tauzero

[quote name='flyfisher' post='991771' date='Oct 17 2010, 11:06 PM']"Imagine a perfect world" Ah, but who's idea of a perfect world, that is the question.[/quote] It's where the perfectly spherical cows beloved of science problem setters live.

[quote name='Protium' post='991716' date='Oct 17 2010, 10:18 PM']Who is Stanley Clarke?[/quote] A famous dead science fiction writer who speaks in gobbledygook.

[quote name='chaypup' post='991959' date='Oct 18 2010, 09:15 AM']Why can't we just have a Bass Player World Cup? Invite every bass player in the world, pitch them against each in a series of comps and then the eventual winner can be undisputed.[/quote] There may be slight logistical problems involved with getting John Entwistle, Jaco Pastorius, Bernie Edwards, and James Jamerson involved.

I should be there.

I am generally happy to share gear. I try to avoid buying fragile amps like Ampegs (these seem to be the most cited in threads about some other bassist blowing up one's rig). I lime to think that if a promoter says that I can borrow someone else's amp that that is actually true, though I do tend to stick my amp (not my cab) into the car so I can use it just in case. Generally just saying that you've got your own amp with you is sufficient for a fellow bassist to tell you that it won't be necessary. And if someone else was using my gear, I would expect them to treat it properly - any perching of beer on top of it would be immediately corrected...

[quote name='Bassassin' post='988145' date='Oct 14 2010, 03:48 PM']Like I said several (hundred) pages back - if you're a bassist in an originals band, nine times out of ten you'll be playing music that someone else has written anyway.[/quote] Which would you find more frustrating - playing in a covers band, or playing in an originals band that played original music written by another member of the band but not original music (of at least as high a standard) written by you?

[quote name='Jean-Luc Pickguard' post='988512' date='Oct 14 2010, 10:08 PM']You want to avoid the bass player from obviously 5 believers especially when he's armed with an ashbory, LMII & Schroeder 1212L.[/quote] Don't you find the Ashbory a little light to get a good swing with? I keep trying to wind myself up to the point of actually building one which would be nice and solid, ideal for those rapid blows that you can't get in with a more clumsy full-size bass. Does anyone else find that a 36" scale slows their swing down too much?

[quote name='4 candles' post='988463' date='Oct 14 2010, 09:42 PM']some punk keys waller from leeds uni, 4 years into his degree gets lost soloing over "mustang sally" !!!! guitar player "4 years at leeds" has the contempt to not even listen to "celebration by cool and the gang", shows up and cant read the charts, or even remotely play the tune. w***er[/quote] That's all very well, but the first one's degree was in biochemistry and the second one's was in Russian.

Two covers bands One originals band that does the occasional cover One Trad Arr band One acoustic duo that for any one gig will range between all originals and all covers

The singer (who is also rhythm guitarist) writes the lyrics and a fair bit of the guitar part, the lead guitarist writes some guitar parts, I make some suggestions about where to go with chords. I'm feeling it a little frustrating as I've also got a fair number of songs what I have wrote and would like to get at least looked at by the band but it never seems to happen. I've also just written a tune for the ceilidh band, my first attempt at diddly-diddly music. It's all Mrs Zero's fault, for the initial play-in tune she wrote "Up to you chaps" on the set list, so we decided to write a tune called "Up to you chaps"...

[quote name='lanark' post='987699' date='Oct 14 2010, 09:00 AM']How on earth is that electro-acoustic?[/quote] It's a bit like a Polo mint. The body has a big hole in it, the beige bit in the middle is some sort of crappy melamine cover for it, and there's a slightly better-looking bit of wood (or simulated grain melamine) covering the back of the cavity. If only he'd used some pretty wood on the middle bit, that would have been gorgeous. Mind you, it's only got four strings so I wouldn't have been tempted.

[quote name='Bassassin' post='983934' date='Oct 10 2010, 11:15 PM']Anyway an interesting example - and not just for the spectacularly erm, interesting spelling.[/quote] The spelling is quite origonal? And his approach to punctuation is a little unusual too? I imagine him as speaking with that irritating lift at the end of sentences? Looking at that chip out of the nut end of the fingerboard, and reading the bit about needing a new "trust rod nut", my own trust is that there has been a degree of butchery for which the nut was removed and subsequently replaced. I wouldn't be surprised to find that a degree of percussive maintenance had been perpetrated.

If only it was fretless.

[quote name='Legion' post='974207' date='Oct 1 2010, 03:40 PM']In essence, its a pity that 40% would drive you from the pub but does that mean we should all stop trying?[/quote] Of course not, but I wanted to put some sort of perspective on this, that just because a band is an originals band doesn't mean it's any good, or, even if it is good within its selected genre, that I would want to listen to that genre.

Could I appeal against the decision?

