Gary James' Interview With Mr. Bass Man
Scott Spray



He is called "Mr. Bass Man", and it's easy to see why. The artists he's played with, toured with, and recorded with reads like a "Who's Who Of Rock 'N' Roll". We're talking The Mamas And The Papas, Clarence Clemmons, The Drifters, The Platters, The Coasters, Ronnie Spector, Jose Feliciano, Elvin Bishop, Slash, Felix Cavaliere's Rascals, Rick Derringer, The Sylistics, Dion, and the list goes on and on! He was inducted into The Blues Hall Of Fame as a member of The Johnny Winter Band. He was inducted into the New England Music Hall Of Fame in 2020. With Johnny Winter, he appeared on The David Letterman Show and toured with him in Europe, the Far East, South America and Scandinavia. He played New York City's Lincoln Center with The Chambers Brothers and Madison Square Garden and The L.A. Forum with Ronnie Spector.

The gentleman we are referring to is Scott Spray, affectionately known as "Mr. Bass Man."

Q - It seems like The Hollywood All Stars Band might have been inspired or influenced by Ringo Starr's All Starr Band. Yes? No?

A - Well, I'm not actually sure how Steve, the Hollywood guy, how he actually decided to put it together. I wouldn't be surprised. You got Ringo, one of the only two Beatles still around. I've seen Ringo before. He does a great job. He's got Edgar Winter in his band. I was in Edgar's band for years. He had Felix Cavaliere in his band and I worked with him for years. I've done everything but worked with Ringo. That would be nice.

Q - Maybe that's next in your future.

A - Well, who knows? It's never too late.

Q - Who gave you this title, "Mr. Bass Man"?

A - I'm not sure. I guess different people have thrown that around for awhile. What happened is, I ended up being a studio kind of guy, a studio rat. I started back in the '70s actually. When I was a kid in the '60s I did a record, late '60s. When I was a little kid. Then by the '70s I became a studio bass player. At this point I'm on about nine hundred records, trying to get to a thousand before I stop.

Q - You admire bass players like Duck Dunn, Tim Bogert, Carol Kaye. What do you think of Paul McCartney? I ask only because I got into a rather heated discussion with promoter Barry Fey about this subject. He ranked John Entwistle as the number one bass player in his autobiography. Barry Fey never gave me the chance to talk. He cut me right off. Paul McCartney is not only a bassist, but a singer. songwriter and producer. So, what are your thoughts?

A - There's a couple of different ways to look at it. When I was a kid, the reason I do what I do is because I saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan, February, '64. They looked great. Sounded great. Girls loved 'em. What's not to like? Then I zoomed in on what Paul was doing, playing, the bass itself. Over the years I got to realize what a fabulous musician he is, not just as a bass player. He's a great bass player. But back in the day, when The Beatles were playing I could picture him, and of course my all-time favorite James Jamerson from Motown, from McCartney and James and Brian Wilson when he did The Beach Boys with Carol Kaye, they were playing all melodic, lyrical bass lines that no one else was playing. McCartney was one of the three guys that were doing that. He was certainly the most famous. But as far as a bass player, musician, all-around singer, songwriter, he's tops. Nobody cam beat Paul. He's done it all. My all-time favorite bass player over the years, it's still James Jamerson. The stuff he did on the Motown records is just astounding to me and still is, even though he's not the singer, he's not the writer, he's just the bass player. Without those bass tracks, all those Motown hits would not be hits.

Q - How does a guy like yourself get to play with all these different people? Is it word of mouth recommendations?

A - In a sense it is, yes, because I don't have a publicity guy. I don't have a manager, somebody calling saying "Use this guy." What happens is over the years I started hanging around at a place called Connecticut Recording Studio in Bridgeport (Connecticut), Paul Leka's place, started using me on sessions because I was hanging around down there. Hand clapping on Harry Chapin's stuff. Actually, I met Hollywood Steve down there. We both went to the same high school. I played on Steve's record in 1977, 1976, something like that. So, what happened is, the more records you play on, the more you seem to get known. Every time I did a record, somebody would hear it or hear of it and ask for the same guy that played on that record down at that studio. So, I became the house bass player. Whoever came in, I did the record.

Q - There was no one big break then in your musical career, it was just recording on one artists record after another?

A - Well, as far as the studio work, yes. I would have to say that because doing my first few records down there (Bridgeport, Connecticut) and then I branched out to other studios. "Oh yeah, you're the guy from Connecticut Recording." Or, "You played on such and such." You played on "Give Me Just A Little More Time", the Angela Clemons remake of that big hit. We had a number four hit with that. Because of that, people started asking for the guy who played on those records. Truthfully, my first major break, outside of the studio, was getting a job with Edgar Winter. That was 1979, when I was on tour with somebody. I think it was Diane Scanlon. I came home from a tour of the South, gone for two weeks. Came home that night, went to Connecticut Recordings, did a recording session. The guitar player on the session was a friend of mine, Al Ferrante, who said, "Hey, you know two days ago I got the gig with Edgar Winter." I said, "That's great! Good for you." He said, "Oh, and the bass player, I don't care for the guy. I don't think he's gonna stick around. I'm gonna recommend you." Three days later Edgar called me and I got the gig. So, that really started the "name" people playing with the "name" kind of guys.

Q - You worked with Harry Chapin.

