Podcast Review: Basscast

Basscast

Overview: David Burgess and a guest bassist listen to music and evaluate mostly electric and sometimes upright bass players. Actually it's more than that, more or less in this order:

• There are tracks from the guest bassist (solo or with a band)
• Maybe some bass news, or gear and equipment news
• Tracks for the featured album or bass player with background and comments from David and his guest
• "Step Back in Time" segment, which could be an album or an overview of a bass player's career and life, again with background and comments from David and his guest. This part also includes music
  

Passion Factor: David and his guests tell you why they like something, get kind of mushy when appropriate, and do a pretty thorough job on the selected topics for each episode.

Sound Quality: Great

Sound Levels: Medium. There is a little difference in the volume between speech and music.

Type of music: Rock, punk, fusion, jazz, heavy metal, alternative; just about everything but classical

My prudish rating: PG-13 for occasional cussing. No sex or violence (except for the fact that when you listen to the bass, you'll feel violently sexy, so be careful)

Time: From 1 to 1 1/2 hours

Frequency: Every 2 or 3 weeks or so

Web Site: There is not really a web site, and the link in iTunes just takes you to an admin place. The real place to go is the Basscast area at the Talk Bass forums where there are notes and discussion on each episode. You'll have to register if you want to post comments. There are not any links here, but notes on what was in each episode. This makes it necessary to copy and paste and search for albums you might want to buy, which is not fun for lazy clickers like me. On the other hand, I'd rather hear this in-depth podcast than have an intuitive website, if it's a choice between one or the other.

My Humble Opinion: I enjoy this show, even when David plays music I've never wondered about. I appreciate it when he constructively criticizes tracks - when he doesn't like something, he says so. I always learn something new, and I've learned to listen more effectively. And hooray when he yells at producers when they don't put enough bass in the mix! Maybe somebody will listen to him.

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