Rock and Roll; Interview with Larry Graham [Part 1 of 4]

OK well when we first started playing together. I was a guitarist. And we had. A little trio guitar. And. Piano drums. Nice little trio. Dale Graham trio my mother's name Dale. And. So we would play a lot of the clubs in lounges. And. In the Bay Area. San Francisco Albany area. And. Then at this one club that I played. There was an organ. That had the foot pedals that went about half way across. And you know I. Thought I'd get into trying to play the foot pedals and at the same time play the guitar and sing. And it worked. You know and so it sounded like we had some bottoms. When we were playing and it was really nice because the mother saying the drummer saying and so three singers and all of these. Happening. But then after we got used to having this bottom.

The organ. Broke down it was just a little too old and beat up. And so we put it in the shop to try to get it repaired. But I guess it was you know just over the heel and you couldn't find parts for it but now. We have got used to having this bottom in a sound. MP going back to just guitar so I got the idea to go down to this music store. It's called Music Unlimited. And. I rented a bass all Saint George Bass what a bass when I was pretty. And. I said well I'll just rent this temporarily. Until the organ could be repaired and then I'll go back a guitar that was my first love. And. But. You know months pass. Months pass months pass and. Next thing you know I was like stuck on the bass. You know it was like I want to get back to my guitar. But I had to keep on with the bass. So

we would sound full. But the interesting thing about it. Is that when I played the guitar. Didn't use a pick very often at all to put my finger so when I went to bass I would play with my fingers and I would use a pick. And then most bass players at the time was playing like the overhand style. You know like this. But. Because I was going to be a bass player I was really interested. In learning the correct and proper way to play because remember I'm going back to my guitar. And. That. Mark up. It's over now and then right. Play what you. Like. Well naturally born from upright bass standing up playing with fingers like this. And then going to electric bass. It was natural for

bass players to go to the overhand sound now you base your hand with the ring and all the debate you know I'm going to delay. Delay when I'm playing it's going to. Be. Dead. What is the difference between style and. That other place place. Like. OK first of all when I went to Bass be traditional with hands with upright bass players would play like this. Right. And then when you went to electric bass and just. Naturally had the same kind of technique and which was more like. It was nothing like that like that. But now.

I was already playing with my fingers because that's where played guitar but after a while my mother and I started working along without a drummer and so I started pumping his brain and plucking the strings make up without having the bass drum. I would and I did have a snare drum so I would pluck and so I got a solid. Like that done. You do sort of kind of maybe like a cow like you had a drummer but you didn't really have lazy. And again it was kind of an unusual way of playing but remember I wasn't going to be a bass player. This was just to hold down the game and soon I get back to my guitar. So even though I would get a little criticism from

maybe a question of musicians playing this strange kind of way it didn't bother me because I wasn't planning on going to baseball but it worked out in the long run. I very much like jazz. Is that because. In night clubs and lounges you would get requests for all kinds of songs ballads and blues you know a live reading. If it did not have the Beatles. You know like that would be like a calico blues thing. But then you could get. Rock n roll songs or whatever didn't matter I would still use the same technique. It would still work in either case. But then now. Later on. The style got popular but does. A Should I go into that. We want to hear how it's shifted into. This line of Family Stone thing.

See what happen is ok and. OK. Now. OK. So to. Get a little bit into how that style got popular or. Not realize I'm just trying to hold down my job and as far as I'm thinking this is sufficient we're playing club the lounges and I'm really not thinking in terms of records and all the recipes. But there was this lady that used to come down and she was one of the regulars in this clip we played it was a place to relax with the lawn in the corner. Peyton Ashbury in San Francisco and she used to come out come out and hear us play. And she used to also listen to Sly Stone on the radio because he was a disc jockey on here so well. And she was a big fan of his. Well she found out that he was going to be starting his own band. And she took it upon herself I didn't even know this she took it upon herself to start to

call him in and heard him say he got to come out and hear his bass player. He used to get good command of his bass player you know. And so because of her persistence Eventually he became down. And he like what he heard because originally he when he plays bass. You know. When you heard what I was doing and you like that. Yes me to join his band. And it was through. That group that now you add that bump and pluck in. With. Drums. You know it's. Just you know to get there just you know like that. So that that they're just going to have a will. And that's I'm a coming up party but then later on we got into a song that featured my

thumbprint in plucking songs live. Thank you. You know. And then the first time I was really able to. Really get. My base featured pumping featured in and I really never thought it was going to be like. My pump unplugged would be all records and people imitating this. But we had a hit record called dance to music you met. Yeah. You know it's not like this. And I don't want you to go and I asked some of them so that the king just won't hide my purse on came out of the little box you step on is a distortion box you know and you step on the golf cart or come home. But. I don't have it here but it's kind of like that.

And then later we got into a song that featured my company in plucking and it was really a song it was kind of thanking the people for the that we had had by the end and it was a song called Thank You For let me be myself. They got a chance to. Play here. Thank you. And then that's not going to plug up popular because now you had all kind of groups. That were hopping in a Family Stone. As a group in our records because they would hit records. So to play that song it would be kind of difficult to play it over Hand So You had to kind of like check out what

grammars do it and copy the record you had to copy my style so my playing got popular. Through. Those records and it all started by just kind of like an accident.