Steinberg as he pauses to sip his tea before jumping back into his commentary on the limitless possibilities of frequency. His insights on his instrument and its role in music shift from master class to abstract within the same sentence, but every word he speaks is full of intention and the deep knowledge that he’s amassed throughout his 62 years. His statement about bass makes more sense as he elaborates that as a kid he primarily kept to himself and passed the time mimicking birds, nature, and the city noises of his hometown Boston, where his earliest inclinations were based solely on the sounds around him and not yet the instruments that create them. His point is solidified as he reflects, “I really wanted to be a train when I was a little kid, and bass was the closest I could get to that.” There’s never a dull moment when talking with Steinberg, which is perfectly expected if you’ve ever heard his bass playing. His love of the avant-garde and his eagerness to utilize every resonance his instrument will produce — including those traditionally non-musical – has sculpted his distinct voice as a musician. Simply listening to his work on Fiona Apple’s Grammy award-winning 2020 opus Fetch the Bolt Cutters will give you a keen idea of Steinberg as both a bass player and a person. In taking on a deeply intimate role in the songwriting, production, and entire album-creation process, he’ll tell you it’s his finest and most personal work to date. “Listening back to the music I’ve created has made me realize that I’ve taken a really scenic route, and it’s nothing I would have imagined when I was young and impressionable. I’ve got to say, I’ve done a lot of weird shit. The stuff I’ve been a part of is mind-numbing and gratifying, but it’s all led up to Fetch the Bolt Cutters, which is the culmination of all of the meaningful bass playing I’ve ever done in my life. It’s the most important thing I’ve ever helped to create.” (photo by Justin Mark Morrison) The album’s origins are fitting of artists as open and unabashed as Apple and her bandmates and co-producers Steinberg, drummer Amy Aileen Wood, and multi-instrumentalist David Garza, who spent months at Apple’s Venice Beach home never once touching their instruments. Instead they spent that time banging on walls, chanting primitive cadences, shaking food containers, plucking rubber bands, and stomping around like little kids. While that might not seem like the most productive songwriting process for most musicians, the exercise brought the quartet closer and even sparked many ideas that made the record’s final cut. And once they did finally pick up their instruments to write, Steinberg played a significant role in sculpting the material, as his upright and electric playing on “Ladies,” “Heavy Balloon,” and “Cosmonauts” displays the profound chemistry that he shares with A