“He learned what the notes were”: How touring with Gene Simmons transformed Geddy Lee’s bass playing
We think we know everything about an artist just by listening to their music, but it doesn’t often work out like that. Sure, when we listen to bands like Kiss and Rush, we understand their approach to creativity a bit more, but it’s not until you listen to somebody talk about the creative process that you get genuine insight into what they’re like as an artist. One of the biggest shocks to a lot of people is how few famous musicians can’t actually read music.
A lot of the people whom we commonly refer to as some of the greatest songwriters on earth don’t have a clue how to read a lick of music. Jimi Hendrix, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, and Bob Dylan—none of them have a clue—but it hasn’t stopped them from making some of the most beautiful music ever committed to the airwaves. It’s truly fascinating how effective they are at writing excellent music while also not understanding a great deal about the complexities of the technical side of things.
Gene Simmons also can’t read or write music, but it hasn’t stopped him from making a pretty good career for himself. A lot of people criticise Kiss, saying that they are a stadium band with an iconic look which they use to their advantage. While there is certainly a lot of work that goes into their marketing, they need to have the music to back it up, and they certainly do have that.
Gene Simmons and his band are able to create a large sound that gets heads nodding and toes tapping. If not for their ability to create that large sound, then their makeup wouldn’t take them very far. The man knows his way around a fretboard, so much so that he was even able to teach bass mogul Geddy Lee a thing or two.
We go back to the idea that some of the greatest musicians in the world don’t know the technical side of things, and Lee might be the best example of that. Nobody doubts his ability as a bassist, he’s arguably the best in the world, but he doesn’t have a huge knowledge when it comes to the technical side of things. He doesn’t immerse himself in theory, and instead dabbles mainly in sound. He knows when something works and sounds good, so why overcomplicate things? Simmons found this out when they were on tour together and jamming backstage.
“One night back at the hotel or backstage someplace, Geddy [Lee] and I were sitting down, trading licks, and I said, ‘Do you want to do a blues scale? You go first, and then I’ll continue the chord pattern’, and he said, ‘I don’t know what you mean’,” recalled Simmons, “At least from what I recall, Geddy didn’t understand what a blues scale was or what ‘1,4,5’ meant. That also bears noting that when you go ‘1,4,5’ to a musician, that means something, it’s a relationship of notes or chords.”
Simmons continued, highlighting Lee’s unique approach towards music, “So I go, ‘Well, okay then, you hit a G, either octave or low’, and he said, ‘Which one is that?’ Geddy played purely by ear. Now of course later on, he learned what the notes were and stuff like that.”
