Jaap Van Eik

Dutch bassist, he also played guitar in Trace (6). Jaap was born in The Hague, in the western part of The Netherlands. At around the age of three his family moved to Venezuela, so along he went. When he was eleven he suffered appendicitis, for his own sake his parents decided to send him back to the old country to recover, and to get a better educational grounding. He started playing the guitar at fourteen, but switched to bass three years later; "because in those days there were always too many guitarists!". He would however return to the guitar in some bands later on, such as Trace. When asked about early inspirations, he had this to say; "As everybody in the sixties I was hugely influenced by The Ventures and The Shadows. Later it was The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Stevie Wonder, Little Feat and Allman Brothers, to name a few. My personal favourite was Jack Bruce, would you believe it. Also guitar players like Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton." Read more at https://aftersabbath.blogspot.com/2015/05/day-after-sabbath-119-panda-jaap-van-eik.html While studying graphic design in Arnhem, Japp met pianist and fellow student, Herman Brood. Herman is a famous character in Dutch rock, who became an artist later on (wiki). Sadly he committed suicide in 2001, after years of health problems resulting from life-long heavy drug use. At this point Jaap had already played in a Shadows covers band, with Herman and some other local guys he formed a band and started hanging out in small clubs. They were The Moans, later just "Moan". Soon they were playing further afield; "We mainly played around the city of Arnhem. When a serious fight broke out during a gig and the police had to intervene, we were expelled for a while and started to play in Germany (Arnhem is located close to the border). We played in Germany quite often, where we met loads of English bands and musicians. They were like gods to us!". From the late ‘60s into the ‘70s, Jaap became an in-demand bass player. In his own words, he had a "tendency to use the bass as a solo instrument", which goes some way in describing his personal style. He spent time in many bands, including Cuby + Blizzards, Blues Dimension, The Motions and Solution. He also played on the Jan Akkerman ‎solo LP, “Profile”. He regards the most defining moment in his career as his time with blues rockers Cuby + Blizzards. Herman Brood had already joined, and recommended Jaap. This is where he and Herman first made names for themselves. Jaap remembers: “This was a whole new step up. They were quite famous then and played many gigs, made a few albums and toured a lot in Germany and other European countries. As a matter of fact we even went to England, where we met people like John Mayall (we did a tour with him and his band in The Netherlands afterwards) and Alexis Korner.” Jaap left Cuby in 1969 and switched around various bands and styles in the ’70s. "Blues Dimension was brief, Solution was great, we toured the UK extensively in the seventies, and I was foolish enough to turn down an offer from Jan Akkerman to join Focus! Trace was the last band I played in. That was a nice period although things became rather complicated then.”