I'm not sure how others are, but I am grasping at straws here even trying to find cover songs.
I'm running into the opposite problem - trying to figure out which last four songs to pick. Here goes:
As a bass player I'd say my biggest influence on the electric side (definitely Ron Carter and Paul Chambers on the upright side) is probably Pino Palladino. I struggle to think of anyone who has been a first call session musician for such vastly different styles from his iconic 80's fretless work with Paul Young, Gary Numan, Don Henley, Peter Gabriel, Phil Collins etc to work with early 90's pop on albums with Eric Clapton, Melissa Ethridge, Elton John and many others he was a complete chameleon. In the last few years he's played in John Mayer's Trio, The Who (filling in for the late great John Entwistle) and Nine Inch Nails in addition to his jazz fusion project PSP with heavyweights Philippe Saisse and Simon Phillips.
But it was his turn to ne0-soul with D'Angelo was what blew my mind and had me relearning how to play my instrument. Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Common, Anthony Hamilton, Leela James etc. all had Pino playing bass on their tracks. But it all started with D'Angelo's second album, the amazing "Voodoo". The whole album is fantastic with ?uestlove and Pino setting a deep and laid back pocket for D'Angelo to combine soul, funk, hip-hop, gospel, even jazz into an eclectic mix. You can feel the influence of Parliament/Funkadelic, Prince, Marvin Gaye, Sly Stone, even Miles Davis but with a much more hip-hop like production and embeded with time shifting beats and fits and starts courtesy of the genius of J Dilla. It's a touchstone album for neo-soul but it's also much more than that. Every track is great but only one of them is a cover.
"Feel Like Makin' Love"
from the 2000 D'Angelo album "Voodoo"
and the original
"Feel Like Makin' Love"
from the 1974 Robert Flack album of the same name
