casapete

Seen a few for sale over the years, and like everything else prices have steadily risen. Although not exactly rare, few seem to surface these days so demand / value rises. The Pro Tone range consisted of a Strat, Tele and P-bass IIRC. A friend of mine has the Tele and it’s a cracking guitar, especially for the c£200 he paid for it. The aesthetics don’t appeal to me personally - red / gold hardware / pearl plate etc, but some other colours did exist - black, blue, white, natural and I think sunburst. (Not sure if they all had the gold parts / pearl plates though.) I’d agree on price - somewhere in the £300/£350 area.

Maybe so, but he was there to do what they asked (albeit mainly for the cameras) - if he was bored with the material then he should have just carried on doing his thing. Session players manage it all the time.

More built in jeopardy I think - he seems a good player and would surely nail that solo in 10 mins max? The drummer from Liverpool is the main offender for me - surely there must have been better applicants, or again was he chosen knowing things would go t*ts up? The replacement drummer for the 95 year old guy on the other hand seems to be fine.

I would say ‘yes’ . The Rumble 500 is 350 watts into it’s own 2x10 speakers and is great IMHO. Also a loud combo for its size/ weight. I know TE watts are also loud, but don’t think you’d be disappointed - if you did need extra clout you could also add a matching 2x10 cab to release the full 500 watts into 4ohms.

Got ‘Breezin’ when it was released, and loved it. Not really my usual sort of music but great songs and playing, especially on ‘This Masquerade’. Also remember hearing him do ‘The greatest love of all’ from the soundtrack to the 1977 movie about Muhammed Ali ‘The Greatest’. Although not as technically perfect as Whitney Houston’s later version, his vocal is still superb.

Thanks Dave - we don’t always do such large venues but sometimes they’re the only option in some places. We’re doing Glasgow Kings Theatre on May 18th if you can make it-drop me a PM if you can. I just use my regular GK set up - 1001RB amp into a Neo 410 cab. Used this for years and never let me down. I’m the only one not using IEMs so like to have headroom onstage etc. Would maybe like to try something else for a change, Aguilar or Ampeg but the pandemic hit us hard so will need to save up for a while. Cheers, Pete.

We've done some gigs in Scotland this week. First one at the wonderful Caird Hall in Dundee (pics 1&2), a favourite of mine. Great crowd and a good sounding room. Gig made even better by some of the best pizza we've had at the wonderful Mozza restaurant near the theatre. Second one was at The Edinburgh Playhouse (pic 3). It's massive, seats something like 3060 people, unfortunately not when we were there though. One of the biggest seated theatres in Europe apparently. Gig slightly marred by a group of pis*sed people near the front kicking off through the first set, but the excellent security staff had them sorted for the 2nd. I love Edinburgh, and had time pre gig to walk around this wonderful city.

Drummer drove into the back of my old Astra estate. Had to claim on the insurance, and it was written off as the parts needed for the tailgate/ bumper etc came to more than the value of the car. They let me keep it, so sourced the parts from a breakers yard for around £150 IIRC ( was in the 90’s) and got it sorted for less than £300 in total. Nice man from the insurance company valued the car at £800 so for once I was ahead on the deal. About the only favour that particular drummer ever did for me too.

Great tune, wish I was in a band doing it. Was only thinking about this yesterday - we were gigging in Dundee, home of AWB.

I don’t generally suffer from anxiety so quite lucky there. I do get a bit twitchy if I think someone else on stage is nervous or likely to f*ck up though, and also strangely enough playing in front of friends and family. Think that comes from being made to play piano when we had relatives visiting when I was 7 or 8. I did feel more pressure during gigs when I used to play guitar, felt like everyone wanted me to prove what I could do ( which wasn’t a great deal...). Maybe explains why I found playing bass less pressured, and why I’m happiest not in the spotlight as such.

Yup, the old drummer was a lovely bloke - amazing for his age (mid 90’s I think). To be fair, as an ex dance band drummer , he was never going to hack doing rock stuff - same as the pianist who couldn’t grasp how to phrase the song and the drummer who hated reggae etc. It’s obvious that most of the people who were picked to be in the two bands were just totally unsuitable to add jeopardy to the programme ( as Cosmo mentioned in the previous post. ) Throw in a looming deadline for the first gig at a major festival along with a bit of sad back story stuff and it’s nearly as bad as ‘X Factor’ type rubbish. Of course, we had to have singers with no sense of timing as well. 😆

I’ve just got back from seeing Tommy Emmanuel in York. Stunning playing and not all 100mph stuff either, which usually bores me rigid. Superb support from Jerry Douglas, probably the world’s finest dobro and lap steel player. A great evening’s entertainment.

