bassbiscuits

Depping gig inside a church for a wedding near Hinckley. I was worried about the acoustics of playing in a place with high ceilings etc but no problem at all. The audience were really up for it with lots of dancing, plus one guy who came up and sang a couple of songs with us (I think he knew the singer 🤷🏼‍♂️). Good catering too courtesy of a pizza oven thing out the back. Winner. Took a small rig of just one Markbass 2x10 cab, a LM2 head and a Yamaha BB604 bass. Pared down the effects board to just a tuner and a compressor gaffer taped to the top of my amp head.

I have different bands: My main band - a fiery soul/blues trio in which I share lead and backing vocals alongside bass, work on songwriting with the singer, and have a fairly free rein creatively to bring whatever I bring to songs. I also provide the PA, lights and transport. My solo gigs - I choose to do (or not do) whatever I like, as it’s just me. No one to have to run anything by apart from my wife in terms of gig times/dates. My PA and my gear, mix of my own songs and covers, all sung and played by me. Tribute band bassist - all the publicity and marketing is done by the band leader. I just learn my lines and show up, and do my bit on setting up, taking down and transporting kit. Dep bassist - again I have little to do with promoting or influencing the band’s direction, and just turn up when they need me to provide bass and backing vocals, and help set up and take down the gear.

If we get a dep drummer into my own band from time to time, we tend to streamline the set to focus on stuff that’s easy to get thru with me cueing him for any unusual stops / starts etc. If it’s just the occasional gig with someone stepping in to help us out, it’s probably not the time to debut some horribly complicated track. As ever, good onstage communication is a wonderful thing.

To be honest it’s got the same strings it came with, which I’d imagine are short scale and then cut down. The Tanglewood probably ain’t what you’re after for a season of proper gigging. Something like a secondhand Squier Mustang or Ibanez Talman etc are much better more solid basses (the Tanglewood was for my son to learn on.)

At the very cheap end is a Tanglewood Elfin bass, or Squier do a mini precision bass. I have a Tanglewood Elfin and it’s merely ok, rather than brilliant. It’s something like 26” which is really short for a bass. Cheap and fairly cheerful tho.

Flats are good on any bass. Different sound and feel to rounds, but plenty of good things to be had with flats.

If all works well, depping isn’t for one-off gigs; if you do a good job people tend to ask you back next time which makes it more worthwhile putting in the initial effort. In my main depping job, I cover for a bassist whose side project clashes with some gigs, so it’s steady depping rather than one-off depping. Much better.

I dep regularly though currently I only dep in one band which makes life easier as I largely know their set from so many gigs now, so at worst only a few newer tunes emerge at short notice at any one time. My advice is really “learn your lines and show up.” Being well prepared, polite, punctual and attentive to the rest of the band onstage will already put you ahead of a great many other players. If you’re lucky you might get a chance in soundcheck to run through any tricky unusual arrangements / endings etc. Bring spares - batteries, leads, strings (see “be well prepared” above). I think I’m usually on the same money as the person I’ve replaced. But really, if I’ve agreed to do a gig for a certain amount then I can’t really grizzle whether someone else is getting paid more or less than me anyway.

Sounds like a hell of a first set.

Will do!

Kiss tribute band Hotter Than Hell at Leicester 02 tonight 🤘

I think people should be free to hold whatever opinions they want. But I won’t work in a band with someone who I find to be an objectionable d..khead, for whatever reason that may be.

The first time I left a band I tied myself in knots about how to do it. Ultimately I realised that it’s entirely fair to everyone involved to leave a band that’s not working (ideally giving them a bit of notice if there are gigs booked etc.) But really, it happens all the time and life goes on. If it’s polite that’s ideal, but even if it’s not polite it’s still the right thing to do.

Me too. Proudly so.

Yeah as above. No way would I choose to work with someone with such views. A friend of mine (wasn’t in a band with him though) started expressing some very dodgy personal opinions about race, culture etc on Facebook a while ago. The first time it made me wince, the second time I decided to have nothing more to do with him. And I haven’t. I’m not associating myself with stuff like that.

Picton Music and John Hamm’s Music in Swansea were the places that got me started with Satelitte, Westone, Washburn, Charvel and the other hallowed 80s brands. I’ve still got my Arion tuner from Christmas 1986 that came from Picton Music. Legend has it there were bigger music shops in Cardiff, a whole 40 miles away, but we never made it that far (too young to drive and too far to cycle).