Carol Kaye’s favourite Beach Boys bassline
As the most recorded bass player in history, the fact that Carol Kaye doesn’t get recognised in the same league as the likes of James Jamerson, Paul McCartney or Geddy Lee as being one of the finest to ever pick up the instrument is a travesty.
Of course, appearing on more records than anyone else doesn’t automatically qualify you as being the greatest, but when you’re being recruited by so many of the biggest names in rock and roll to lay down a bassline, then surely you’re doing something right.
As a member of the Wrecking Crew, an accomplished group of session players who were recruited by all the biggest names to slot in as a backing band, it’s clear that her versatility was one of her strongest assets. She may well have recently turned down her induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on the grounds that she didn’t believe her work was of any more importance than the rest of the collective’s efforts, but it’s also hard to ignore just how impactful her bass playing was on every record she contributed to.
Amongst some of her most famous credits, she worked alongside the likes of Glen Campbell, producing the iconic bassline for ‘Wichita Lineman’, and also gave Nancy Sinatra the bassline for ‘These Boots Are Made For Walkin’’. In addition to this, she’s also worked with some of the legends of soul, such as Sam Cooke and Ray Charles, and this is only naming a mere handful of the performers she collaborated with.
However, it was most notably with The Beach Boys where she produced her finest work, with Brian Wilson recruiting her to perform during the session of four of their classic studio albums including Pet Sounds. Despite Brian Wilson being an accomplished bass player himself, Kaye was weaving magic from the ideas he was relaying to her, and her performances on all but two of the 1966 album’s tracks are nothing short of sublime.
Out of the eleven tracks she did play electric bass on for this landmark record, her favourite is surprisingly the only track on the album that isn’t an original composition, and is instead a Wilson arrangement of the traditional song, ‘Sloop John B’. While audiences are divided on the merits of the song, with lots of people arguing that it takes all momentum out of the flow of the record, Kaye recognises it as being her finest moment performing with the group.
In a 2025 interview with Music Radar, Kaye noted the controversy behind the track, but praised it for its strengths and how she believes her performance was one of her finest. “A lot of people don’t think this fits with Pet Sounds,” she claimed. “But really, what does fit with Pet Sounds? You can’t even present the argument. All I know is, ‘Sloop John B’ is a happy tune that really works.” Mentioning how Billy Strange and Glen Campbell were both guitarists on the track, with Hal Blaine on drums and Lyle Ritz on upright bass, she also commented on how the band was one of the greatest she’s played with.
However, while she continued to praise the song, she also revealed that she wasn’t aware for a long time that Wilson himself was a more than competent bassist, and simply thought he was able to arrange for her easily. “Brian encouraged me to move around with my parts,” she continued. “He liked the bass to be non-static and energetic. What’s funny is, I never knew he was a bassist. I always thought of him as a piano player who knew how to write for other instruments. It wasn’t until years later that I discovered he could play bass.”