After more than 35 years running Astra estates , I’ve recently changed to a diesel Skoda Octavia estate. Great car, drives very well and pulls like a train in all gears with the boot area loaded, and does nigh on 60mpg whatever I drive like. Load area is good, although for the size of the car probably little more than the (smaller) Astras. I know Vauxhalls are often not liked by some, but I always found them very reliable and easy / fairly cheap to maintain. Hope the Skoda proves as good.

I would love to try this! Sounds a blast, especially with good musicians to work with. With my acoustic duo we do gigs where we put request forms on the tables, and can usually manage approx 80% of the stuff the punters ask for. Even if we’re not completely sure of the song ( nearly always the lyrics that trip us up), they appreciate us having a go. Got our monthly gig in Scarborough tonight where we get inundated with requests, from 1920’s to 2020’s, really looking forward to it.

Another plug for BBC2 on a Saturday night - this week there is the Bruce Springsteen documentary , ‘ A Secret History’ on at 9pm. Following this at 10pm there is the 2019 film ‘Blinded by the light’ , a great comedy drama.

Are The Sex Pis*ed Dolls still going? Think a couple of members were called Anna Key and Connie Rotten. 😆 My 8 piece band has 3 female players, and is all the richer for it. Most of the time it stops it being too ‘ blokey’ which for me is especially welcome. We all get on very well, despite an age range of early 20’s right through to me and the drummer! I’ve never liked being in groups of just men, either for work or socialising, so it suits me fine, We spend a lot of time together travelling and performing, and honestly can’t remember a crossed word for years.

Curious as to why your wife wouldn't go to see a female fronted band? We would never have been to so many gigs over the years if Mrs CP had applied that criteria, or I'd have been to them on my own 😆

I saw Lou Reed there in the 70’s with my brother, who saw David Bowie there around the same time. The list of who has played there is amazing. Apparently when Sinatra was there someone had to go and remove him from the nearby pub and get him onstage as the audience and band were fed up of waiting for him.

There’s some good stuff on BBC2 tonight ( Saturday 19th). Starting at 8.30pm there are three Stevie Wonder programmes including ‘ A night of Wonder’. These are followed at 11.35pm by a Teddy Pendergrass documentary.

Yeh, a great little pub - it said on the board outside ‘Real music and live ales’. A mate of mine used to run Thursday evenings there, and I used to do it when their regular bassist ( the amazing Aidan Lawrence) was away touring. Always a great night, especially when I stayed over and sampled the excellent beers. Haven’t been in for a while now, hope it’s managed to retain it’s magic for local musicians. Happy days.

I think one of the reasons I'm sticking with the CD format is that I just can't get used to the concept of not owning music in a physical sense - as Woodwind says above, I only stream to see if I like an album then usually buy it on CD. Plucking music out of the air seems alien to me as a replacement, am guessing it's having grown up with a music collection to hand on vinyl/CD it's hard to let that concept go. Definitely an age thing I think.....🧓

We had a great gig last night at Liverpool's Empire Theatre. Despite the long journey in pretty grim weather, it proved well worth it - around 1300 people in the audience which amazed us. A really historic venue that has put on a long list of great singers and bands over the years, including of course The Beatles. Always think of this when I'm singing 'Roll over Beethoven' on that same stage, (albeit quite a different version from theirs and Chuck's!!) Managed time to get a great pizza at the famous Ma Egerton's pub (near the stage door) before the gig too, so didn't have to walk far on a night of dreadful weather. Made it home around 2am, knackered today though.

It’s on the west pier, in fact the full name of the venue is The Lookout on the Pier. We play there one Sunday a month at present, and it’s a wonderful gig. Before it was up and running we also used to do The Watermark on the north bay, again a great venue previously run by the same people as The Lookout. I’ve played in Scarborough quite a lot over the years, and have worked with some amazing players there. Used to play at a great little pub called The Indigo Alley, bottom of N.Marine Rd. Also many good New Years Eve gigs at The Scarborough Spa as well as many other function do’s at all the major hotels. It’s only an hour’s drive from where I live, and always enjoy working there.

Interesting to see how the availability of reasonably priced CD players has seemingly diminished at a more rapid rate than the CD format itself. Assume that means these CDs are still in the main being played on ageing hi-fi / computer disc drives? (I’m wondering whether to buy a back up CD player to try and future proof my large CD collection. I’m reluctant to shell out more money to re-purchase my music collection again for a third time.) All our kids ( in their 30’s) don’t possess a CD drive at all, preferring not to own hard copies of music in favour of streaming. It’s just how things move on, but I’m hoping CDs will become retro and hip again at some point like vinyl has. I’ve still got some of my vinyl (which doesn’t get played) including a vast amount of singles (45’s) which I don’t know what to do with.

Another GK fan here. Started with an 800RB (which I still have), and have had a 700RB II and currently use the 1001RBII. All great amps IMHO, and am sure the big daddy 2001 will be awesome. Enjoy!