visog

Re-read the OP and agree entirely with your proposition about [u]how [/u]a line is played - simple or complex. (*went off on rant about Pino fans lauding his 1-note per month approach.*)

Careful - over simple and you reduce the quality of the music and limit the bass player's voice. Jaco spoke in 16ths. Anthony Jackson uses some pretty hairy harmonies. Up to the player to make it work. Don't use personal limitations to make arbitrary rules about so called 'profound' simplicity... Create a musical part, make the song better - that could be breves on the root or semi-quavers on the ninth.. whatever...

I'd be cautious about a maple board... don't take the strings as well as ebony or rosewood. Only fretless players I've seen go maple are Sting and Christian McBride - both of whom carry it off well though...

Well in the end, the show was OK. Not much new in terms of musicians who played with her. Max Bennet being the only new commentary I've heard. Not too much about her guitar playing either but none the less a good listen. Jaco gets a couple of mentions but only in passing.

R2 tomorrow night (Monday 30th) has got a special on her guitar playing... Good to hear Coyote on R2!

Sadowsky?

Exactly... you're paying for the name, the trendy make. Don't get me wrong, they're great basses and have that swoopy tone thing happening but at the end of the day, you're still faced with dishing out Em on the plank just get something that works and hit the 'shed...

Coo... that's erm interesting. It's kind of got a Spitfire body and the peg-head reminds me of his old 90's basses. Would love to have a go and compare with my regular Spitfire. I'm sure the sound and playability will be Bernie's usual high standard, even if you're not keen on the looks.

[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1402916688' post='2477773'] Less than a year to go for mine! [/quote] What does that mean? The 2nd hand one looks nice but that pricing if for the current trend for them surely. Is it worth that? (You could get most of Mark's other stock for that and he's got some amazing basses....)

Bit more cash to spend? What about this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZVFpNUEvx0

You'll wait for years, get the dolphin of your dreams... and then you'll prefer the cheapie you've grown used to in the meantime... Hope you find one..

Never mind the vocal, I want his hair!.... P.S. Is that Flanders on high vocals?

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1400758658' post='2456668'] Another convert here. Just finished reading the text cover to cover. Now I just need to get to the exercises and start to put the bits together!! [/quote] Bilbo, can you give us a review/blog to let us know if you think it's worth the curious investigating... I'd appreciate your thoughts. It's a bit like getting into Charlie Banacos or Pat Martino's approach. It's kind of 'what religion are you going to devote your life to...?' So please tell us if we should be Jewish, Catholic, Protestant or God of Fire... No really, I'm open apart from circumcision...

Agree with OP although the tone and perspective is important. Whilst I think Jaco's music and impact are incredible and must have been over-whelming when they broke-out in the early-mid '70s, his genius had a sad flaw. I hope the doc gets the balance right... There have been a few biogs - the infamous Milkowski bood (which I quite enjoyed although those close to Jaco say it was inaccurate). To my mind though, Charles Shaar Murray's BBC radio documentary is the best and I hope the film takes its queues from this. [url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTcbTg8O548"]https://www.youtube....h?v=tTcbTg8O548[/url] Some personal eulogies are better than others. I find Joe Hubbard's fact based version just puts him on a pedestal too much: [url="http://www.joehubbardbass.com/1287/10-things-to-know-about-jaco/"]http://www.joehubbar...now-about-jaco/[/url] Such lists obscuring his genuine innovations and talent, and ignoring the contributions of the legions of people who helped Jaco along the way, e.g. re. orchestration and composition, where he got pretty intensive 1:1 training from Charlie Brent and Peter Graves. So I hope the doc strikes the right mix. Anyway, I like Will Lee's musical memories of Jaco: [url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=RfhkkFcGo0c"]https://www.youtube....d&v=RfhkkFcGo0c[/url]

[quote name='vmaxblues' timestamp='1401734309' post='2466356'] Sorry, just from my personal experience, I did have at one time a matched pair of Pentabuzzes and very good they were too. I contacted him to ask a couple of technical questions about them and to get an idea of value for insurance purposes.....had the snottiest email back basically saying, not interested, you got them secondhand! I sold them both shortly afterwards..... Now, if you contact Rob at Status, or Alan at ACG, wonderful and helpful responses. [/quote] Bernie Goodfellow too... although I got mine new so Mike Pedulla would approve. Or maybe not as it's not a Pedulla... P.S. Why would you need two Pentabuzz's? I believe they're great BTW...

