Matt Rubano

Bass Player Magazine Interview

 

By Greg Olwell | December 2004

No Longer Taking Orders

'I'm a big, dorky bass player for life." You might not expect to hear those words from the member of a popular emo-rock band, but that's how Taking Back Sunday's Matt Rubano describes his passion for playing. He adds, "I like being where I am and having that be my domain." Whether he's doubling a guitar line or playing double-stops on the band's latest Victory CD Where You Want to Be, Matt's lines show off his ability to listen and adapt his playing for each song's needs.

Before joining Taking Back Sunday in the summer of '03 as a replacement for Shaun Cooper-who played on the band's debut, Tell All Your Friends-Rubano honed his listening and playing chops by studying at Berklee College of Music and the Bass Collective. Driven by a desire to get out and play, he left school and spent a few years as a New York session bassist, including playing on Lauryn Hill's The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill [Ruffhouse]. "I had great teachers, like Lincoln Goines, but I wanted to try working right away. You can go to a school's practice recording sessions a hundred times, but it never compares to going to a real session-having someone drop a chart in front of you and count it off in under a minute! Or going to a session and getting two chords and being told to 'Make a watery bass line.' Learning to work with artists and producers is way different from a classroom."

So what is the biggest change from studio work to creatively contributing as a member of one of the most popular independent rock groups? "Our songwriting process is democratic almost to a fault. It can be like five chefs trying to bake one cupcake, but it's where our sound comes from. A lot of what we're really pleased with on this record is the result of our equal contributions."

With Matt's addition to the band, Rubano and drummer Mark O'Connell seized the chance to change the band's rhythm section. "Mark and I wanted to try some more challenging things than the typical pop-punk rhythm section stuff." The key was looking outside of pop-punk for ideas and fitting them into the band's sound. "It's not literal copying-I tried to take feels from other styles, mash them into what we're doing, and make them rock a little harder. Doing that made me feel like my past experiences were more relevant to what we were doing, instead of just chopping through it. I drew most of my influence from James Jamerson, Paul McCartney, and the guys who played bass for Michael Jackson."

“If you’re not married to the drumset in one way or another, you’re just in the way”

As he found out during last summer's Warped Tour, there weren't many other players on the tour who'd decided to forgo a pick and play fingerstyle. "I was the odd man out by playing with my fingers, but it's how I learned and where I'm most accurate. I like to run and jump around a lot with Taking Back Sunday, and I can't do that with a pick. I have a lot more control using my fingers."

With Taking Back Sunday, Matt plays two Fender Marcus Miller Signature 5-strings and an Alleva-Coppolo Beyond Vintage KBP4. He also uses a '97 MTD 6-string as his main studio bass on R& gigs. He strings his basses with DR strings. For Taking Back Sunday's big rock sound, Matt prefers newer, brighter strings. He amplifies with an Aguilar DB 750 head and a GS 412 4x12 cabinet on each side of the drum riser. He uses a DigiTech Bass Driver distortion/overdrive and a Moogerfooger Lowpass Filter for a "kick-drum-like" bottom end.

As a studied player, Matt has clear-cut feelings about what's needed to be a good musician. "You need to have the basics. If you have crappy time, or if you don't have good tone, you're useless." What can you do to improve your time? "Play with every drummer who will have you! If you're not married to the drumset in one way or another, you're just in the way. You also have to get comfortable with a metronome. Feel and time are like cousins-they're related, but they're not necessarily the same thing. I think of a metronome as a frame of reference. You can play along with it forever, but it won't matter in real musical situations, because a lot of great drummers push and pull the beat."

Ultimately, it's the bassist's flexible role in the band that fuels Matt's love of playing. "The cool thing about being the bass player is that you have to be in the right frame of mind for the situation. You either have to take someone else's lead or come up with something unorthodox and different from what anyone would ask you to play, but everyone likes it when you play it.