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Hi folks Some of you know that in November my wife and I had a little boy called Frederick. I'm happy to report that he's a proper music fan - he really listens and chills right out when there's something playing. I'm a bit worried he'll become a drummer like his uncle so I've started him on a fairly rigorous series of bass lessons before sending him off to study with @devinebass for a few years (whenever you're ready Scott) I have my mini 16" bass for him to play with when he can sit up properly. Should make one fret per finger easier, too. Today was lesson 1 - basic familiarisation. Bearing in mind he'll one day inherit Basschat, you should all be very nice to him. ped

The Suit , the hair, the boots, the voice...(he plays bass too)

I saw them around this time at the Kursaal in Southend when the album 'Burn' came out. One of the best gigs I've ever seen to this day. A naked woman appeared on stage seemingly from nowhere and jumped on Ritchie, who promptly unslung his guitar and played it on her backside

Well yesterdays experience was a good one. Whilst a few players came over and tried out two of my basses, the Classico and Stanley Clarke signature, I played only one which was one off the really short headless basses that sounded really good and the strings were not floppy like i expected. Its a bit of a long standing joke with my musician friends that I have never ever really been good at allowing others to play my instruments or playing instruments that are not my own, so i hope my reluctance to try more of your basses yesterday was not taken as a personal slight in any way. After yesterday experience i’m feeling a bit more comfortable in allowing others to play mine. Moving on, there were a lot of nice sounding basses i could hear during the day but I think the bass that stood out for me sound wise was the Enfield. No idea who was playing it or whose they were or what model. My thanks to the organisers for a well run event. Maybe you can branch out into putting gigs on there at some point too. ✔️👍🏿🎶🎵

Big thank you to @jebroad, family and all the other people who helped put the bash together. Was a great day and we’re looking forward to the next one!

Ah lovely. Beats this - my grandson 3yo at the time

I bet she thought that nobody would notice... Happy Birthday to our own @Silvia Bluejay ....

I had another acoustic gig Thursday night at the BlondiPop. Good crowd and nice venue. A guy complained that he couldn't hear the lead vocals or bass that well. Do you guys ever check how your levels are in the house? GREAT NEWS! My band has a great Summerfest ( world's largest music festival) slot this year. 7/3 at 5:00pm on the ULine Rock Stage. 80s hit nakers Lover Boy are the headliner. Another festival on 7/13 we're opening for The Charlie Daniels Band ( " The Devil Went Down To Georgia") A few other festivals have come through too Guys, I feel so much better Blue

Mrs Teebs was booked to make the cake, but I was off work on friday, so I 'borrowed' her recipe & did the construction (or whatever the correct term is) of the cake. 🎂

Great. That's exactly what I wanted to hear. Thanks all.

As far as defending the Ric brand goes, I rather admire it; keeping production in that same factory, piecewise improvements of the design & manufacture over half a century of production; it's a lot better than the wild-west of Fender basses, where you don't know if that you are getting is genuine, there are fake transfers everywhere, and some brands even produce fake Fenders. However, producing their own treble bezel is at best a bit hypocritical, I would say.

Excellent occasion, my thanks also to @jebroad and Mum for organising! Good venue, plenty of space and light. A welcome chance to put faces and voices to so many names that I won't pick any out - except @SpondonBassed and Jack, and @seashell. Ridiculous amounts of cake, with @Teebs 's chocolate cake the standout. Favourite bass of the day: @jazzyvee 's beautiful EUB as seen above. Very impressed by the build and sound quality of the many short-scales - not for me, I'm completely into light-weight long-scales, but an eye-opener. Also @Andyjr1515 's talk, which has led me to start reading the build threads. Final thanks to @Teebs for the lift from Manchester, I couldn't have got there otherwise, well worth the journey 🙂

As a matter of fact, JE, it was my housemate Jack's ticket that won the prize. Two of his tickets were drawn and none of mine! He was delighted to have won it. We've known Andy for a couple of years now and we've both been impressed by his builds and mods. Jack's more of a uke player though and he's gifted it to me. As we share a house, he's still going to hear it... quite a lot probably. I'm very lucky. I've just had a good hour playing with it and it's lovely. To be honest, I've always liked the notion of one day owning an AJR modified or built bass. It was a great climax to the day. Full marks to you JE and your Mum. You both made us feel very welcome. You made this year's East Midlands Bass Bash a great follow up to @Sibob's excellent events. Cheers matey! Well done. This isn't the first time that Andy's put up such a nice prize either. He put up a decent acoustic bass a couple of years back too. It's been a great day out for the two of us after a rough six months or so. Looking forward to the next one.

