casapete

Marshall did a 4x15 cab in the early 70’s. Not many around now and go for big bucks.

This was featured in BBC Proms Northern Soul on Sunday night, still on iPlayer. Great bassline and song!

I’m pis*ed off that I missed the recent tour ‘Northern Soul Orchestrated’ which was this exact show. They came to Sheffield City Hall too, one of my favourite venues. Hopefully they will be doing some more dates at some point, as all of the dates were sell outs. Just great seeing so many talented singers and lots of musicians making such a big and happy sound - loved it. Bassist Steve Pearce commented that it was one of the best gigs ever, and he should know!

For anyone who missed this great show, it is currently on iPlayer after being shown on BBC4 last night. ( Much better than the footie…)

Sheryl Crow last night at The Piece Hall in Halifax. A wonderful 18th century building built in a square, designed for cloth weavers to sell their goods. Despite my aversion to large / outdoor gigs ( see post above), me and Mrs CP got some tickets for this gig as we both love Sheryl and she wasn't doing anything else on this brief UK tour that was near or indoor so we bit the bullet. Weather was awful as we got to the gig, but we found shelter under the arches on the perimeter whilst watching support band Dea Matrona, whose bassist sounded great on her Mustang bass. Fortunately the weather improved as SC and her band came on around 9pm. Great mix in a space that I would imagine can’t have been easy for her engineer. Band were wonderful, with Robert Kearns using Reverend, Fano, MM Stingray G&L basses. He also played guitar and Wurlitzer piano on a few songs, during which Sheryl played bass on her Guild M85, and sounded fine too. Audley Freed on guitar was his usual brilliant self, although missing fellow long standing SC guitarist Peter Stroud for this tour. Tim Smith did a good job standing in though. Sheryl was superb, in great voice and looking amazing! They did all the older stuff everyone loved, as well as a couple from Sheryl’s recent album ’Evolution’. Played for around 1 hr 40 mins. They have a few more UK dates, recommended. (pics below not mine, obvs!)

Mick Ronson co-produced the album ‘Transformer’ with Bowie, and also arranged strings on it as well as playing piano, recorder and guitar. Some people reckon Bowie played the acoustic on WOTWS rather than Mick though.

My days of doing big gigs are now over. I would happily pay the silly ticket price for a favourite band in a smaller venue, but not a stadium. Surely doing one large gig should mean the prices are reduced, not hiked up? As you say, poorer view ( who wants to watch a gig on a video screen?), worse sound, possibly getting drenched and rip off food/ drink prices all mean I’ll pass. I was tempted to see Springsteen recently, but at the crazy prices involved and all the above I bailed. Definitely sticking to small / medium sized venues now.

We played in Beverley yesterday at the wonderful Sun Inn, which is now a monthly gig for our acoustic duo ‘Milestone’. Arrived at 4.30 pm to set up, and it was already busy. The gig runs from 5.30 till 8pm, with us doing 3x40 minute sets of 100% audience requested songs. We had the most ever number of requests, and managed to play most of them, although we were pleased the lady who’d asked for Britney’s ‘Hit me baby one more time’ had to leave before we attempted it. Other songs requested included Springsteen’s ‘I’m on fire’, ‘Broken stones’ and James Taylor’s version of ‘How sweet it is’ which doubled as a request for some JT and Motown. This is one of those special gigs where everything is just spot on - a great audience, brilliant staff etc, and fantastic landlords Paul and Del who really care about music. ( Del even said we should get there a bit earlier next time and he’ll serve us one of his legendary Sunday lunches, or Yorkshire Tapas!) Looking forward to our July gig.

What is it with venues that put on live music and have television on at the same time? We won’t play with them on, period. One of our regular gigs has TV on when we arrive and we leave them on whilst setting up, but then turn them off just before we start playing. Sometimes not popular ( especially when a key match is on ) but we fill the pub with people who’ve come out to see us, not watch telly.

A Dano Longhorn was going to be my first recommendation, although price and their somewhat ‘Marmite’ appeal made me reconsider. That red one looks ace though!

