Born in North York, Ontario, Canada in 1953, Geddy Lee was a teenager in the late 60s and he was lucky enough to have seen many incredible Rock and Roll bands playing live.
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Those experiences were extremely important for him and were crucial to inspire him to become a musician. As you know, he ended up becoming the bassist, keyboardist and vocalist of the legendary Progressive Rock band Rush.
Over the decades he talked about many artists who influenced him and once mentioned four bassists who he said are his heroes.
The 4 bassists that Geddy Lee said are his heroes
Jack Casady
It was in an interview with UDiscover Music in 2019 that he mentioned those artists and the first one is Jack Casady. The musician is best known as a member of Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna, band he formed after the famous group came to an end.
Geddy loves Jefferson Airplane’s early albums and he told Music Radar in 2022 that he thinks Casady is very underrated. “I always found Jack Casady from Jefferson Airplane to be very underrated. He played odd basses. like this Guild that was really modified. He was really into that mod stuff.”
“Listen to his playing from the early days or the live album ‘Bless Its Pointed Little Head’. You’ll hear something really twangy and aggressive for what essentially was a trippy Californian band. He had this heavy tone that pushed the band along. Jefferson Airplane went through a million configurations in their history. but Jack made those early versions of this band stand out for me.”
Geddy Lee continued:
“I really gravitated towards his sound on the song called ‘The Other Side Of This Life’. There’s a live version of it that we used to cover way, way back in Rush when we were starting out. During the intro, he plays this angry circular pattern. If you listen to that, you’ll hear how there’s a nod to Jeff in my sound,” Geddy Lee said.
Besides the song mentioned, Geddy also previously mentioned the track “3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds” as one of his favorites.
Besides being part of all the albums released by Jefferson Airplane, Casady also recorded two albums with the band’s spin-off version Jefferson Starship.
John Paul Jones
The second one mentioned by Geddy was the Led Zeppelin bassist and keyboardist John Paul Jones. The Rush member had the chance to interview the British musician for his book “Big Beautiful Book of Bass” a few years ago.
Jones and Led Zeppelin were a huge influence to Rush and after the release of their debut album, they even used to be called the Canadian Led Zeppelin. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine back in 2020, Geddy praised Jones.
“Zeppelin were a huge influence on my band. Our original drummer, John Rutsey – he happened to be at the very first gig in Toronto, at a place called the Rock Pile. He came home raving about that band. So the day that first album dropped, we were lined up the store to get it. I remember running home to my house and putting it on. The three of us just sat around my record in the room, listening to the first Zeppelin record. (We were) just blown away by the tone of the band, first of all. They were really, for us, the first heavy band.”
“We could hear all those blues riffs and all the sound that they had. Also how they sort of had grown out of the blues-rock movement of England. Yet they brought, through Jimmy Page‘s guitar, all these more ethereal moments,” Geddy Lee said.
Rush’s frontman was lucky enough to have seen Led Zeppelin playing live in Canada back in the late 60s. He said that it was a life changing experience and that they were so good that it seemed like Jimmy Page was floating on stage.
Jack Bruce
The late Cream bassist and singer Jack Bruce was also mentioned by Geddy as one of his heroes. The Canadian musician praised Bruce multiple times over the decades and also chose him as his Rock God in an interview with BBC in 2019 (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).
He also had the chance to see them playing live in Canada but none of his friends wanted to go. So he ended up going alone to the show.
“I was a very young, aspiring musician in Toronto, Canada. Jack Bruce’s bass parts that slipped behind Eric Clapton’s soloing always really grabbed my ear. I remember in 1969, seeing an advertisement for Cream coming to Toronto at the prestigious Massey Hall, which was our Opera house.”
“I went to Massey Hall, bought my single ticket and came back for that show. It was one of the strangest and greatest experiences of my life. Because I got a balcony seat. So I was overlooking the stage and I was so close to them. I remember being so enamored with them and watching Jack Bruce. So it was one of the greatest, most memorable shows I’ve ever seen. Then I went of course, to follow Jack Bruce’s solo career (after that),” Geddy Lee said.
Some of Geddy’s favorite Cream songs are “White Room” and their versions for “Spoonful” and “Crossroads”.
Rush recorded “Crossroads” on their 2004 covers album “Feedback”. Although Cream’s version is extremely well known, the song was composed and first recorded in 1936 by Robert Johnson.
Chris Squire
The final bass player that Geddy Lee mentioned as one of his heroes was the late legendary Yes member Chris Squire. He also thinks that Squire was the greatest Progressive Rock bassist of all time as he told Udiscover Music (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).
“Judging bass players is really about the context of that bass player. (…) If I was to pick the greatest Progressive Rock bassist of all time it would have to be Chris Squire without a question.”
“I think it’s all about context. It’s very hard to pick one guy out and say he does that the best. If you look at Flea’s playing, for his style of music, I mean, it’s fantastic, he’s an amazing player. I’ve got great respect for his bass playing. But how can you compare that to what Chris Squire did. Because it’s a total different genre,” Geddy Lee said.
Geddy had the chance to pay tribute to the late musician during Yes’ induction into the Rock and Roll of Fame in 2017. He inducted the band alongside his bandmate Alex Lifeson. But Geddy not only inducted them, he also played the bass during their performance.
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