All credit due to Jim, remember. I doubt the profanity filter would have much use for the royalties.

The craddock wind. great album name. and yes...I’ve just suggested it to my bandmates.

Why do so many YouTube reviewers feel the need to demonstrate the sound of the instrument/cab/amp with a ten minute slap-fest? Or then there are those who don't even let you hear it and just mumble for ten minutes in some dimly lit bedroom. Or the 'professionals' with some matey banter who, again, don't let you hear it, just point at a load of knobs and sockets and read the labels to you. Finding a sensible review where you get a decent sound file, the bass is played in a range of styles (not just bloody slap) and the key features are highlighted is virtually impossible. </Rant>

Brain fail! Was @Dosi Y'Anarchy

Mine too. Mk.3 and Mk.4 are always the Purple I go back to. 'Burn' must be one of my favourite rock albums. It just kicks every track - only complaint is the bass could be a little beefier in the mix!

You would needed eyesight that eagles would envy as I was busy in sunny Coalville painting our bathroom white with silver sparkle dust

Just got the mini Omni Cab sum off @dudewheresmybass

@KevB doing a McCartney on @grandad's Hofner.

I really enjoyed the afternoon and would like to thank the organisers and participants. The presentation on reduced weight vs feel and sound was really interesting and thought provoking. As a maker of small bass cabs it was revealing how much interest there was in the short scale basses which produced a plummy, warm , soft but deep sound. As a jazz bass freak i use a much cleaner sound. I didn’t get chance to be too analytical but the stacked TC 1x12’s where throwing out that chewy bottom end in piles. The Barefaced cabs were a marvel too. I didn’t try too many basses as I’ve got the dreaded tennis elbow which struck me after playing someone’s bass at Bass Direct. It’s a surprise that some lovely basses have an action too high for easy playing. To all the players out there, it really isn’t difficult to truss the neck straight. I tried a lovely bass of an unknown brand which required a bit of a neck tilt adjustment. If anyone’s worried about this kind of work on a bass I’m happy to help if you come to my place in Walsall. My favourite was the Sadowsky ...it was the metro ie not made in New York and not chambered so a little weighty ....but hey this was a music machine. Thanks for letting me play it. I think it would have been better if we gave each member 10 mins to take us through their rig/basses/sound as the booming was hard to talk over and let y’all hear a DHC Bass cab. I’ll be back. It’s fun. Bass players are the good guys 😁. Please contact me if I can help you with a set up or a cab. [email protected] 07495763638 Only took one decent picture but had to be the Alembics and the Barefaced with Delano Mills. Q

Thank you to all the team...great basses & good to meet fellow BC's

Well, another great Bass Bash. @jebroad and his amazing mum did us all proud with the venue. Lovely to catch up with old friends and make new ones too. Thank you @Andyjr1515 for your fascinating presentation - and the lift too! After enjoying playing @grandad's Mustang and Hofner Beatle bass I won a short-scale gigbag in the raffle. I think the Fates are telling me what my next purchase might be...

Me from recent gig playing at our drummers birthday party.

Can't remember if I've posted to this topic to not, and not abut to wade through 117 pages to find out! So here is a pic of myself on stage with the Grateful Dudes in Putney three weeks ago. Bit of a tight stage with two drummers, but we managed.

The irony is that they've copied something. Furthermore, some of the guys on RRF aren't happy about it, either.

