hiram.k.hackenbacker

I look forward to the rock album.

One thing I’ve learnt, and it maybe just me, is that although I like the learning process, practice and rehearsals, you can overdo it. Learning and practising the same thing over and over again until you ‘get it’ is a bad thing, for me anyway. More often than not, I’ll work on something and still feel I’m no further forward, but then leave it for a day. Coming back after a break, I find a lot more went in than I thought it had and I’m able to capitalise on it. Using this method for learning a lot of ‘foreign to me’ sets for dep slots really helps.

Wal - Yeah, I think it’s ‘Wol’. Sei - I always thought it was ‘sigh’, as in seismic. Lakland - I’m a fairly recent convert to Lakland and had up until that point assumed it was ‘Lack-land’. I had to ask how it should be pronounced and you’re right, it should be ‘Lake-land’. Quite handy as I no longer incur the wrath of Mrs.H by mixing up the name of the shop with how I had been pronouncing the bass manufacturer. Maruszczyk - Never had to type it. Never had to say it. And probably never will. Babicz - I always though it was ‘Ba-bits’ 🤷‍♂️ Mayones - I thought it was ‘May-own-ez’ 🤷‍♂️ Sadowsky - ‘Sa-dow-ski’ all day long. Vanderkley always confuses me. Is it ‘Van-der-clay’? Aguilar - I’m presuming ‘A-gill-are’?

Just reposting this in case anyone missed it. Gary ( @cetera ) is looking into getting a limited number of Spectorbirds made. Things are developing nicely and if you have serious interest in this project, PM him as soon as you can and he will include you in the group. I would stress on Gary’s behalf, that if you put your name forward, your input will be required. There’s no point in being a bystander in a development project.

I think there's lot of truth in what you've said there. I've often reconsidered a prospective purchase after reading that parts have been 'upgraded'. Generally, if there is a bass that I'm interested in, it's the original spec I'm expecting, not someone else's idea of what might make it better. There are exceptions of course. I would regard any other bridge on a Gibson bass that came with one of those three point monstrosities as an upgrade. Same goes for earlier Rickenbacker bridges 😂

Air every time and it shouldn't take weeks either. You may wish to read this though, which details my recent experience of shipping a bass to the USA.

It's actually the section before 'a flower' which is in D, but I always remember the vocal line 'bang, bang, bang - bang, bang, bang' returns to the D. The other one is the opening E bass note of Tom Sawyer. I reckon I could tune to that pretty well by ear.

Same for me, just not the same song. There’s a bit in Supper’s Ready that is burned into my brain that ends on a D. Tune from there. I’ll have a try later and see if I can still do it.

For the most part, the targets of Frank’s mirth were very well deserved.

It’s OK, I’ll take your word for it 🤪

Would have been close enough for me.

Yes, very much the Ricky Gervais school of thinking here. Don't confuse the subject with the target.

This is in as used at BD 😍

Yeah, the dots on the fretless weren't for me either. The B & W Fade, the one with the Stellartone and the Metallic Gold were my picks.

I regard myself as someone who doesn't suffer from performance anxiety. I know people who do and it's not pleasant to witness, let alone suffer from. The closest I'll get to being a little twitchy will probably be about this time next month having accepted back to back gigs with a band I've not played with before, won't have rehearsed with before and I've not played about 50% of the songs in their set before. Should be interesting.

I do get a response when I send an email, but I don’t get any follow up i.e. progress photos promised. I haven’t had any images of the body, yet apparently the bass was near completion in January 🤷‍♂️.

I've no idea. Comms have been dreadful since we agreed the spec and the deposit was paid. The comment I posted on Jan 14th was the reply I received after I sent an e-mail enquiring how things were going. I've had nothing since. Quite frankly, I'm done with chasing him now. I'm confident he will contact me when/if it ever gets finished, but the lack of updates and photos that have been promised (on more than one occasion) is inexcusable. So much time has gone by that I've actually considered buying both a JJ Carbonlite and a JJ Signature that have come up for sale in the mean time. I managed to resist. I've decided to leave things until 6/4/22 which will be the one year anniversary of paying the deposit. If I've heard nothing by then, I will attempt contact again. I would appreciate anyone that knows him not to mention the build on my behalf. If I get an e-mail today, that would be a little more than a co-incidence 😎.

Every chance of seeing once I actually get it 😒.

Definitely interested in seeing one. What sort of price are we looking at?

I'd pop round and have a look at that....if it wasn't over 450 feckin' miles away from me 🤬

I still think this is one of their best tracks....

Yep, listened to it several times now and I like it.

I'm not sure that I see it as a flaw, odd yes, but not necessarily flawed. I presumed, that given their construction, there is supposed to be very little (if any) movement in the neck, even taking into account changes in temperature/humidity etc. Again my presumption, but would the neck relief be set reasonably low from the manufacturer, but you can still raise the string height if required? I have several graphite necked instruments myself and I can count of the fingers of less than one finger how many times I've had to mess with their respective truss rods. Maybe the answer is Modulus installs truss rods unnecessarily? I don't know. I'd really like to try one though.

I’ve often thought about getting a Vigier. I guess I’ve left it too late now. There’s a lovely Passion IV for sale, but I think I would prefer the pick-up position on the Arpege. That said, I’ve not played either, so it’s just pie in the sky for me really. Sad to hear Patrice is calling it a day, but nothing lasts for ever and he’s doing it on his own terms, so good luck to him.