KevB

Yep, think they've been doing that approach with new acts for quite a while.

Yes theres a venue near me that the singer checked out (but I knew the score there anyway) where they want you to play before they give you a gig. Fortunately it's not a full gig, they just want to look at bands they don't know at their open mic first to check them out. It's fair enough if you are an unknown quantity. Unfortunately 3 band members live so far away from the venue that the chances of them making a midweek open mic are pretty much zero. I recall its not a well paying venue anyway which is one reason I've never played there.

I know he wasn't a bass player but I thought his passing shouldnt go unnoticed (unless Ive missed it elsewhere, sorry). Terrific drummer in his day.

Well you are essentially playing as a trio, the other guy is irrelevant. It's OK, if you found a keys player it could be a tight combo. The only thing I would struggle with is if it was all Evis and/or Buddy Holly.

It's not that surprising though and as some players get famous and rely more and more on their techs you get the impression from some of their 'rig run down' videos that they arent totally sure exactly what does what and why any more but they 'have someone that takes care of all that'. It's fair enough, frees up time to concentrate on the actual playing and performance rather than getting bogged down with the technicalities.

Looks like there is a virtual JV1080 available as well but it's not clear if it is just the equiv of the basic original unit or if they have included patches from expansion boards. The online blurb just refers to 'over 1000 waveforms' which isn't all that helpful, may look into it further when I get chance. Edit it looks like they are selling at as a 'cloud' downloadable on a monthly subscription which works out way more than I'm prepared to pay so think it's back to the hardware vs for me.

The thing that I liked about the sound canvas is that it seems to contain a lot of patches. My JV1080 has expansion boards fitted for 60s/70s keys, vintage synths and orchestral and all my 'patches' are actually in performance mode where I've mixed multiple patches to get the sound I like, so the sound canvas having 1600 or so of the original Roland sounds on it would make it very easy to recreate my current sounds from a virtual version. If there are potential reliability issues with set ups like this then I'll probably stick with what I have (though I wouldnt be using the tablet for anything like PA mixing which would probably eliminate some of the issues you have had). Thanks for the report.

Sorry, missed the ref to iM1. Curious if anyone's tried virtual sound canvas though. Theres a limited function 14 day trial version available if I get time I might download a copy and see if it could do a job. I do like the dependability of my JV1080 in a rack case but it's a lump of kit to haul about and I have to use the little expander box with it too. Some very nice patches on it though.

That's the beauty of the 12 step with it's associated editor software, you don't have to follow the standard conventional keyboard layout at all. You could have completely unrelated (in terms of how a normal keys layout would be) chords mapped to adjacent buttons, you just have to get used to remembering where each is. For instance if your song backing happened to need (purely randome off top of head) Am then Gmaj then F#7th then Cmaj you could programme each of those in turn on just any 4 adjacent 'buttons' and you just tread on each in turn as it's needed in order. I'm not a techie nor do I have any real theory behind me but I managed it.

I don't want to derail the thread but has anyone tried any of the 'virtual' sound modules with a 12 step? I was thinking of something like this It's 115 Euro on Roland web site. I'm a bit old school but the possibility of running sounds straight off a tablet and removing the intermediate enhancer box is tempting.

Yeah, don't think they are ever going to be that busy though. One gig booked in August but as you say most places are booked out until Jan now.

Think I know which you mean. Been trying to pin down the manager there for a gig date for weeks. Never answers emails, tries to avoid any communication with public unless he's forced into pulling pints for them when the other staff are snowed under (rare).

One thing that tends to get overlooked with this type of kit is the importance of the sounds themselves. Fortunately the quality of patches has much improved over the years but there's no point having a good triggering system if the sounds coming out of the speakers are weak. It's like paying good money for a quality bass and coupling it with a rig that can only make it sound like a wasp in a jar.

I have started in a band that does Another Brick so I got the chord progression for the keyboards under the guitar solo (we do it in the original Dminor) and programmed them into various positions on a McMillan 12 step. That's one good thing about the 12 step over, say, Roland PK5's. You can programme a particular patch on the McMillan so that any 'note button' can sound up to 5 different notes and they don't have to obey a normal keyboard layout in relation to each other either. If lechirons wants to PM an email address I can send him an invite to a dropbox where I can leave a demo of me playing them over the solo when we were messing about in rehearsal a few weeks back.

No shots of Pink Floyd? disappointed.

^^ For electric rock gigs particularly, this. Singer in latest band still brings his phone to rehearsals for checking lyrics but if he thinks he will be doing it regularly at gigs I will be having words.

Journey's current singer was from a trib and I think when Thijs van Leer wanted to get Focus back as a touring band he basically went out and recruited members of a Focus trib (though another original member subsequently rejoined). Tim 'Ripper' Owens selected from a Judas Priest trib when Rob Halford left for a while. The story is used as the basis for a film.

In a rather amusing 'life imitating art' (or at least tributes) moment I read the other day that Mike Campbell is now on board with Neil Finn in Fleetwood Mac. There's a guy who's both Lyndsay Buckingham and Mike Campbell in FM and Tom Petty tributes respectively. Seen him in both and both were excellent acts. Never done a trib myself but wouldnt knock it back if the venues were good and it was a band I was genuinely into. Don't think he's posted on the thread but one of our members is in the brilliant Kate Bush trib 'Cloudbusting'.

Does sound possibly like casual servce. Alternatively stash the Elf in the car glove box and if you end up anywhere likely to have a music shop take it along, then you know exactly what your amp sounds like with whatever cab you test it with.

Probably not...

A couple of entries, hope they havent been posted before. One of the most haunting TV themes ever... Then there's this oddity by Dave Greenslade no less from a little remembered drama series set in the Midlands, the original album version is instrumental only but they put words to it for the TV show reworked version :

Because every so often something comes up which I hadn't heard about elsewhere and looks worth investigating. Sadly its been a case of diminishing returns for a few series now.

Spondon, its a shame if the Derby thing has gone I really intended to pop over one week then got sidetracked looking for a new band. As for those chesnuts yes I've played Red House, Hey Joe and Mustang Sally at jams. The big difference is that no one ever got up to dance to the first two. I'll hold my hands up to the occasional Stormy Monday as well...

I didn't bother recording the last series as I found myself FFWing so much I just dipped into it on the iplayer instead. Looks like that'll be the plan this series too.

There was always a house band at the local one I went to most after moving to the area I'm in now in 2007. That's when they worked best. House band did a short spot to get the thing rolling then one or more house band members would either sort out time slots of already functioning bands who came as a unit to play or sort individuals out into on the spot bands (filling in if there werent enough of a particular muso around) or the house band acts as a backing band for someone just wanting to get up and sing. Sometimes we'd have to get a singer to come back the following week if it was something obscure we needed to go away and learn.