Ida Nielsen & The Funkbots

In the organizer's words:

Ida Nielsen released her sixth album "More Sauce, Please!" on June 16, 2023 on the German label Leopard Records.

The fearlessly funky and multi-talented Danish bassist, singer, songwriter and bandleader Ida Nielsen - a former member of two Prince backing bands, the New Power Generation and the four-piece rock project 3rd Eye Girl - has released her sixth album as a solo artist and her fourth since the death of her mentor in April 2016. With her characteristic 4-string Sandberg California electric bass, she plays with her usual authority, takes on all the vocal parts, provides numerous keyboard tracks and combines driving funk beats, virtuoso slap bass playing, fluid rap passages, catchy pop hooks and plenty of attitude on More Sauce, Please!

From the energetic opener "Been Trying", with scratches by Congolese DJ Amazulu Nanga and a scorching alto saxophone solo by fellow countryman Jakob Elvstrøm, to the orchestral pop-rap finale "Give Me A Bit Of...", More Sauce, Please! pulsates with energy and shines with impressive musicality. The mix is complemented by Son of Light 's raps in the heavily grooving "Bounce Like a Grandma", the playful call-and-response between Ida and Finnish beatboxer/scratch master Felix Zenger in the rock-funk track "Ninja", the infectiously disco-like "Glorious Disco" with a 70s flair and the slap and tapping demonstration "Slappadibopbop".

Ida also shows off her own rap skills with quick rhymes in "Kuku Put Some Sauce On It" and delivers layered vocal harmonies in the hypnotic "More People Like You". Her reflection on lost love "It's Gone" features incisive lines from rapper Victor Danos, while her call to "get into emancipation" in "Shake It Off" sounds like an optimistic anthem for funk fans:
"If your life sucks, whatcha gonna do? (Shake it off!) / If your heart breaks, whatcha gonna do? (Shake it off!) / If you're stress level's going through the roof, whatcha gonna do? (Shake it off!)."

With the Minneapolis funk track "Bounce Back", Nielsen also pays tribute to Prince - with falsetto vocals in the style of "Kiss" or "Cindy C" and a furious slap bass solo. "I learned so much from Prince that it's hard to sum it up in a few sentences," she explains, "but what I usually say is that it was a huge gift and the most magical musical journey ever - and a lasting learning experience beyond imagination." She had already dedicated her 2016 album TurnItUp to her late mentor. "The most important thing Prince taught me was: always play with your heart!"

In August 2010, the Danish bassist received a call from the Purple One himself in her Copenhagen apartment to jam with him in Paisley Park - an unofficial audition that she passed with flying colors. "His manager at the time told me Prince had seen my Myspace profile and wanted to jam with me. Then they said they would call me back. After two weeks without a message, I really thought it was a joke. My friends all knew it was my biggest dream to play with Prince, so I hardly dared to believe it. But finally the call back came. And of course, this whole journey has been life-changing in so many ways."

She adds: "I was an all-round bass player before I joined Prince in 2010, but my heart always belonged to funk. I love it so much. And I think that's what got me the NPG job."

Alongside Prince, with whom she toured until his untimely death in 2016, Nielsen cites bassists such as Marcus Miller, Mark King, Larry Graham, Bootsy Collins and Victor Wooten as role models in slap playing - influences that are clearly audible in her punchy bass style on More Sauce, Please! "All my albums are bass-heavy, old-school funk with influences from hip-hop, reggae, neo-soul and world music," she explains. "My last album 02022020 was more lo-fi, dreamy and loungey because I just felt like it. But a lot of my fans were disappointed that it didn't have the typical banging funk. That's why I'm now back on the old-school funk track - and have even created pseudonyms to outsource my ideas to other genres."

Born in the small Danish town of Aarhus, Ida first started singing in the school choir before picking up the bass at the age of 16. In the 1990s, she studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Music, played in numerous bands and later toured Europe with the Belgian pop group Michael Learns To Rock. She then worked as a touring bassist for the Belgian-African band Zap Mama, which was founded by the Zairean singer Marie Daulne. Nielsen released her debut album as bandleader in 2008 under the name Bassida: the groove-soaked Marmalade. This was followed by Sometimes a Girl Needs Some Sugar Too (2011), TurnItUp (2016), Time 2 Stop Worrying (2019) and 02022020 (2020).

In 2014, Nielsen played with Prince, guitarist Donna Grantis and drummer Hannah Welton on the 3rd Eye Girl album PlectrumElectrum. She gave her last concert with Prince at an exclusive New Year's Eve party on St. Barts on January 1, 2016, hosted by Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich. In an interview with MusicRadar, she said: "I'm aware that there are a lot of Prince fans who want to support me. I really appreciate that - and I also really appreciate that they still love funk."

And there's more than enough for funk fans to enjoy on Ida's latest album More Sauce, Please!

Ida was voted one of the top 10 bassists in the world.

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