Latest articles by Mike Brooks
“Paul was tuning his guitar at one point, and I said ‘What key is that in?’, added a bassline and that became a song”: The good luck and creative chaos behind Mr Big’s Lean In To It
The Lowlist "Like a chainsaw going through chocolate pudding”: Mr Big's Lean Into It caught an unstoppable rock band at the top of their game…
"If you swing too much, it interrupts the head-banging, and that’s the last thing I wanted to do – the head-banging reigns supreme!" In praise of Living Colour's Vivid
Jagger produced them but that sound was all theirs. Inside Living Colour's late 80s classic debut
Green Day's Mike Dirnt wrote the bassline for Longview on LSD: "Later, it took me a long time to be able to play it, but it made sense when I was on drugs"
In praise of Dookie, the 1994 album that put Green Day on the pop-punk throne
Deon Estus moved to Dublin to play with Phil Lynott. He ended up giving George Michael (and Wham!) groove
George Michael could play bass – but it was Deon Estus who gave his songs groove, especially on 1987's Faith album...
"I never wanted to be just the bass player, plonking away. I played a lot of notes – too many sometimes!" Trevor Bolder and the low-end magic of David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust
The Lowlist Ziggy Stardust was recorded in just one day. It made David Bowie a star. But bass players could only hear Trevor Bolder...
Marcus Miller's The Sun Don't Lie: the moment Miller proved he was more than just a slap monster
Glass-like fretless tone. Thumb-thumping passages. Tributes to Jaco: 1993's The Sun Don't Lie served notice that Marcus MIller was more than a sideman
Level 42's debut album: a Britfunk classic that took slap bass and bent harmonics to a new, uh, level
It's 1981 and the bass players of the UK are looking at their thumbs and wondering if they can keep up…
The legend of Marvin Gaye's What's Going On is that James Jamerson was so drunk he played the bass lying down
And yep, most of us can’t play those basslines standing up and completely sober
The Yes Album: When Chris Squire created one of the most recognizable bass tones in rock
The Lowlist The Lowlist – celebrating longplayers with low-end – doffs its cap to Chris Squire
Larry Graham on when you really need to use a 5-string bass
The godfather of slap bass says “I actually love playing a 5-string for other artists, but not for live shows”
The Lowlist: INXS's Kick was the sound of a rock band taking on modern technology
Slick, smoldering and able to fuse rock, pop, funk and dance rhythms, Kick was peak INXS
The Lowlist: Blondie’s Parallel Lines – the album that defined New Wave
The rhythm section was "was totally out of whack". The producer was "like Adolf Hitler". But out of it all came an all-time classic.
The Lowlist: Def Leppard's Hysteria, the album that changed melodic rock
Real bass, sampled bass: how Hysteria redefined a genre's production standards.
The Lowlist: Chic's C'est Chic was pure groove genius
We doff our caps to the uplifting grooves and funkalicious basslines of Chic's second album
Why Thin Lizzy's Live and Dangerous is one of the greatest live albums ever released
Unfairly maligned as an album "fixed in the studio", a new version of Live And Dangerous proves Lynott and co didn't need overdubs
The Lowlist: Jamiroquai’s Emergency on Planet Earth was a solid platinum gem for all bass players
An appreciation of the album that introduced the young Stuart Zender
Ampeg Rocket Bass RB-108 and RB-110 review
One of the great names in bass amps rolls out a portable, affordable range of Class D combos... It's time for lift-off
Boss Katana-110 Bass review
The bass-specific version of the hugely popular Katana guitar amp range has finally arrived – we put its flexible feature set to the test
Dragonfly CS-5/345 review
A custom five-string from Japan that places plenty of tone options at your fingertips
BITE Funky Booster review
There are no weedy bass tones with this customized four-string
Cort Artisan B5 Element review
The B5 is like a beefed-up five-string greatest hits of Cort's Artisan series, with a generous spec at a very attractive price
Aguilar DB599 Bass Compressor pedal review
A super-compact, transient-taming compressor from the storied bass amp brand
Spector Euro 4 RST review
Tired of back-breaking basses? Try the new lightweight Spector Euro
