Bass guitar legend Herbie Flowers dies aged 86
nme.comElton John, Lou Reed, David Bowie, Cat Stevens, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Bryan Ferry, among others.His start as a musician came in 1956 when, aged 18, he was conscripted into the Royal Air Force.
There, he played the tuba as a bandsman, before eventually taking up double bass shortly followed by electric bass.Speaking to Guitar World last year, Flowers shared how his early experiences playing tuba eventually influenced his playing on Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’. “I was a tuba and double bass player, and I wanted the strings to feel like a double bass,” he said. “But there was no intention to be clever.
We really didn’t know what we were doing!”Once his military service was complete, he spent a brief period as a bandsman on the ocean liner Queen Elizabeth.Eventually, he began working as a session musician, lending his talents to producers such as Shel Talmy, Mickie Most, Steve Rowland, Richard Perry, Gus Dudgeon and Tony Visconti.In 1969, Flowers became a founding member of the group Blue Mink.
Their biggest hit was ‘Melting Pot’, which reached Number 3 in the UK Singles Chart that year. Alongside Blue Mink, he was also a member of T.
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