If you needed any more proof that most people react to a song’s groove rather than the lead instruments’ usual histrionic antics, that the melody might be the icing on the cake, musically speaking, but it is the bass and backbeat that are the real sonic sustenance, then you just need to give Empty, the latest release from we be echo, a spin.
It’s all about the groove because this is a track built almost exclusively on groove—an authentic post-punk groove at that, which makes sense as the man behind the band name has been doing this sort of thing for four decades. This isn’t someone trying to sound like those times; this is the sound of someone surfing the sonic aftershock of those times.
Without much in the way of top-end melody instruments, the bass guitar does the lion’s share of the work—which it does elegantly and eloquently. Not only does it ground the songs by locking into the bottom-end drum patterns, but it also grooves and grinds, delves down, and dances over the beat, creating layers of bass-heavy tones and low-end textures.
As well as the various vocal arrays there are just a few additional sonics, which, to be honest, could just be more bass sounds at work, accentuated and effected, which mimic, to some degree, what the rhythm guitar or keyboard would be contributing but simultaneously sounds not at all like them.
As a one-time bass player, I have stood on stage, looked out at the crowd, and seen exactly what they are getting off on. They might be briefly enamoured by a flashy guitar move, impressed by a singer’s vocal prowess from time to time or appreciate an impressive keyboard flourish, but it is the groove that they are slaves to; it is the sound of the bass and the beat that are commanding their movements. I’m surprised that more people don’t get it….we be echo certainly does.
