You may have seen the 2014 documentary Jaco, produced by Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo. It’s an astonishing tale, which follows Jaco Pastorius from his early life through to stardom with Weather Report and as a solo artist, before his struggle with bipolar disorder and his tragically early death in 1987 at the hands of a nightclub bouncer.
Along the way, the most commonly-seen bass guitar is the famous 1962 Fender Jazz Bass, which Jaco defretted and used to devastating effect on many seminal recordings. Stolen from him in 1982, the bass vanished from the public eye until 2006 or thereabouts, when it resurfaced in a New York music store.
Asked for a huge sum to repurchase it, the Pastorius family were aided greatly by Trujillo, who purchased it on their behalf. Although he’s the technical owner of the bass. his stated intention was for the ‘Bass Of Doom’ to reside with Jaco’s family, where it remains to this day.
Jaco Pastorius: The Greatest Bass Solo of All Time? (Live in Germany 1978) – YouTube
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Felix Pastorius is an extraordinary bass player himself, as you might expect, given the legacy of his late father. “This bass was like a lost relative,” he told Bass Player. “It was something I had been around all my life in terms of listening to and hearing stories about it, but I had never met this ‘thing’ you know?”
In August 2020, we asked Felix about the resurrection of the Bass Of Doom.
Tell us the story of how your family reconnected with the Bass Of Doom.
“It was during the process of litigation. My brother and I were in New York – this was before I moved up there – and we were given the opportunity to see the bass in person. The person that had it wanted verification from the family, and the luthier who refurbished the bass. They wanted us to put the stamp of approval on it so they could get a bit more bang out of it.”
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This must have been incredibly emotional for you.
“It was a very tumultuous experience. Here we were, with the opportunity to finally see this instrument, with me as a bassist, and the rest of my family all musicians. We were able to touch it, plug it in, and experience this instrument for the first time in 30-plus years. At the same time, it wasn’t ours – at this point it was in someone else’s possession.”
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Were you aware of its history between it being stolen from Jaco and turning up at a store in New York?
“That whole process, from my father to these guys who had it… Who knows? There’s no real log of what happened. There are stories that have been told, and there are people who were around, but there’s no definitive receipt of sale.
“So my brother and I show up to see the bass, and the owner is there. The guy who brought the bass in the first time didn’t believe it was ‘The Bass’ when he saw it, so they sent him away or that’s what they tell us.
“Then the guy comes back, and then they get a little more curious about it, because now he’s mentioning a few things that make a little more sense – naming some people who are locals, who have been in New York for a while. They ended up purchasing the bass.
“The guy who owns the store, his brother is a bassist, and he apparently started bodyguarding it. It was in his apartment and he wouldn’t let it go anywhere. So we walk into this music store, and the owner is there and he’s making sure that we didn’t turn up with a lawyer – or some kind of backup!”
What happened next?
“He makes a phone call and Chris Jisi from Bass Player magazine turns up, he makes another call and the store owner’s brother turns up with a gigbag. I know it’s in the bag, and it’s 100 feet away from me, and then it’s 50 feet, then 10, then five… And then it’s right next to me.
“The guy pulls the bass out, looks around and tells me I have five minutes, which was a completely weird situation – like finding a lost relative, but only having five minutes with them. I played it and I was shaking. I didn’t know what to play on it, I was so dumbfounded.
“The five minutes passed and that was it – the owner’s brother took the bass away again, and we continued to talk to the owner.”
So when did it come back to the family?
“I didn’t see it again for a few months, because we were going through litigation – and then Robert Trujillo came in and saved the day. We went to the office of the lawyers who were representing the music store, and they had the bass there. We signed a few things, I took the bass and we went to our own lawyer’s office and had a little party. I plugged it in and played a bunch of stuff.”
How did it feel?
“It felt amazing. I was awe-struck by the energy that surrounded this instrument, and the way it still sang – notes were pouring out of it. Any early-’60s Jazz already has its own character, and even though this one had been refurbished, it still had stories, like an old sailor. It was a great party, and it felt awesome.”
Robert Trujillo plays Metallica…with Jaco’s fretless bass? (2011) – YouTube
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“From then it’s gone back and forth between him and me. Robert played it at a Metallica show in Yankee Stadium in September 2011, which was amazing. I used it to record a Yellowjackets album called A Rise In The Road.”
That’s great to hear.
“From day one, Robert has always said, ‘This is your bass as much as it is mine.’ He believes in it the same way I believe in it. The only reason this bass has any value, aside from it being a Fender Jazz, is because of one person. If it wasn’t still being shared by that person’s family, it would be sacrilegious.
“It was a really unusual experience, even more so from the perspective of being a bassist. I think of everything we went through as a family, working towards making sure our father’s estate is protected, which was not an easy thing, because there was a lot of turmoil in the family. To go through all that stuff and find ‘The Bass’ was the icing on the cake.”
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