The Session Player Thread

Bellycaster

Time to revere the great Session Guitarists.

Back in the day, some guys just got all the Gigs.

I'll start with probably the most well known. Mr Steve Lukather.

He even played the solo on this.

 

There are loads of Session players past and present, best thing sometimes is discovering some of the stuff they played on.

Let's have some more!

 

[Deleted User]

Robbie MacIntosh. Genius session player; great taste/tone. Played on Talk Talk's 'The Colour of Spring' (one of my favourite albums), worked with the Pretenders (his guitar work on 'Hymn to Her' is masterful), also worked with Macca, John Mayer.... A stunningly good guitar player.

citizen68

Mr Lukather's buddy?

johnnyurq

My list would go.

The daddy and most prolific of all is Tommy Tedesco I think.

Jimmy Page

Chet Atkins

Chris Spedding

Jeff "skunk" Baxter

Duane Allman

Bellycaster

citizen68 said:

Mr Lukather's buddy?

I have a feeling L.A might figure strongly in this. ;-)

Bucket

Dann fucking Huff.

Although admittedly my favourite playing of his is with Giant, not his session work (great though much of that is).

Bellycaster

Bucket said:

Dann fucking Huff.

Although admittedly my favourite playing of his is with Giant, not his session work (great though much of that is).

You read my mind, have a Wiz.

citizen68

Tom Bukovac

historyisjunk

Yep, +1 for Chris Spedding.
Also- Doug Pettibone, Mike McAdam.

Chris Spedding with Robert Gordon-

spacecadet

Brent Mason. If you're into that sort of thing.

viz

Kyle bolden, lovely player.

Bellycaster

@viz

I'd not heard of him, so I did a quick search and got this

http://www.mymusicmasterclass.com/premiumvideos/funk-pop-gospel-guitar-masterclass-kyle-bolden/

One and a half minutes of taste and class. That spoke to me on a very personal level. What he did there is exactly the style I "try" to incorporate into my playing and is where I am trying to aim at aside from the Fusion "Outside" playing I'm endeavouring to learn too.

I'll have to search for more of this guy.

Thanks for introducing him to me.

 

 

viz

He's ace, a lovely chap, and has had an amazing career. lucky bastard!

birdo

Barrie cadogan , has player with a lot of people ( weller, Edwin Collins, chemical brothers, primal scream plus a load more) . Outside of playing with his own band little Barrie.i met him at a gig he did locally and he's a really nice bloke . Happy to have a drink a chat about guitars . Oh my other session guy that I m amazed that no one has mentioned is Steve cropper. He does so much with so few notes.

Kebabkid

Well, firstly let's pay tribute to all those who played on The Beatles stuff and of course The Funk Brothers for their contributions to so many classics and people like Big Jim Sullivan! There are so many others from 50s-70s.

The common "LA crew" of *Lukather, Landau and Huff have been mentioned but I'll pipe in with a few more like Larry Carlton (Steely Dan, Crusaders, Tim Pierce (numerous sessions, but a lot of Rick Springfield stuff). Michael Thompson, Lee Ritenhour, Jay Graydon, Paul Pesco and Paul Jackson Jr have also played on numerous sessions (Madonna, Hall & Oates, Streisand etc)

*It was rumoured that at any one time in the 80s, Lukather could be on as many as 6-10 out of the top 20 US hits in the charts.

Lyle Workman - numerous sessions but biggies are Bourgious Tagg (he was a member of the band), Jellyfish and Beck, plus someone who's also shared some of those sessions with him, a Jon Brion - perfect sounds, parts/solos and layering on the stuff they've played on.

Homegrown - +1 to Robbie McIntosh (Macca, Pretenders, Mayer) and Iain Bairnson (Kate Bush, Alan Parsons Project, Bucks Fizz, Pilot, State Cows) and one of the most tasteful, accomplished and melodic players on the planet -  a definite unsung hero!Dominic Miller of Sting fame also did/does sessions as did Rob Harris of Jamiroquai - both great players.

Two worth mentioning are Neil Taylor (Tears for Fears - he did the solo on "Everybody wants to rule the world", Robbie Williams etc and the Adam Goldsmith (houseband for The Voice etc). Some of you may have seen this article about session work in Guitarist mag

http://www.musicradar.com/tuition/guitars/how-to-make-it-as-a-session-guitarist-552866

 

 

Bellycaster

Kebabkid said:

Well, firstly let's pay tribute to all those who played on The Beatles stuff and of course The Funk Brothers for their contributions to so many classics and people like Big Jim Sullivan! There are so many others from 50s-70s.

The common "LA crew" of *Lukather, Landau and Huff have been mentioned but I'll pipe in with a few more like Larry Carlton (Steely Dan, Crusaders, Tim Pierce (numerous sessions, but a lot of Rick Springfield stuff). Michael Thompson, Lee Ritenhour, Jay Graydon, Paul Pesco and Paul Jackson Jr have also played on numerous sessions (Madonna, Hall & Oates, Streisand etc)

*It was rumoured that at any one time in the 80s, Lukather could be on as many as 6-10 out of the top 20 US hits in the charts.

Lyle Workman - numerous sessions but biggies are Bourgious Tagg (he was a member of the band), Jellyfish and Beck, plus someone who's also shared some of those sessions with him, a Jon Brion - perfect sounds, parts/solos and layering on the stuff they've played on.

Homegrown - +1 to Robbie McIntosh (Macca, Pretenders, Mayer) and Iain Bairnson (Kate Bush, Alan Parsons Project, Bucks Fizz, Pilot, State Cows) and one of the most tasteful, accomplished and melodic players on the planet -  a definite unsung hero!Dominic Miller of Sting fame also did/does sessions as did Rob Harris of Jamiroquai - both great players.

Two worth mentioning are Neil Taylor (Tears for Fears - he did the solo on "Everybody wants to rule the world", Robbie Williams etc and the Adam Goldsmith (houseband for The Voice etc). Some of you may have seen this article about session work in Guitarist mag

http://www.musicradar.com/tuition/guitars/how-to-make-it-as-a-session-guitarist-552866

 

Good article that, KK!

Neil Taylor is like the British Lukather. ;-)

mudslide73

The solo on ewtrtw was one of the things thst got me into guitar. What other stuff is Neil Taylor on?

Phil_aka_Pip

Tim Renwick

Michael Landau and a lot of the other guys who have played for James Taylor (he knows how to pick 'em)

Kebabkid

mudslide73;49779" said:

The solo on ewtrtw was one of the things thst got me into guitar. What other stuff is Neil Taylor on?

Look him up on Wiki and it shows his discography but he was one of Robbie Williams' guitarists for quite a while.

duotone

love this James Buton clip playing Elvis Mystery Train, especially the ending.

octatonic

Mike Landau 

Brent Mason 

Redd Volkaert

Brett Garsed