| Bass Gods: Interview with Jean Baudin, 9-String Bass Geek Extraordinaire! |
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Wow. Read on for the rest of the interview. TMusic: Jean, first of all thanks for taking the time to answer some questions for us. Now, nine strings. What's the deal with that?  JB:
No problem, Joe. The 9-string has been a kinda of
evolutionary thing.
When
I was a kid I use to tinkle on the piano we had (never had
lessons).
Then in my early teens I wanted to be in a band. Drums were the first
choice which were vetoed by my mom. I can't sing for shit, so
that was
out. The guitar was the next choice and my fingers
were too clumsy to
make chords, so I wound up getting a bass for christmas.
After a
couple of hours, I was getting ticked off by the lack of notes.
So,
the next year I got a 5-string made with a ton of frets, then many
years later I broke it doing a flip on stage while on tour and got a
6-string, then I found about Conklin who specializes in extended range
bassists (ERBs) so I asked them what's the most you can make? and they
said they had made a 9-string. So I ordered one.
That was in 1999.
TMusic: I see you have a Conklin bass (pardon me whilst I drool), the Jean Baudin Signature Model. Did Conklin approach you or did you approach them on your quest for more strings? What have they been like to work with? JB:
They have been great to work with. Bill and Mike really know
their stuff. Conklin had made a couple of basses for me, and
I wanted
a kinda cool retro one, kinda like a 70's jazz bass. So we
talked
about making a model that other people could order... It's hardly a
line though, as they custom made one-by-one and retail for
$8000.
Conklin may be doing a new line of mass guitars, so maybe we can make a
stripped down affordable one in the future.
TMusic: Ok, so your video of you playing the Super Mario Bros. theme song launched you to be somewhat of an internet superstar. One of your signature 9 stringers has a PacMan theme (click for pic1, pic2). Come clean, Jean, do you have an old 8-bit Nintendo hooked up to the TV in your basement, like the rest of us geeks?  JB:
I actually own a couple of dozen old arcade games... the upright
kind they used to have in video arcades and bars. Like Space Invaders,
Dragon's Lair, Centipede. It's been a hobby of mine, to
tinker with
them and set up the garage like an arcade and have friends
over. I do
have an 8-Bit Nintendo, ColecoVision, Vectrex, and Atari 2600 too..
however, none of them are hooked up. The only semi-vintage
game system
I have hooked up at the moment is the Super Nintendo.
TMusic: Tell us some more about the equipment you use. JB: I use Accugroove speaker cabinets that make my basses sound crystal clear. One of my cabinets is a 21" subwoofer which can push the sound of my low F# and C# strings. I also use a Millenia Mic Pre, and a couple of Stewart 2.1 Power Amps (2100 watts). Our guitarist is a trooper to be able to cope with my sound. I also have tons of effects (delays, distortion, chorus, etc.). TMusic: Wait, an ELEVEN string bass (click for pics of the Joust bass created by Ken Lawrence Instruments) now? Amazing! What is the goal behind that? JB: More notes, more of a palette to work with. Evolution, hahaha. TMusic: Time to plug your band. Tell us a bit about Nuclear Rabbit. I've only heard a little from them from the bands website, but you guys seem to have taken mainstream, balled it into an edible package, ingested it and shat it out. In other words, it's unusual. Fast, possessing more talent than the entire Republican party, but definitely not mainstream. JB:
Yeah, we are definitely not mainstream. We've been around for
15
years and bands like Papa Roach, Alien Ant Farm and the Deftones used
to open for us... hahaha... and we're still underground. It's
just
weird stuff... you either love it or hate it. I
can't categorize it
myself but some kid came emailed me the other day and said, "Nuclear
Rabbit makes System of a Down look like the BeeGees." That
seems like
a good soundbyte.