I have told this story before but some years ago I was idly browsing on Ebay when I saw a Mesa Road Ready 2x18 up for auction. It was on with an initial bid of £50 and the auction was set to finish quite early one Sunday morning. I wasn't desperately after such a cab but thought I'd get up to see what it was going for nearer the time. With a minute to go it was at £60 and I thought I'd just stick in a bid of £75. I got it for £62. Turns out it was one of only 3 (or so it seems) and this one was built for Cass Lewis. Only down side was the fact that it had a sticker on it when I collected it. The sticker proclaimed its weight to be 107 kg. That said, when hooked up with my (then) Diesel 2x15 the sound was, quite literally. awesome.

I think you richly deserve this

Good times! It is great just to play stuff we all read about but certainly does not exist where I live. Sadowsky, G&L L1000 (Wowzers, whatever is driving that tone is bonkers), Alembic EUB, Mouse, Enfield, Manton, Letts and Shuker. And the Jabbass mini basses. I will be having one of those! Also just putting faces to names. And cakes. Mant thanks to everyone involved in the organising. Did I mention good times?

I suspect ped minor will be plotting dad's demise in a freak yachting accident at some point, and taking over the throne

I for one welcome our new overlord.

Read Geddy’s book to him in the Ladybird style and it’ll be smooth sailing away from Drum Island.

The expression "I hate meeces to pieces" was popularised by the fictional cat Mr Jinks in the Hanna Barbera animated TV series Pixie and Dixie and Mr Jinks. It is a little-known fact that the prestissimo bongo accompaniment which underpins Hanna Barbera's classic chase sequences was recorded by the late Roy Jenkins (1920 - 2003, latterly Baron Jenkins of Hillhead) during a trip to Hollywood in 1957 undertaken at a time when he was intellectually at odds with his party leader Hugh Gaitskell. Jenkins' bongo recording was used and re-used in scores of Hanna Barbera cartoons including Huckleberry Hound, The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, Secret Squirrel and Yentl Yeti among many other shows. In June 1972 Jenkins declined to extend his licensing deal with Hanna Barbera saying: 'I'm putting that sort of thing behind me'. Faced with the threat of bongo-less chase sequences Hanna Barbera invited UK Foreign Secretary Sir Alec Douglas-Home to record a new version of 'the chase bongos' but Home declined, indicating that Denis Healey (Jenkins' successor as shadow Chancellor of The Exchequer) might be interested. Keen to deliver a snub to his predecessor Healey immediately agreed terms with Hanna Barbera, adding 'This will show that snivelling little ponce Jenkins where to get off'. The new bongo part was scheduled to be recorded at Regent Sound Studios on London's Denmark St in July 1972 during the third reading of The European Communities Act. On the day Healey - no committed Europhile - was on edge and fluffed his cues. Overhearing an engineer observe: 'That Stafford Cripps - he was never one to choke an intro' a furious Healey stormed out of the studio. The session was saved when pianist Nicky Hopkins was drafted in at short notice and delivered a flawless first performance even though he had never before played the bongos.

Flapjack Corridor - prog rock / psychedelic folk

If his screen name is owt to go by I'd say he's managed to electrostatically charge his bathroom walls and powder coat the wet white paint. If I was doing it, it would involve a modestly sized explosive device and a bucket of glitter, Mr Bean stylee.

Picked up various bits of Trace Elliot gear for a song...some people just want to get rid of it.

The word is that he retired to Birmingham!

I may be helping shift this thread to the build section... but (bear with me on this) I'm no luthier but have been building high-end furniture for years. The wood merchants and users who know their materials will often hold a board of hardwood up between finger and thumb left hand, and tap hard 2/3rds of the way down with knuckle of right hand. The sound says (a) how dry that board is, and (b) this is our bit - it's tonal nature. If you got to try that with alder and ash (say) you'd hear what you expect right away - the ash is more crisp and a little higher (assuming fully dried stable woods - what is 'dry' is another topic). I've never tried ash v black walnut but would expect the walnut to sound more crisp and focussed, a slightly sharper crack sound. I'd expect the bass to be a little brighter with more pronounced higher mids. I think you can do the same with a finished bass - damp all strings and tap body - compare one bass with another - you can hear native voice differences. There's a timber merchant I know supplies many luthiers and he does this tapping thing a lot. Bob at Timberline, the luthiers here will know him. Sorry this prattles on - but a lot of what we seek starts with the woods innit?