Suzi Quatro Bass Quotations

I got my first real bass guitar in my hands when I was 14 - a 1957 Fender Precision, which is still hanging on the wall in my front room. I loved the heaviness of it and the feel of the wood. I still do.

A bass should sound like a bass with the thump of the finger against the wood, like it began with stand up.

The bass player's function, along with the drums, is to be the engine that drives the car... everything else is merely colours.

Guitar is for the head, drums are for the chest, but bass gets you in the groin

The bass should be the note of the bass drum, and then you've got the engine of the band that everything else builds on. Everything else, the guitar, the keyboards, is a colour.

I joined an all-girl band in Detroit and, although I was a pianist and drummer, I was asked to play bass because no one else wanted to. When I strapped it on, it fit me as good as my leathers. At the first gig we played, I looked out at the audience and thought, 'This is what I'm going to be doing for the rest of my life.'

I like a 5 string bass - it gives you some interesting options. I played one a few times on stage. There was no problem... I was real natural.

The golden rule for playing the bass is that's it all about feel, not just plonking away. You need to feel the sound, not using a pick or a plectrum - which has meant plenty of calluses on my fingers.

As Mick Jagger will tell you, performing is an aerobic work-out. I've got the bass guitar, which is the heaviest of all the instruments, and I'm a little girl, in boiling-hot leather under the lights. You have to keep the fitness level up if you want to look good up there.

Music has always been in my family, but it was mainly keyboards. I learned to play classical piano, but when I first heard the amazing bass guitar of James Jamerson, who played on all the big Motown hits of the '60s and '70s, I knew bass guitar was my instrument.