toneknob

Not often I post here, but going through an embarrassment of riches this month bass-wise: last week at the Pizza Express Jazz: Janek Gwizdala tonight at the Barbican: Hiromi with Hadrien Feraud in the band the weekend: Michael League and Bill Laurance at the QEH (also got Goose the same night, suspect quite handy but unknown-to-me bassist) later in the month: Stick Men/Tu-Ner in Prague with Tony Levin, Markus Reuter and Trey Gunn

Bjork's got an amazing voice but as with most of her material I find it a bit tuneless and meandering at times. Speaking of which, some of this reminded me of the vocal jam at the end of You Enjoy Myself by Phish, which is different any time but here's the first one from youtube

Also I can lose afternoons building my own bass at https://fbass.com/model/

I love F Bass, ever since I saw Alain Caron playing them mumble-mumble years ago. This one was on reverb.com until recently and I nearly hoiked out a kidney for it: https://reverb.com/uk/item/72465995-f-bass-vf5-j-2017-transparent-seafoam-green (£5k + £200 shipping. flowers not included)

Listened! For me mostly harmless, not massively memorable, probably won't come back. Some nice bass playing.

I use the Gary Willis three-finger method, see various videos at https://www.youtube.com/@gwillis44/videos Of course I sound nothing like Gary Willis but it's great for muting and cross-string picking efficiency.

I don't sound anything like Victor Wooten when I play. Thankfully the opposite is true as well

Somehow I get Paramount+ through my Sky box, it's pretty much impossible to find anything though as it's not an actual "channel" and Sky's search thing isn't great. I'll try looking again on December 5th!

Do artists get paid for streams from the bandcamp site if you don't buy the album? (I'd be up for a Spotify version but I'm paying for it anyway)

I'm in. Do I have to listen to it more than once if I don't like it? Along a similar vein a few years ago I made a bet with myself to listen to an album that I'd never listened to before every day for a year (familiar artists were allowed but the more off my usual piste the better). I'd already won the bet by early December and carried on until close to Christmas (I think I gave myself a week or two off)

The cheap seats for Madge are 2x the cost of a floor ticket for Abba though. Also, Abba have an actual band who are quite good. Anyway - night two for Madonna, late start due to some tech failure, early finish because of O2 curfew. Ooops/Schadenfreude And also also, there's no Hanky Panky in the set (the song that is), so *duncan bannentyne accent* ahm oot

He played one song that no one knew, no wonder he's angry

In the intro for Vincen Garcia, 48 hours is what CW said as the heads up time. It'll be interesting to see how the same story is presented in Manchester and Glasgow over the next few days. Report in Team Basschat! As for Sonny T, apparently "something came up", nothing more specific than that. Meanwhile, given that as recently as three weeks before the tour, CW himself "took a tumble" (his words) and injured both legs and an arm, it's a miracle the shows are happening at all.

Enjoy! super tight band as you'd expect. The setlist is changing every night so hope you get some surprises.

I saw Cory Wong and band last night at Hammersmith Odeon. Sonny T isn't on the tour but the story is that the new guy Vincen Garcia stepped in with 48 hours notice when Sonny T pulled out. Previously Vincen had DM'd Cory Wong saying "let me know if you ever need a bassist in Europe". CW sent him a 50-song playlist, his tour manager's phone number and said "see you in Stockholm in two days". Here's the set from a few days ago in Brussels (Dean Town is the last song if you want to fast forward)

I've never seen the Zep set from Live Aid - my second (and last) 4-hour VHS tape had long run out by the time they came on. I'm equally curious and terrified to see it.

My first ever gig was Dire Straits the night before Live Aid - they were half way through their endless run at Wembley Arena on the Brothers In Arms tour. On the day they played their Live Aid slot at Wembley Stadium, paused for a restorative half of mild and a Capstan No 6, then played another full set back at Wembley Arena.

Coming to the Old Vic in the New Year: https://www.oldvictheatre.com/stage/event/just-for-one-day "Relive the day music brought the world together. Featuring the songs of Bob Dylan, David Bowie, The Who, U2, Queen, The Police, Elton John, Paul McCartney, The Pretenders, The Cars, Status Quo, Paul Weller, Sade, The Boomtown Rats, Bryan Adams, Diana Ross, Ultravox and more, this is the story of Live Aid and the people united by it. Political unrest, social revolution, boom and bust. In a decade of neon and noise, one moment made the world stand still and brought 1.5 billion people together – and they all have a story to tell about ‘the day rock ‘n’ roll changed the world’. " What do you remember of the day? I've recently been through the entirety of the show (well, 99% of it - playlist below - there's no Led Zep obviously) and while some of it is amazing it, Saturday afternoon in London gets a bit of chore on occasion - mostly thank to bands who are playing their latest and (not so) greatest rather than running through the hits as the better performances exhibit (Queen, Bowie, Ultravox, etc). _

and Tom Cawley is on the joanna. Think I might have to go to the Pizza Express gig! (I'll get around to listening to it at some point)

1, 2, 3, thumb (for plucking) and little finger out there in a manner that would give Scott Devine conniptions

When I meet my musician friends out in the wild, it's largely gossip about bands we used to be in (sometimes at the same time), others in the same genre, gigs we've been to, things we've heard. Take away the subject matter and it's a old ladies gathering at the tea shop - lots of words but very little information is actually being exchanged of any value outside those in the immediate circle. Besides that, I have made new friends by going to gigs and saying hello to people in the audience I've seen before at similar shows, or have seen performing in similar bands.

I can see from the Barbican presale that about half to two-thirds of the hall is priced at the £111 rate. That's about what I paid to see actual Rush at the O2 on the Time Machine tour. The £66 tickets are the restricted view areas at the very extreme front sides of the auditorium. For comparison I saw Brian Eno doing a talk in the same hall, best central stalls seats about £20.

good vibes all round!

Loads! occasionally they even reply, although sometimes it's just "please leave me alone"