Melvin Gibbs, seen at right in the photo above, is the bassist for the avant-rock/jazz/metal/dub trio Harriet Tubman, whose new album The Terror End of Beauty is out now and sweeping up rave reviews everywhere. Before forming Tubman with guitarist Brandon Ross and drummer JT Lewis in 1998, Gibbs was a founding member of Defunkt and of Ronald Shannon Jackson’s Decoding Society (alongside future Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid); he played in Sonny Sharrock‘s band; he appeared on John Zorn‘s Spillane and The Big Gundown; he was a member of Arto Lindsay‘s band Ambitious Lovers; and from 1994 to 1998, he was the bassist for the Rollins Band.
In this episode of the Burning Ambulance podcast, Gibbs talks about his time with Jackson, with Rollins, and with Harriet Tubman; about whether his music is jazz, and how one even defines such a thing; and much, much more. There are two versions of this episode: a free one, which is below, and a much longer version, which is exclusively available to Patreon subscribers. To hear the full, 90-minute conversation, visit patreon.com/burningambulance and become a subscriber for just $5 a month. Future episodes of the podcast will be similarly expanded, and additional subscriber-only stories will also show up from time to time.
