King Crimson and Peter Gabriel bassist Tony Levin has announced that he will release his new solo album, Bringing It Down To The Bass, through Flatiron Recordings on September 13.
The new album, Levin’s seventh solo album, explores Levin’s signature instrument and his musical life through a variety of styles including prog, jazz, thrash, classical and even a touch of barbershop quartet.
“I had pieces very much in the prog rock vein and I had pieces that were based on the bass,” Levin says, “and somewhere around the middle of the record I made the difficult decision to toss the prog stuff – well, not toss it exactly, save it for another album – and the more I focused, I chose the kind of pieces that had to me a sense of unity to it in that it’s about the bass. Not songs with singing about the bass, but each song is either based on a bass riff or a bass technique that I then invited some great rhythm sections to play on.”
Given Levin’s pedigree Bringing It Down To The Bass features an array of celebrated guests including Robert Fripp, who donated one of his distinctive soundscapes to the moody Floating In Dark Waters, drummers Mike Portnoy, Pat Mastelotto, Steve Gadd and Jerry Marotta, keyboard players Larry Fast, Gary Husband and Levin’s bother Pete, guitarists Earlk Slick and David Torn and more…
“Way back when we toured with King Crimson a lot, there were a few tours this century where Robert would play a looping soundscape he would create before the show and the audience would hear it as they came in,” Levin reveals about Fripp’s soundscape. “He would make up a different one every day, maybe a half hour. Some nights when we were about ready to go at 8 – we always started at 8 – Robert said, ‘Tony, go out and play bass to my soundscape.’ These soundscapes were often atonal, but sometimes they were tonal. We played many on stage, every night for years and it occurred to me then that it would make a very interesting piece on an album, just bass and soundscape.”
Bringing It Down To The Bass will be available on double vinyl, CD, Blu-ray and digital. The Blu-ray will feature Dolby Atmos, DTS-HD 7.1/5.1 mixes and hi-res stereo audio. The Apple Music stream will be available in Immersive Audio/Dolby Atmos.
Levin will be touring the US from September to December with BEAT, alongside Adrian Belew, Tool drummer Danny Carey and guitarist Steve Vai, performing King Crimson’s 80s repertoire.
You can see the new artwork and tracklisting below.
Pre-order Bringing It Down To The Bass.
Tony Levin: Bringing It Down To The Bass
1. Bringing It Down To The Bass
2. Me And My Axe
3. Road Dogs
4. Uncle Funkster
5. Boston Rocks
6. Espressoville
7. Give The Cello Some
8. Turn It Over
9. Beyond The Bass Clef
10. Bungie Bass
11. Fire Across The Sky
12. Floating In Dark Waters
13. On The Drums
14. Coda