YOUR QUESTION

11/18/2020 The Scruff

My mother decided on the sobriquet. Not me.
1. Do you have a favorite key or musical mode to perform in, either for your selection's tone or the range it provides with chord/scale progressions?
2. Do you prefer fretless bass guitars (which I am postulating given your proficiency with contrabasses, unless your smiles and concentration belie your frustration) or fretted basses?
3. Danny Heifetz in a 2013 interview briefly explained how Theo Lengyel became disillusioned with the band, but he credited Theo to playing the trombone and flute. When did he use either (or you with the student clarinet you fear) in a live or studio setting?
4. I am not asking for them to return or Mr. Bungle to cease playing what initially and currently united them, but why are saxophones seemingly making a resurgence in heavy metal? I prefer bass and contra-alto clarinets in the genre.

MY ANSWER

1. No, but I’m always exploring. I will say that Db is a pain in the ass on the upright, but not all my choices are based on ease or comfort.
2. I rarely play fretless and though I do enjoy it, I’m more at home with the frets. The difference in scale length and hand positions is so different on upright and electric that knowing one doesn’t necessarily facilitate the other.
3. Theo played mostly alto sax and occasionally trombone on tour; the latter usually on cover songs. I played clarinet in Danny’s band Dieselhed at a live show in SF once, and again at the Women’s March in NYC around 2017, and on some film music I’ve written.
4. Well, Scruffy, you can’t always get what you want. I have fortunately not heard any metal with sax in it.