tauzero

Never rely on the guitarist to find out fundamental information. Mrs Zero contacted Kilians to see if they would be able to supply PA (the guitarist had said that they had one but it wasn't very good and they preferred bands to bring their own). Turns out that they have a PA, which they'd prefer us to use, and they can also get us backline and a drum kit. So now we're looking at plan Q, which is go there and back by coach. Not the quickest transport solution, but it is cheap and means none of us have to drive.

Play a little flurry of notes in chromatic runs and rapidly don my beret, trusting that the audience will recognise jazz when they hear it.

[quote name='mart' post='1347785' date='Aug 22 2011, 09:38 AM']Really? Just how exactly does one fix this easily?[/quote] With a nammer.

We have hit a snag, in that the company we were going to hire a minibus from for £300 have stopped hiring them for European use due to a high nickage rate. Currently working on alternatives that aren't going to cost significantly more.

Our main driver for the German side is a courier so he's used to long driving stints. There will be three other drivers who could do this side of the Channel (and the other, come to that, though at least two of us haven't driven on the right). Gear's sorted, it would have been nice not to have to take the PA but that's life. Must remember to get some plug adaptors, it would be rather embarrassing to turn up and not be able to plug in...

A German friend of our (The Lightning's) guitarist Steve has multiple sclerosis, and we're going to Munich to play a couple of gigs to raise money for a wheelchair for her. It's something which also has quite a bit of meaning for Kaz and I - a good friend of hers from school days when we first met has MS, and has been in a residential home with very little mobility for a few years, and my first girlfriend recently got back in touch after 32 years, and it turns out she has just gone into the secondary progressive stage of MS. Some more on our little adventure at [url="http://www.thelightning.co.uk/munich.html"]http://www.thelightning.co.uk/munich.html[/url] And this is where we're playing: [url="http://www.kiliansirishpub.com/"]Kilian's Irish Pub[/url] We're going over by road, hiring a minibus and heading off under the Channel. Passports sorted, just under two weeks till the off...

All my bands do setup within an hour. Two are vocal PA and backline, but for the ceilidh band, everything goes through the PA (four instruments, one vocal mic, one mic for miscellaneous use). I do PA and my rig. Everyone else sorts themselves out.

I should be there. Think I'll bring a few Antoniotsais.

[quote name='TheRev' post='1343888' date='Aug 18 2011, 12:42 AM']I've just got home from the strangest gig I have ever done. 2 hours on the back of a carnival float in Weymouth, with the entire band dressed as Robin Hood.[/quote] That must have been very cosy. How many arms and legs did the costume have?

[quote name='PerfectionBG' post='1341685' date='Aug 16 2011, 11:28 AM']But thanks for letting me find out what everyone on here thinks a 'proper' bass should cost. Yes it should be one that feels right for you, but a £10 car-boot jobby would rarely be a gigging bassists bass-of-choice, where as Fenders and MusicMans have appeared at the last 10 bands I've seen live, gotta mean something right?[/quote] Indeed, it means bassists have very little imagination. I couldn't vote in this as there are several bands I'd go for - anything from £200 to £2500.

I'd be in for another one (having missed the last one with car problems).

Both covers bands are 4-piece, vocals, guitar, bass, drums. The vocalist in one of them can play guitar too but as yet hasn't - I think we might benefit from him playing on one or two tracks. A former band had two full-time guitarists plus the vocalist playing guitar on some songs too. It did actually work quite well.

Tune down to C (or BEAD) and use a capo if you need to have open strings at particular pitches Use a pitch shifter The third option, go into a deep sulk and announce that all songs have to be in standard tuning, is only allowed if you're a guitarist or vocalist

Avoid eating Warwicks made of wenge, as it's poisonous.

Isn't it nice to know that, whatever the variability of wood, all strings will always sound exactly the same, regardless of who they were made by, how they are constructed, how much they've been used, and how many grams of human detritus are lodged in their windings?

The Variax doesn't use MIDI, it's a DSP system (digital signal processing, same as you find in multieffects). It's slightly frustrating that they've missed the opportunity to include a feed for a 13-pin lead from the individual bridge saddles, it means I've had to put a MIDI pickup on too so I can go mad with silly sounds.

We're giving £280M a year to India. Perhaps they could afford that themselves if they stopped their nuclear weapons programme.

[quote name='AttitudeCastle' post='1332591' date='Aug 8 2011, 07:21 PM']Would you say they are decent? Might get a seven string one if another with a great big inlay on the fretboard comes up! (I love inlays and what not like that!)[/quote] I find them very playable, and they sound fine to my cloth ears. Keep an eye on the auctions rather than the BINs, although he only seems to be punting 5s out in the auctions at the moment - they're going for about £50 + £95 postage (plus about another 25% for VAT and duty), so you could get one for £200.

[quote name='icastle' post='1332949' date='Aug 8 2011, 11:24 PM']Riots and looting are usually exemptions on insurance policies. As for government compensation... not sure where you got that from... [/quote] I thought that riot wasn't an exclusion, war was. For example, [url="http://www.directlineforbusiness.co.uk/business-insurance/contents-insurance.htm"]Direct Line cover losses through riot.[/url] Where are you all getting your insurance?

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='1328315' date='Aug 5 2011, 09:40 AM']No I didn't intend to offend anyone and can't imagine how it could offend anyone but hey ho, it's impossible to say anything without offending someone isn't it.[/quote] You can't go poofy-footing around all the time.

[quote name='BigRedX' post='1323970' date='Aug 2 2011, 10:52 AM']I've not played a Variax Bass, but I have spent some time with the guitar versions (I was seriously contemplating a Variax Acoustic at one point). Unfortunately even a very average player like me could tell that although some of the sounds were excellent, as instruments from a playability PoV they were a bit pants really.[/quote] Oh. As someone who'd been playing guitar inadequately for 40 years, I'd say that my Variax 300 is fine in playability terms. I was not quite so impressed by the 500 or 600 (although the 600 does have a maple fretboard which would be better for string bending than the 300's rosewood board) and only briefly tried a 700 which felt awful. I use it for impersonating an acoustic, because it's ergonomically better suited to me than an actual acoustic, and it saves me switching between 6-string and 12-string.

[quote name='derrenleepoole' post='1325285' date='Aug 3 2011, 09:58 AM']Or one of these from Vietnam: [/quote] His earlier models looked like this: which was the 7-string version of Now he's gone over to his new style, which is the seven string version of this: I had to do a bit of fiddling with the nut and put in new pickups on my 7-string. It's got a lovely neck though. I must say, though, I do prefer the look of his older models.

The ridiculous Strat guy also has a [url="http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/fender-stratocaster-hendrix-zappa-relic-replica-strat-/120753935593?pt=UK_Musical_Instruments_Guitars_CV&hash=item1c1d7ed4e9"]"Hendrix replica" [/url]- surely it's a good idea to look at the guitars that your target replicee [1] plays, in which case he'd have seen that the way to replicate a Hendrix guitar for a right-hander is to a ) take a left-handed Strat and turn it upside down and b ) that's it. Also, in every picture of Hendrix playing that I've seen, his Strat is in immaculate condition. This "replica" isn't even a slightly convincing copy of the post-immolation Strat, which looks like this: [1] Replicant? Beware of Deckard...

[quote name='Chris2112' post='1324658' date='Aug 2 2011, 06:37 PM']It makes me wonder - who the hell buys these things new?[/quote] I did. Though that was 1987.