The Carter Conundrum

...Ron Carter is one of the more frustrating musicians in jazz. It seems to go unsaid in the jazz media, but it's rare that such a mighty talent has been suffocated by technology and the choices he's made. It's a pretty simple pro/con situation:

Pro: Ron Carter has a tremendous feel for swing, choses great notes, has flawless intonation, and somehow manages to react to other musicians while maintaining awesome time.

Con: He runs his bass through this gawd-awful pickup system that makes it sound like rubber bands strung over a tin can with a balloon stretched over it. Seriously. For the most egregious bass sound ever, listen to the first track on this album.

Carter has defended his pickup sound innumerable times, and it's his right to sound the way he does. His bass, with the pickup on, is not an acoustic instrument...it's all coming from the amp. He tends to record it direct to the board, too, which is terrible...even when it is unnecessary: like his duo album with Helen Merrill or an '80s era solo album that I have. Why do you need a pickup when there are no other instruments? It's a little bit laughable.

What's even more laughable is that I keep track of his albums where the pickup is on and the pickup is off! His early albums with Eric Dolphy and Miles Davis thankfully predate the pickup...his '70s era stuff on Contemporary is rendered pretty unlistenable by the pickup. His recent run of quartet albums find the sound still there, but toned down to a relatively listenable level.

And then there albums like the two he did with the Joey Baron Quartet, or his wonderful new duo album with Houston Person, where the damn thing is off and the bass is recorded acoustically. And the tone is rich and warm. The years of reliance on the pickup has not killed his gift for pulling as much wonderful sound out of the bass as possible...it's strangely reassuring...