From a WAKY Believe It or Not Weekend

[Travis]

Has anyone heard the story of the bass guitar solo in Marty Robbins' 1961 hit "Don't Worry?"

Believe it or not, I first heard the story on a WAKY "Believe It or Not Weekend" back in the early '70s.

WAKY's Believe It or Not Weekends were one of those specials that would rotate with other weekend specials (such as the "Name It and Claim It" and "Giant Aquarius Weekends"). About once or twice an hour, during a WAKY Believe It or Not Weekend, a feature would run telling of an unusual event that had occurred during the making of a hit song followed with the playing of the actual song. I seem to recall Johnny Randolph as being the voice heard on those features, but other WAKY jocks may have participated and WAKY news personnel may have recorded them as well.

In the case of Marty Robbins' "Don't Worry:" During the 1961 recording session, a vacuum tube (remember those?) in the studio console went bad giving the bass guitar solo a fuzzy weird sound as it recorded. Upon playback, it was obvious that the tube needed to be replaced and another take of the song needed to be done. But after listening to it a couple of times Marty and his producer decided that they liked the effect... AND LEFT IT IN!

Marty's band later found a way to emulate that sound so that the bass guitar would sound pretty much the same whenever they performed the song on TV or in concert. Check out the following "YouTube" video link and watch Marty have a little fun with his bass guitarist during a live performance of "Don't Worry." Depending on when and what time you access the link, the video may or may not be available. Marty performs the song a bit slower in the video than in the original recording, but you should still check out the original version to hear how the bass actually sounded when the vacuum tube went bad.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XtbEipkP_o&feature=related

Believe it or not, I first heard about this on a WAKY "Believe It or Not Weekend" during the early '70s. The promos leading up to those weekends generally had a stinger at the end with the Weird Beard saying, "Weekends are better on WAKY."

Indeed, they were.

[bruiser]

The man who played the solo on "Don't Worry", was one of the Nashville Cats, the legendary Grady Martin. Grady was actually playing a six string bass. There's no telling how many recordings Grady can be heard on. He usually played lead guitar, and was on a lot of Marty's songs, including "El Paso", "Devil Woman", and "Ribbon Of Darkness". You can also hear him on Johnny Horton's "Honky Tonk Man" and "One Woman Man". Bill Black played bass on "Honky Tonk Man".

[Travis]

Grady Martin's contributions, as a session musician alone, are nearly too numerous to count and many believe he never got the recognition he deserved. It should be noted that the man emulating the distorted bass solo in the YouTube video is NOT Grady Martin.

[bruiser]

Odd that Marty's band was using the steel guitar for the solo. Fuzz steel. You don't hear that everyday.

[Travis]

That may have been necessary in order to recreate the malfunctioning vacuum tube effect; otherwise, they would have been forced to carry a bad tube with them wherever they played and would have to plug the thing into an amplifier before doing that particular song.

And believe it or not, I don't believe what I just wrote. I doubt if that was the reason for using a "fuzz steel peddle guitar."

At least I don't think it was.