See Hear Podcast

Most working people have that day gig – accountant, engineer, admin, hospitality. The job pays the bills and puts food on the table. We don’t tend to think of being a musician as a day job category. Welcome to episode 110 of See Hear Podcast. Through the 20th century, there was always some group of musicians who had that “day job” status – playing for corporate functions, teaching people to instrumental skills, and being the faceless people providing the grooves and melodies behind your favourite records. Remember the shock you felt realising that the Beach Boys weren’t playing their own instruments on Pet Sounds? Or The Monkees? The collective of Los Angeles session musicians who became known as The Wrecking Crew (via drummer Hal Blaine’s autobiography) provided the music for tons of songs that music fans consider pop pantheon. There were other collectives of course – Motown had the Funk Brothers, Stax had Booker T and the MGs, and there were the collectives in Muscle Shoals and Nashville. Film maker Denn