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='974082' date='Oct 1 2010, 02:38 PM']I think people in cover bands don't realise that people playing originals aren't doing it to "get famous". Maybe they've been playing covers for so long that they've forgotten what it's like to play music for fun instead of for money. They could do to join an originals band and be reminded of why they started playing instruments in the first place.[/quote] So that they can piss off audiences with dreadful songs? We have a local Battle of the Bands annually. I review the bands and use the pub system to summarise them: Bands I'd actually bother travelling to a pub to watch Bands I'd go to the pub that they were playing in if I happened to be nearby Bands I'd pop in to see if I was in the pub next door Bands I'd stay to see if I was already in the pub Bands I'd leave the pub to avoid At least 40% fall into the last category. Of about a 30 band entry, typically one or two would be bands I'd consider going to see, two or three would be bands I'd pop in to see if I was nearby, ten or so would be ones I'd stay to see, and the remainder would drive me from the pub. I would probably stay in the pub if a covers band played, as long as they were competent and played music that was reasonably to my taste (that covers John Denver to the Sex Pistols, so odds are that I won't be offended). I started playing instruments so I could make pleasant noises. I started writing songs because I thought I could add to the canon of good songs in the world, not so I could supplant it.

[quote name='BottomEndian' post='973879' date='Oct 1 2010, 01:06 PM']That's cheap capos, I should hasten to add. There are all sorts of [url="http://www.g7th.com/capos/performance"]more expensive capos[/url] that purport to exert only the necessary pressure, but I have yet to meet a guitarist who has one.[/quote] For my acoustic guitar stuff (which is actually mostly done on a Variax electric), I use a G7 capo, as does a folky guitarist that I know. No tuning issues. I suspect that it's not just the capo itself but also could be the technique used to put the capo on.

[quote name='Twigman' post='973869' date='Oct 1 2010, 01:00 PM']Most originals bands give up before they get the opportunity to experience this - I'd agree. .....but what if they hadn't given up?[/quote] Most of them still won't experience it because they're crap. I enjoy playing good songs, whoever wrote them. I also enjoy creating basslines, which I get more freedom to do in the originals band (and, come to that, in the ceilidh band, which is a "trad. arr." band).

Blues/rock covers band: very rocked-up version of "Stuck in the middle" Ceildh band - "Jennie Lind" and "Grandfather's" (it's probably called "Grandfather's summat-or-other" but I can't remember ever being told what summat-or-other is). Originals band and pop/rock covers band are still building the set so the first number is fluid. Acoustic duo - we change the set every gig as we normally only do eight or nine numbers of 40+, so it could be anything. To those who complain about the set list changing, I'd say that doing the same set in the same order two or three times a month for two or three years is painful. If you're stuck in that situation, sack whoever it is that couldn't be arsed to introduce new songs to the set.

I'd be interested, especially if it was a bit northwestish of London, eg Milton Keynes, Oxford, Aaah Bicester.

[quote name='The Burpster' post='962937' date='Sep 21 2010, 07:58 AM']The 'isnt quite right' option is a right bugger to find.[/quote] Fodera will do it for you for $749.

[quote name='Musicman20' post='970494' date='Sep 28 2010, 11:23 AM']I never realised there were as many legal orientated basschatters on here! I no longer feel odd.[/quote] What astonishes me is that at £175 an hour, they're spending time on Basschat...

[quote name='Mark Latimour' post='969332' date='Sep 27 2010, 12:15 PM']WHilst I would probably have to get Jason from Fodera to explain it better than I could, I can imagine why they charge what they do for a pickguard: IIRC there are only 3 or 4 buidlers at FOdera (and I believe only 3 who actually work on the basses). If someone is spending an hour making a hand cut pickguard, that's a hour that they are not spending on a making an actual bass. I'd imagine that the pricing reflects the fact that the builder's time has been unitised and they now assign a time cost charge to each "option".[/quote] So how does that work with a lined fretless, where they use exactly the same slots that they'd have cut for the frets to go into and stick either some veneer or some wood putty in and then flat the surface with the same radius block they used earlier (and charged $1000 for using if it wasn't the one that they normally use), saving them the time that it would take to put the frets in, trim them, true them up, stone them, crown them etc? A net saving in luthier time for which the customer is charged $499. Does this mean that Fodera actually charge a negative hourly rate for some tasks?

[quote name='w...' post='969405' date='Sep 27 2010, 01:04 PM']More importantly it was my first ever gig My live playing cherry has been popped, roll on the next gig, I like the rush!![/quote] Congratulations. It's a great experience, playing live.

Bear with me, this gets there in the end... Went to a bike breakers that I knew and noticed a few bits in there that looked familiar (Yamaha XS650 wheels with a slightly odd pair of tyres as it happens). Turned out that someone had brought in a job lot of stuff and sold it to them. I asked them to keep it on one side (they knew me so they obliged) and headed off to my lockup garage - which had been broken into. Among the bits nicked was my Ohm 1x15 cab which I was storing in there because I wasn't using it at the time. So I reported it to the police, and then got on with my own detective work. The second second-hand shop I rang was run by someone I knew from a long time back. I asked about the cab and he'd got it in the shop, along with some other stuff. He'd also got the registration number of the car which had brought the stuff. So I got the cab (and other stuff) back, and there was a prosecution (unsuccessful as the magistrates were stupid enough to accept the story that the seller had bought the stuff in good faith). Off on a complete tangent, that reminded me that the serial numbers of the Laney PB150 head I had at the time and the Ohm cab were identical. Now there's a coincidence...