TMusic: Have you gotten any interesting emails/feedback since your video was spotlighted on BoingBoing? JB: This kind of thing has happened a few times since I first posted that video earlier this year. I got 90,000+ hits this weekend and what happens is one site posts, then other sites copy the news story and run it on their site... then when the article gets old my traffic goes back to normal. I think boingboing and another site musicthing in the uk did the most damage this time. My server has a little domain tracker thing so I can see the exact link where all the traffic is coming from and I can read all the comments... usually, I get positive emails, but on the comments for the articles I can see people talking trash... (what a dork why so many strings?, penis extension, the other guy does mario better, etc.) - it's kinda funny actually. I get tons of email from people saying I've inspired them so I know I'm doing okay. TMusic: tinfoil.music spends a lot of time on digital media rights, lawsuits and copyright. You are certainly a musician and quite possibly a hardcore geek. What are your views of big music lawsuits, filesharing and such? JB:
I like filesharing... Nuclear Rabbit has got tons of fans all over
the world because people share the songs. Back before Mp3s we
used to
put on the label of our tapes "Feel free to copy this tape for your
friends". I've never been into music for the $$$$, if I was I
would be
writing something more commercial or playing in a
cover band. That's
just not where my heart is.
TMusic: Any tips for those looking to get started on a 9 string? This is the time to plug any one manufacturer that you think puts out some amazing gear. JB: I wouldn't recommend 9-strings to anyone unless they really felt like they needed more notes... some people that make great extended range basses are: Conklin Guitars (of course), Bee Basses, Ken Lawrence Instruments, JP Basses (in France), Alembic, and Ritter Basses (in Germany). There are other guys, but these are the ones I've had hands-on experience with and are confident they could make the perfect instrument. Of course, they aren't cheap. TMusic: Influences: Who are your major influences? Did any one person drive you to the nine string? JB:
When I was a kid I really liked Steve Harris (Iron Maiden), Cliff
Burton (Metallica) and Geddy Lee (Rush). Later I got into
Jaco
Pastorius, Stanley Clarke and Stu Hamm. However after my
first few
years I kinda gave up on bass players and my influences were music by
J.S. Bach, Score Composers (Bernard Herrmann, Jerry Goldsmith, Marco
Beltrami, etc.) and pretty much anything under the sun. No
one person
drove me to 9-string.... but myself. =)
TMusic: Last question Jean. You gotta have some massive hands to play that 9 stringer. Do you have to get your gloves custom made as well? JB: hahaha... no, my hands are pretty normal. Thank for your time Jean! Be sure to check out Jean's website here. Jean's band, Nuclear Rabbit, can be found here. Lastly, be sure you check out this AMAZING video of Jean playing the Super Mario Brothers theme song on his PacMan bass.  We also got the chance to speak with veteran luthier, Bill Conklin who has had a hand in many of Jean's custom basses. TMusic: What challenges has Conklin had to tackle in order to bring these multi-stringed wonders to fruition? I've seen some pictures of Jean's PacMan and Joust bass and the neck is as thick as a small tree. Conklin must be using some seriously innovative technology to pull these things off. BC: The biggest challenges in building these "out-there" instruments were finding strings and pickups for them. We worked with several string manufacturers to come up with the proper gauges that would handle the tension and be capable of achieving the correct tunings. We also had to find a pickup maker that was willing to stretch way beyond the norm and wind some wicked pickups for these beasts. The actual construction of the instruments is not that bad. We use the same techniques to build the super-wide 9, 10 and 11 string necks as we do to make the 4 and 5 strings. There have been a lot of high hurdles that have tripped us up along the way (many times it was customers requests that pushed us beyond our own comfort zone) but we were determined to make these a reality for our players and with a lot of engineering and perseverance we were able to pull them off. TMusic: I'm pretty certain I'm not using my soul. Could I trade it in on a nice 6 string model? BC: We were accepting souls as payment on Halloween, but that offer has now ended. Sorry. All pictures copyright Jean Baudin. Live pictures by David Grossman. Pictures used with permission, not under Creative Commons License Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites          Add your comment
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