A - Yes. I'm on three of his records as hand-clapping and finger snapping, not playing bass.

Q - What kind of a guy was Harry Chapin?

A - He was a sweetheart. He was always doing benefits to help people, raise money for hungry people and homeless people. He was just the greatest guy. However, I will also say he was a pool shark and used to beat me at pool all the time at the studio. The joke was, whoever lost had to buy breakfast. I don't think he ever bought breakfast because he was that good. He cut that song, "Cats In The Cradle" in Bridgeport. I watched him do it. The next three records, myself and friends of mine were there trying to break into the studio business and he put us around the mic and had us clap and finger snap on five or six songs on the record. Kris Kristofferson, Rita Coolidge was down there. They put our names on the record and paid us. I thought this is great. I'm getting paid to hand clap on a Harry Chapin record. That was probably '74, '75. He was a really great guy. I never got to play bass with him.

Q - Part of the reason you got to play with all these people is your personality. You have to get along with the people you're working with. That's a big part of the equation. Am I right?

A - I don't look at it myself that way as me. I look at all the other musicians I've worked with, all these years in the studio and in bands, and I realize the reason they're on the gig is, sure you have to be able to play, but there's always someone who can play as well as you or better, but if you're not the right guy, if you don't get along with people, if you show up late on a session, you're disrespectful to a guy's music, you don't have any ideas to help out, if you don't get along with people, they're not going to call you back. Nobody wants to be on the road with somebody you don't get along with. That's the hardest thing, going on the road.

Q - Now see, that is something that is rarely talked about. It's always how good of a musician the person is, but it's more than just that. It is the ability to get along with whoever you're playing with.

A - I absolutely agree. Back in the day when I was breaking into the studio work, I'd done maybe thirty, forty records. I was starting to get a name for myself. They had great players come in and cut tracks with us, but nobody got along with them. They were never called back. You saw these guys once. "Hey, whatever happened to that great guitar player?" "Well, nobody liked him, so we have another guy that's just as good." There's always somebody around the corner.

Q - You worked with Edgar Winter, but you were also with Johnny Winter.

A - I was with Edgar '79, '80, '81. I did an album called "Standing On Rock" with him and now subsequently from that record I'm on five of his records. They pulled some of the tracks and pulled 'em on "Greatest Hits". Different records came out. "The Best Of Edgar Winter" and so on. I find myself on a bunch of 'em. With Johnny, eighteen years after I stopped playing with Edgar, I got a call to play with Johnny from a friend of mine who was playing drums. Vito Luizzi was playing with Johnny at the time. He said, "We need somebody to rehearse once a week. Our bass player is not working out." So, I ended up joining Johnny's band. I started playing with him in 2000 and played with until the day he died in 2014. I played with him close to fifteen years. I'm probably on five or six studio and live records and another half-a-dozen bootlegs from around the world. They keep turning up and I didn't even know I was on 'em.

Q - You wrote music for the TV show Sex And The City. Isn't that more lucrative than being on the road?

A - I think the word here is writing. I wrote with some other guys. We wrote music for Sex And The City that used our stuff for four or five of the seasons. Not the theme song, but the background music. When they walk into a bar, that's us playing. Between scenes, that's us. That's very lucrative, yes. Absolutely. I did The Today Show. I sang and played bass of that for about twelve or thirteen years. I didn't write it (the music). I just played on it. It's whole different way to look at playing music. I wrote for Johnny Winter. I co-wrote the first record I did with him called "I'm A Bluesman". I co-wrote the song and two others on the record. The record was nominated for a Grammy. That was great. It didn't win, but because it was nominated and because I'm a songwriter as well as bass player on the record I did very well, especially because of the writing. The last album we did, "Step Back", that won a Grammy. That's the first Grammy winner I was on. That was cool.

Q - You've played on over nine hundred records. Are you just paid for the session or do you get royalties for each record sold?

A - Well, it depends. On the majority of those I was not the writer. I was not a band member. I was a hired guy to come in. "We need you for a day." "We need you for a week." Whatever. You're paid up front through the Musicians Union. There's a minimum wage, Union scale. You can't make less. You can ask for a lot more if you want. So, you get paid to do the initial session. If you're not the songwriter, that's pretty much all you're going to get paid, unless, I've done records where a song from the record ended up in movies for example. It's a union contract, so they track it down. It's something you played on. "It's in a movie. So here, we're paying you again." As far as writing for Johnny (Winter) and Sex And The City, every three months you get a check for songwriting and publishing. That is endless. As long as it's being played, you get paid for the rest of your life.

Q - If you ever stopped recording and/or touring, what would you do with yourself?

A - (laughs) That's a good question. I'll have to ask my wife that. We've been together forty-three years. In all that time, until Johnny passed away eight years ago (2014) I was pretty much on the road six months a year. Take that forty-three years, I've really been home twenty-one and half years and gone the other half. Now, because I'm not really touring like I used to; I still take a trip to England and play over there. I went over with my friend Jay Stone and we did some stuff over there. I went to Italy with the band two years ago, but it's not like it was with Johnny. We were on the road six months a year. I'm not on the road constantly. I was in Maine last week, but that was two days. But I'm in the studio during the week. So I'm home every night and my wife can't believe I'm home every night. After forty-three years she's like, "What are you doing home? Don't you have a gig?" (laughs)

Official Website: www.TheHollywoodAllStars.net

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