Interesting discussion... some basses are bad through design, materials or QA, the latter category felling even the mighty, Rickenbacker, Stingray and I'd add Fender too. I you may not like the design but it's rare you get a bad Ibanez or Yamaha. Oh and in response to the thread, I'll call out my £75 Egmond from Colte Guitars, Chester...

[quote name='vmaxblues' timestamp='1401725762' post='2466213'] Shame Mike Pedulla is such a nob. [/quote] Substantiate/expand please? (Always thought he was a pioneer builder for Mark Egan, John McLaughlin and others...?)

String spacing already covered but I'd add set-up for light gauge strings and possible a 32" scale - try one first. Pi and MK are both 4-string players which suits their similar style of working off the 'E' string and using a lot of left-hand slaps. That specific slap style (perhaps its just me) doesn't translate onto a 5/6 string quite as well so I'd check your technique before moving to an extended range. I'm not sure the type of pick-ups are too much of a factor but having a 3-band EQ or some sort of treble boost really helps to bring out percussive elements of the style. Finally, a good action helps too but that's more of a set-up factor than a build factor. Pity you're not in the UK, since as well as Status, Bernie Goodfellow makes great basses for this style too with a tone circuit that really fits the style.

So what's the bass angle? Who's on bass? Were they good?

It's a good question to ask as ironically, for a serious 4-figure purchase, you're buying on trust and an aspiration where as in most other situations, you buy with the actual bass in your hand. So I'd firstly ask myself do I truly want/need a unique bass? Then research and go to the next Bass Show, the Bass Gallery and Bass Direct and try out as many of these customs as you can. Also A/B with them with the hi-end mass produced models. Yamaha and Ibanez may not have the cache of a customer built but they've got six-sigma QA (go look it up - it's basically martial arts applied to production systems) which makes for some wonderful basses. Finally, your builder will be you partner in this endeavour so find someone who you get on with and shares your vision. Also, pick someone who's reasonably near to you so you can pop-in when build decisions are made. I went with Bernie Goodfellow who whilst making cracking basses, lives near the Antarctic (well Brighton). ... and then remember Jaco changed everything on a $90 second-hand mass-produced Jazz, albeit of good vintage.

Geddylicous!...

Loving a Spitfire... that blue is nice too... Slaptastic!

That is gorgeous... ticks all the boxes: modern playability but with aged mojo! Tell us Fretmeister - do you worry about dinging a relic'd bass?

So I just got my copy... Nice package... well done. Obviously funded by a certain Metallica bass player and Jaco fan: Robert Trujillo. Not a cheap knock-off like some of the later New York recordings - a quality product produced in conjunction with the Pastorius estate. Not breaking too much new ground... it's the early demo's for his debut solo album. I'd say it's one for the Jaco fans & completists for the new photos, packing and new takes. Continuum and Havona are demo's but clearly he's played them for some time as he's fooling with the melodies and fills. Overall the sound quality is pretty good but with a lot of hiss... dolby not being around in '74. (But I was never a fan of noise reduction anyway as it sucked out the high-end..) Tread carefully though... it;s pretty full-on and by that I mean Jaco is absolutely shredding on every tune, many of which are pretty hard jazz. Weather Report it is not. Most of the tunes are a deadly 16/32nd note groove with some pretty wild electric piano over the top. In fact one of the tunes, 'Balloon Song' ends up sounding very like Yes' 'Gates of Delirium'! He was 22 at the time of this recording and it's all here: groove for days, accurate super-fast phrasing, woody mid-range tone and harmonic chords chiming everywhere. visog

[quote name='dannybuoy' timestamp='1400845281' post='2457447'] I always thought they looked alike (take the 's' off https to get the video to embed btw)! [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uBOtQOO70Y[/media] [/quote] Me too! Also, I hoped he'd do the cow-bell thing and he did! Cool