Harley Benton do some short scale basses that are often praised on here - have a look at them on Thomann website. From my experience of SS basses, 32 inch scale doesn’t feel much different to 34 inch. Dropping down to 30 inch scale models does, so that would include Mustangs - you don’t mention a budget but they start at around £350 for the Squier CV60. A friend of mine wanted a shorty bass for his teenage daughter, and I found him an Ibanez TMB30 Talman which was an ace thing - she’s just done her first gig with it. As usual, secondhand is always worth considering to get more bang for your buck. Also if weight / body style is a consideration as well as scale length then best to see if your friend can try a few out to find something that feels right for her.

Reminds me of an incident in a big local working men’s club a few years ago. The resident band and compère/singer were doing their first set of the evening to warm the crowd up, before the bingo naturally. Singer tells the band to take a few solos in a song, and the band see him head towards the bar at the back of the concert room and presume he needed a beer rather urgently. After far too many solos they finish the song, singer-less. One of the band goes off to find him, check if he’s okay etc. As there’s no sign of him, he goes downstairs to check in the bar, and en route asks the doorman if he’s seen the singer, who replies ‘ Oh yeh, if you mean Dave I saw him getting into a taxi about ten minutes ago’. Great way to hand in your notice. 😆

You're right Dave. From my experience (unless you're a big name act with 40/50 years of material to work with and millions of adoring fans) audiences do have a limited attention span and it's best for everyone to acknowledge this when planning setlists. I think for a covers / tribute band 2x60 min sets are more than adequate. I honestly don't see the point in adding songs to the sets and making them so much longer, other than satisfying the ego of some band members who don't know when enough is enough! Also bear in mind that venues like plenty of time to sell more drinks which is probably when the band is having a break / interval. Older audiences like to stretch their legs / go to the loo / grab another beer etc without feeling they're being a nuisance or missing out on some of the band's set. Personally I've always preferred one longer set from a playing point of view - easier to maintain the audience's attention and choose the songs to make the whole thing more cohesive. When my old band played some festivals we found the one set thing a revelation after being used to doing 2x60 minute sets in theatres. ( Unfortunately if we tried to opt for one set, with no support act, in theatres then we would be charged more by the venue to offset their loss on bar takings. )

Should anyone be tempted to try one of these beauties out, GAK in Brighton currently have 3 s/h Longhorns in stock. All Korean reissues, they are in copperburst, black or yellow (gold), and all priced at £419 each on eBay.

Another Johnson and Knopfler episode at 10pm tonight ( 30th May) featuring Emmylou Harris, along with Vince Gill. Followed by an AC/DC doc at 11pm, all on Sky Arts via Freeview.

Bit far away for me - shame as sounds like it would be my kind of thing too. Hope you get sorted, all the best. Pete.

1. Ampeg SVT (1980’s version). Best amp I’ve ever owned, whether into the 8x10 or others. 2. Gallien Krueger 800RB. Classic head, very musical and loud for its size. Had mine a long time. 3. Fender Rumble 100v3 combo. An amazing little thing, weighs nothing and sounds ace.

So true. More than 25 years ago in my old function band we were temporarily without a guitarist. With a couple of big gigs in London on the horizon, our agent put some feelers out to see if a dep could be found. To my amazement we got offered quite a ‘name’ player for around the same fee as were getting each. Only caveat was a hotel needed factoring in, but I was staggered to think that said guitarist would have needed to do such gigs.* From my experience the money has changed very little over the last couple of decades, and I regularly still see dep gigs being advertised with fees still the same. * Anyway, in the end we got a local bass dep and I winged it on guitar! 😆

Nice bit of foam by the bridge - well done that man!

Has to be James for me. My brother’s love of Motown throughout the 60’s left an indelible impression on my musical journey in my teens, and it was the bass on these records that had me hooked more than anything else. I was the odd kid at secondary school who liked what many thought of then as ‘girl’s music’. Most of my mates were into dreadful prog and rock , whereas I loved soul, r’n’b and rock and roll along with a lot of chart stuff too. Stayed the same for decades, and hearing James ( and his contemporaries like Bob Babbit) still has the same effect on me today.

Sounds great, and wonderful pedal steel too. Nice one!