Bassist Todd Ashburn takes slap/punk to the country
Article By: DD Thornton Kenny, Deaconlight
For the past 25 years, bassist Todd Ashburn has been a Nashville session and touring musician for many country artists. His roots as a bass player, however, are far from country. Ashburn honed his bass skills by playing slap-and-pop bass with his funk metal band, Candy Pig, in Charlotte during the 1990s.
Ashburn has built a successful career as an in-demand session and touring bassist, recording in virtually every studio on Music Row. He’s worked with a wide range of country artists, including Luke Bryan, who has been awarded five “Entertainer of the Year Titles,” Buddy Hyatt, the well-respected Nashville producer and songwriter who played keyboards with Toto, and Jimmy Wayne, who had chart-topper with “Do You Believe Me Now” and did a cover of the Hall & Oates hit “Sara Smile” with the duo singing Backup.
Additionally, living in Nashville has allowed Ashburn to perform live with rock and pop musicians and bands such as Toto, Taylor Dayne, and Danny Johnson of Steppenwolf. Johnson is also well known for his work with Alice Cooper, Alcatrazz, Rod Stewart, and Rick Derringer, who recruited Johnson at age 18 to join his band.
Of Ashburn, Johnson says, “Todd Ashburn has put it down live and on our recordings… rock, blues, country, and soul seem to be his sweet spots, along with, of course, funk and slap.”
The slap-and-pop bass technique, also known as slap pop, slap bass, bass slapping, and similar references, is a percussive style of bass-playing that evolved in the 1970s from funk bassists such as Louis Johnson and Larry Graham. Generally speaking, the electric bass player uses the thumb to hit the strings, then pulls the strings out with the fingers and lets the strings go to slap back on the fretboard. Bassist Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Les Claypool of Primus brought the sound to a much wider audience.
In this 16-second video, Ashburn demonstrates the technique:
Mastering the slap-and-pop technique elevated Todd’s passion for playing bass.
“In summer school, a close friend had the same love of bass as I did,” says Ashburn. He not only had Flea and Red Hot Chili Peppers underground tracks, but he also introduced me to the band Primus.” Primus bassist Les Claypool has been a master of bass slapping. Claypool is on deck for the 2026 Bass Magazine Lifetime Achievement Award.
Ashburn understands the significant contribution he has made in promoting bass slapping. He says, “Les Claypool was groundbreaking in the slap bass world and would become a friend of mine later when Candy Pig was touring. Robert Trujillo was also an inspiration of mine with his Infectious Grooves stuff. Candy Pig is an opening act for them. It’s nice to know that your bass heroes can also be incredibly cool and humble like Les and Robert.”
The one band that Ashburn spent the most time with was the one he founded called Candy Pig, which exhibited his mastery of slap-and-pop. They were a far cry from country music, as funk metal is loud and heavy on the slap bass. Candy Pig went beyond funk metal, blending in hardcore, hip-hop, heavy metal, and primal punk.
This Candy Pig song “Smile” leads off, highlighting Ashburn’s frantic yet controlled slap-and-pop.
Candy Pig was established enough in the music scene to have been chosen to contribute a song to a compilation album of Charlotte bands put together by the big local rock station, WEND. The result was the song “Slump Vibe,” which became an underground hit.
The song was recorded and mixed by Dave Harris, long-time owner of Studio B Mastering in Charlotte.
“I always had tremendous respect for Todd as a well-rounded musician, not just a bass player,” Harris says. “I always felt like Todd walked a really fine line of he’s a very technical player and very adept at, you know, playing his instrument. But he also, if you listen to those Candy Pig songs, he’s playing very technically, but those songs have anger and angst. Todd understands the emotional aspect.”
In 1997, Candy Pig released an EP on Clutchdog Records called “43.” Eventually, they caught the ear of Atlantic Records and recorded their album “Essence of the Groove,” but problems came up and Atlantic didn’t release the record. This led to the band going their separate ways.
Ashburn ended up in Nashville when he was invited to play with country star Jimmy Wayne, who had been a huge fan of Candy Pig when Wayne lived in the Charlotte area. Things didn’t pan out right away, but through networking, word got around that Ashburn is a master of all types of bass skills and has the talent to adapt to any style that’s needed from a session musician.
Ashburn now lives on a 125-acre bucolic property only a few minutes outside Nashville. His property has been the setting of two award-winning country music videos, including Thomas Rhett’s “Remember You Young” and Kane Brown’s “Worldwide Beautiful.” Each video has won the Academy of Country Music Award for Video of the Year. A film was also recorded there, and Ashburn is open to offering the property for other film projects.
Slap-and-pop is not something generally called for in country music. Ashburn’s intense talent in this type of bass-playing opens the possibility of merging this style into certain styles of country music mainstream when the opportunity arises.
Even now, he says of his session work, “I most definitely try to sneak that small slap bass part in when I see an opening.” It will be interesting to observe over time what impact Ashburn’s slap-and-pop skills and creativity could have on country music.