hiram.k.hackenbacker

This will probably sound a bit odd as it flies in the face of what I said previously, but a truly democratic band can work, however, I don’t think it’s going to in this case. The opinion you’ve offered here is precisely the reason why some start up’s fail. You get five of them in a room and it has the ability to get nothing done whatsoever. My 80’s band is viewed by all as the singers as he started it and very successful it’s been too. He has the final say in everything from song choices to clothing to set structure. That doesn’t render the rest of us dumb and unable to put any opinions forward, it just means there is someone there to steer it all in the right direction. We’ve just been through a set overhaul ready for our first gigs for over a year and not a word was said. A new batch of songs were received, learnt and rehearsed for the first time last week and that was with a new (to the band) co-lead vocal. Not even a glimmer of ego with any of it and that’s how it should be. Current dilemma - we took out Rio as it’s been in the set for as long as I can remember. We do feel however, that an 80’s band should have at least one Duran Duran song in the set. We’ve put suggestions forward and to be fair, there’s limited list of DD hits in the 80’s, but he’ll let us know what we’re learning in due course - he’s the one who has to sing it after all. I would personally prefer not to do Planet Earth, but if that’s the choice, I’ll suck it up. It’s looking like ‘Save A Prayer’ or ‘Girls on Film’ at the moment 😜.

As a couple of others have mentioned already, the answer to your problems is forget about this project being a democracy. The song choices should have a degree of democracy in their selection, but if it's an 80's band you want, it needs taking by the horns. You're either an 80's band or you're not. I've been part of an 80's band for years and many very decent songs have been rejected because they were released months into the 90's or at the end of the 70's, but thats the rules. Don't kid yourself that you'll need anything less that a very competent guitarist if you're looking at 'Beat It', 'Jump', 'The Final Countdown' etc.

I’ve received another update from Jon. The neck now has frets and is looking rather fabulous....

I dipped my toe into the world of headless basses a couple of years ago and it was one of the the best things I ever did. I was looking for a 5’er that would be more suited to my 80’s band and came across this beauty. It’s shorter scale and headlessness makes for a supremely comfortable playing experience. You’d never think it by just looking at it, but it’s an absolute joy to play.

Nice. I look forward to seeing it 👍

Are we talking Rotherham?

Probably on account of the fact that it has far better quality tonewood 😜. Thing is, I kinda bought it out of curiosity really. I love a Jazz bass and I love a Stingray, so it made sense in my head at the time. Turns out, it’s neither, but I really like it anyway. It has the most ridiculously low action and the neck profile is very me.

That's a decent price. If I didn't already have one etc and so forth....

I have the Inca Silver version and it's ace! You should give one a go Andy.

A lot of J for your money here also....

https://www.bassdirect.co.uk/bass_guitar_specialists/Jazz_USA_4_Elite_4.html

Based on what? PM @KiOgon and I’m fairly sure he’ll quote you far less for what you’re after.

Another recommendation for @KiOgon from me. The bass build in my signature features one of his stack pot plates with series/parallel switching. I like 'em.

Irrespective of what it actually is, whoever thought that bridge/through body thing was a good idea needs a slap 🤠

I think you’ve had a right result there @Old Horse Murphy - it looks fabulous 👍

It’s Special. Not a Special - just Special 😂

I’m definitely in the Chris Wolstenholme camp regarding how many basses to take to a gig, but it’s been a while since I’ve played a pub to be fair.

Picked my ones up yesterday. It appears my friend is set on using all of his free reel of filament just for thumb rests 😂. The good thing about this design compared to the Zero-mod is that I can use the existing scratch plate screws. Zero-mod send you extra long screws with their thumb rests due to the depth of the hole. Offered it up to my Old Smoothie and it was spot on.

True story: my ex-wife fell asleep during a Zappa gig 🤷‍♂️.

One of the absolute joys of the Zappa catalogue as it stands today, is that for an album like 'Sheik Yerbouti' which I absolutely love, we now have the original gigs from which a lot of the basic tracks came from in the shape of the posthumous release 'Hammersmith Odeon'. Then there are projects that Frank started and Dweezil finished like 'QuAUDIOPHILIAc', which sounds superb on DVD-A. Another DVD-A release is 'Halloween' - you can just shut your eyes and feel like you're in the room (I usually have to make sure everyone else is out for this experience to work properly 😂). For those who fancy a different line-up, try 'Philly '76" which features singer Lady Bianca who was only on tour with Frank for a very short time. One can only wonder at what further delights there are to be released.

Long time Zappa fan here too. My introduction was Live In New York, which is still a favourite. He’s one of the very few artists that I’ll blind buy anything that comes out. Received an e-mail from the ZFT the other day announcing the latest release. Didn’t even bother reading the blurb - went straight to pre-order. I also have a ton of bootlegs, which when you take a deep dive into, it’s just amazing the amount of variation in the sets. Not only that, but when you listen to the songs, they’re not always performed the same way night after night either.

A pleasant surprise today in that Jon sent some more photos from Shuker HQ....

This just in. I have yet to get my hands on one, but my friend seems to have started a production line....

The issue is very much of first world proportions 😉. The Stingray in question is an Old Smoothie which is fitted with what is essentially a 5 string pick up on a 4 string bass. This raises my normal thumb rest position on the the pick-up and it’s messing with my head. The add on thumb rest should lower it to my normal position.