Herbie Flowers, Lou Reed & David Bowie Bassist, Dies At 86
Herbie Flowers, the legendary bassist and session musician whose instantly recognisable bassline on Lou Reed’s Walk on the Wild Side is widely regarded one of the greatest in pop music history, has died.
Flowers, who also played bass for David Bowie, Marc Bolan, Paul McCartney, Bryan Ferry and Elton John, died aged 86, family members confirmed on Facebook.
Herbie Flowers was born in Isleworth, west London, in 1938 and began his career in the 1960s as a session musician, working with producers including Shel Talmy, Mickie Most and Tony Visconti.
He was a founding member in 1969 of the band Blue Mink, which had chart success with the songs Melting Pot and The Banner Man.
Flowers was always in demand as a bass player and created one of the best known of all hooks for Walk on the Wild Side. It has a brilliant, instantly recognisable ascending and descending twang, but Flowers was modest about it.
“People have often suggested that I should have got writer’s credits, but I just helped put an arrangement together,” he said in an interview with Guitar World. “Lou had the chords written out on a piece of paper and my job was to come up with the bass line.”
Flowers is said to have recorded more than 20,000 sessions, including for Dusty Springfield, George Harrison, Serge Gainsbourg and David Essex.
Another claim to fame was that he co-wrote the hit 1970 novelty song Grandad after, it is said, he met Clive Dunn at a party and the actor – a household name thanks to the much-lauded British sitcom Dad’s Army – challenged him to write a song for him.
Flowers was a member of the final line-up of T Rex shortly before Marc Bolan’s death, featuring on the band’s final album, 1977’s Dandy in the Underworld, and Bolan’s Marc TV show.
In the late 1970s, Flowers founded the instrumental prog rock band, Sky, recording and performing with the band until 1995, releasing seven albums. Other records featuring Flowers include Bryan Ferry’s The Bride Stripped Bare, Paul McCartney’s Give My Regards to Broad Street, and Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of the War of the Worlds.
Tributes to the late musician have already begun to pour in. Tim Burgess, the lead singer of the Charlatans, said on X: “Farewell Herbie Flowers, he made the greats sound greater.”
The estate of David Bowie paid tribute, saying Flowers’ work over the years was too long to list. “Aside from his incredible musicianship over many decades, he was a beautiful soul and a very funny man. He will be sorely missed. Our thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Mat Osman, Suede’s bassist, posted on X: “Ah, damn. RIP Herbie Flowers. So many great basslines – imagine having played on Space Oddity, Walk on the Wild Side and Rock On.”