Say Yes, Then Figure It Out: Nicole Row on How to Become a Touring Bassist (Episode 54)

Everything you do is an audition.

Nicole Row left Fresno right after high school graduation, moved to LA with her dog, and jumped head first into the bass program at Musicians Institute. Her friends thought she was crazy. About ten years later, she was sitting down with Nomad in Episode 54 of The Career Musician as the bassist for Panic! at the Disco, after playing upright, electric and synth bass for Miley Cyrus.

Recorded on a Friday night in quarantine, cold beer in hand, this one is candid, funny and full of real advice on how to become a touring bassist. Here is what stood out.

Just go

Nicole didn't know anyone else doing music. She had not been playing bass very long. Her brother, a drummer, found MI first, and she applied the moment she could. Her first apartment, near Cherokee and Hollywood Boulevard, came with flooding, cockroaches, a gas leak and a downstairs neighbor writing plays about her. It made her a little tougher.

Nomad calls that mileage: you learn by experience. His message to anyone stuck in a town that isn't a music city: if you have the passion, just do it. Nicole is proof.

Get up there, and say yes

At her first jam sessions, Nicole wanted to sit back, watch the heavy players, then go home and practice. A bassist friend wasn't having it: that's not how this works, get up there, the gigs will come. She has stuck with that ever since, and things started to blossom.

After MI, she got called for a Vegas cover gig, late nights and chaos. The drummer asked if she could also sing lead. She had never sung lead while playing bass. She said yes, then learned it in her bedroom. The first gig was terrifying. She struggled, got through it, and eventually it got easy.

Nomad loved that. Musicians have to learn to say yes and then figure it out. He also pointed out what two years of playing the current pop hits every night really teaches you: how a pop song is written, crafted and produced, even if you don't notice it sinking in.

The same thing happened with Miley. Upright bass was not in her world yet. She didn't own one. She said yes, worked on it, and now she's obsessed with it. Her first upright cost about three thousand dollars, which is what she could afford. Luck = preparation + opportunity.

The leap, and the van

Vegas taught her a lot, but it wasn't what she wanted, and being there all the time meant she couldn't build work in LA. The day before she quit, she got a call for an audition. She quit, drove home that night, auditioned the next morning, and landed her first tour.

That meant van life: hours of driving, rooming with bandmates, truck stops. Then Warped Tour, which is fun for a second if you went as a kid. Then you are hauling gear through mud in crazy heat, waiting in line for nasty showers or rinsing off with a solar shower bag hung between buses. Her number one tour essential, from all of it: minimalism.

Your reputation makes the call for you

Nicole's first real endorsement was Fender, and that is how Panic! found her. Her Fender rep was at lunch with someone from the Panic! team who mentioned they needed a bass player. He recommended her. Work begets work.

The invite was to come hang at Brendon's house and meet the band. She asked the road manager if she should bring her bass in. Leave it in the car, he said, just chill. About five hours later, as the sun was going down, they finally went into the studio and jammed through some tunes. It didn't feel like an audition at all, but of course it was.

"We're all just people... we're all literally the same, we're human, we do different things."

Nicole Row, 45:24

Nomad's point: if you had landed in LA eight days earlier, meeting a superstar about joining their band might mess with your head. Eight years in town had conditioned her. Zoom out, see everyone in the room as a human being working toward the same goal, and take a chill pill.

A hired gun is still at work

Nicole described the mindset of a hired gun better than most.

"Imagine being at work, but your work friends are really cool and open. You can party together, but you're still at work."

Nicole Row, 36:01

No matter how much fun you are having, you still have to show up and nail your job. Same in the studio. She calls herself a portal for what the artist and producer hear: be creative, but channel it into what they want.

"You're never the boss when you go into that thing. Just 'cause you play the instrument... you can be sent home and someone else can be brought in just like that."

Nicole Row, 1:01:37

Her session for Frozen 2 at Capitol was planned to the minute. Security knew her car, the road manager carried her bass in, the band sang background vocals around a mic, she tracked her part, and she was out in under an hour. Manners and preparedness, every time. That is Low maintenance / no drama.

Get help with the business side

After Panic!, the inquiries piled up and Nicole didn't want to negotiate everything herself. She talked to a lot of people before finding a manager who really knew the music business, recommended through a friend who wasn't even in music. Two weeks in, the range of work coming in had already changed. Her advice: reach out to your friends, even outside music. People know people. Make Music Your Business.

On the road, she keeps herself healthy with daily workouts with the horn section, solo early mornings looking for coffee and breakfast in some city where she doesn't speak the language, and practice time to keep her head right.

The takeaway

Go before you feel ready. Say yes, then do the work. Stay human in rooms full of famous people, and treat every hang like the audition it might be. Nicole's last word for young players whose parents don't support them: life is short, so live out your passion. Follow her at nicolerow.com, and if your own audition is coming up, start with the free Audition Secrets guide.

Get the gig. Keep the gig. Build the career.

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