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I think JPJ never gets the credit he deserves its always about jimmy page,JPJ held that band together did what was required of him to get the overall sound they needed,IMO he is very underrated ,great bass player,great name.

Tone is in the ear of the beholder.

Hafta say that JPJ is way underrated. One of those few bassists thet "never played a wrong note".

Fantastic sense of melody also.

Definitely does not get credit for his major contribution to the Zep Sound.

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JPJ didn't get a lot of attention because he didn't have great attack ... Squire, Geddy, Wetton, Entwistle all have great attack ... Even McCartney has good attack ...

Bass players that aggressively attack their strings get noticed ...

JPJ was too smooth for my taste ... I used to play that way ... smooth and no mistakes ... but now I go for tone, attack, and a few extra notes here and there ...

Mistakes are cool, Heh heh henh hmm heh.

I loved JPJ's tone on "Heartbreaker". The first time I heard that sound, I was blown away. Another bass player I loved that got litle attention was Dee Murray who played on Elton John's albums in the 70's. His playing on Elton's stuff was wonderful. Listen to "Funeral for A Friend/Love Lies Bleeding" off Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. The bass line makes the song IMHO.

Dee Murray was very melodic and had a nice tone.

My point wasn't that multi-instrumentalism is what's important. I was saying that I always hear people going, "It's SO AMAZING how many different instruments John Paul Jones played! He's so talented!" as if it was something absolutely unique that no one else could possibly do.

In my opinion, there are some really awesome Led Zeppelin basslines, and there are some incredibly boring ones. The boring ones are appropriate and necessary parts, but they're just, well, boring. Like on "Communication Breakdown"; he's just mirroring the guitar for 90% of the song. Really uninteresting bass part. Then again, "The Song Remains The Same" is one of the best basslines EVER, I think.

What else could he have done in Communication Breakdown? It's a guitar riff tune. And he does do some interesting stuff on the 4 and 5 parts. I have always thought he was anything but boring.

I think that Communication Breakdown is a perfect example of a bassist knowing when NOT to play. What gives that song it's punch is the fact that he is doubling the guitar part. He's grooving on the choruses though...

JPJ is plenty amazing IMHO.

Communications Breakdown has some pretty challenging riffs in the bass part. Subdued tone, perhaps. But there's a lot going on down there in that tune.

Song Remains the Same is a pretty special song IMO from a compositional standpoint. It's really not that complex harmonically, but has some many contropuntal textures, of which the bass part contributes a great deal.

"Communications Breakdown has some pretty challenging riffs in the bass part."

Almost everything he played had some pretty challenging riffs in it, haha! That's the mark of a good bass player to me, he sounds deceptively simple at first but when you really listen to him you go wow! That guy has some chops.

BTW I'm not a huge Zep fan although I do like certain things by them, I just appreciate good bassplayers in any genre.

It's kinda hard to get the recognition when you have Robert Plant on lead vocals, Jimmy Page on guitar and John Bonham on drums!!
They were just a monster band full of great players. Someone had to ride in the back seat!

Yup, I agree.