The definition of the word ‘progressive rock’ isn’t always what people might expect it to be. Whereas most people think of that genre and imagine Rick Wakeman in his cape and wizard outfit playing the most extravagant music ever made, stretching songs out to unprecedented lengths doesn’t always make someone a legend in the world of prog. It takes studio ingenuity and an ear for new sounds to keep music progressing forward, and after Peter Gabriel left Genesis, he figured that he would bring his brand of weirdness into the pop realm.
Compared to where Genesis would be going when they hit the pop charts, some of Gabriel’s best moments made him look like an art rocker who happened to play pop music. ‘Games Without Frontiers’ or ‘Solsbury Hill’ may have had good enough hooks to get him on the pop charts, but he was more interested in seeing where his muse would take him than following the money machine.
But when working with Daniel Lanois, he began inching closer to the pop charts. As much as Gabriel was reluctant to be a pop star, it was impossible to avoid songs like ‘In Your Eyes’ or ‘Don’t Give Up’ on the radio, each track having a better hook than the last like on album cuts like ‘Mercy Street’. Out of every song on the record, ‘Big Time’ was a much different animal.
There was already a certain hypnotic groove to how the drums worked off the rest of the band, but that groove needed a more percussive attack than usual. And since Lanois wasn’t a fan of using computers to replace human instruments, Tony Levin had a better idea by asking drummer Jerry Moratta to play “bass” with him by tapping the drumsticks on the strings as he fretted every note.
It’s easy to hear the drumstick roll when listened to in isolation, but this new idea got the wheels turning in Levin’s head. He had been a virtuoso bassist working with King Crimson and John Lennon in the past, but how the hell could he be expected to play at the same speed with that much of a percussive attack whenever he played ‘Big Time’? He needed something different, and so the Funk Fingers were born.
Levin coined the term for using elongated sticks over his fingers as he played, saying, “They are chopped-off drumsticks. The invention came about after, on Peter Gabriel’s So album, I had the drummer play on the bass strings while I fingered the fretboard notes. To play the ‘Big Time’ part live, I needed the drumsticks on my fingers, hence ‘Funk Fingers.’ I’ve played with them a number of times since on records.”
Considering how much time had to be put into learning the bass differently, Levin took to it like a fish in water. After all, the bassist and the drummer should always be the musical siblings of the band when they start a groove, so being able to play with the right syncopation was a case of Levin transferring his knowledge of groove to other parts of his body.
And when listening to Levin’s playing afterwards, it’s easy to hear a different percussive attack than how many bassists approach the instrument. There might be a debate to this day about whether bassist should play with their fingers or with a pick, but there is no better way of looking like you’re from another planet than operating a bass with this kind of musical setup.
