Rudy Sarzo recently praised the bassist Carol Kaye on X.
“Which bass player isn’t?” the rocker replied when a fan asked, “Are you a Carol Kaye fan?” A follow-up comment from another fan said, “Thought between Carol and Rudy bringing the low end. Together, they have made a lot of artists sound so good. Many artists owe their legacy, too, Rudy and Carol. Everyone knows the low-end makes the sound.”
Sarzo replied humbly, saying, “I’m not even qualified to be her bass tech.” Kaye has been active in the music scene since the mid-’50s. Last year, she talked about what she has been playing nowadays.
“Mostly jazz stuff,” the bassist stated. “I teach jazz bass as well as jazz guitar on Skype worldwide. Before I ever did studio work, I was quite well known in Hollywood, Los Angeles, and South LA playing in all of the jazz clubs in the ’50s.”
She continued, “At that time, I wasn’t interested in doing rock and roll. But no one knew how to write for rock and roll in the late ’50s. So they came and got us to do studio work. Most of the players on the rock records of the ’60s were done by big bands and jazz musicians. There are hardly any rockers on those records, it’s mostly jazz players.”
“The inventing comes from playing jazz because you’re inventing every note that you play at all times. I played guitar for about five years and started playing bass almost accidentally,” Kaye also said about her switch to bass. “I never wanted to play bass, but the bass player didn’t show up at Capitol Records until 1963. They hired me and I thought, ‘You know, it’s more fun to play rock and roll bass than it was guitar.’”
The musician added, “Every style of music can be played on bass and so that’s what I started doing. So people started copying what I was doing! I had three kids, a mother, and a live in all to take care of, so I worked hard in the studios. It was never what I wanted to do in the first place but it was good. You know, some of it was fun.”
In her career, Kaye has worked with many notable names like Dean Martin, Ray Charles, The Righteous Brothers, Marvin Gaye, and The Temptations.
— Rudy Sarzo (@rudysarzo) August 29, 2024
I’m not even qualified to be her bass tech. 🙏🏻🎸🙏🏻
— Rudy Sarzo (@rudysarzo) August 31, 2024