peteb

Much as I like a tort scratchplate, the mint looks just right with that shade of slightly darker LPB.

That looks really nice. Great colour - is that a mint scratchplate?

Personally, I would suggest having a chat with Jon Shuker

But you have those gigs in the diary. This lot are still rehearsing up a set, have no gigs booked and are nowhere near ready to gig. Not to mention that they may find themselves without a drummer...

I would just leave well alone and see where you are at the beginning of next year. Personally, I would be more worried about the attitude of the guitarists and if I was a drummer there was no way that I would play with them in the current situation. TBH the band sounds like a goner.

It's nearly 2022 already and the chances are you wouldn't be gigging much this year (or even the beginning of next year) even if you wanted to. Give the guy a break...

If she's singing BVs, then she's singing BVs - nothing wrong with that! Some of the greatest singers ever have been employed as backing vocalists, '20 Feet from Stardom' and all that...!

My gigging basses were all made in either America or Japan / America, amps from Poland or America (with a spare made in Italy) and cabs from America again. I'm not at all bothered about buying British these days, but I do think it's quite cool that the amp that I use live the most was handmade by a small company (in Poland as it happens).

Hi Greg, I downloaded the transcription and there's an error in the final part of each chorus (bars 7 to 10). This section should have a natural F (rather than F#) otherwise you find yourself playing a F# against the F chord, which I don't think is quite the harmony that you are intending!

The thing is that there is no bass on the verse, you just come in on the chorus. Sorry for ruining the joke by explaining it...

I think that this thread was derailed when it was suggested that it isn’t such a big thing if you don’t like the songs that you are being asked to play, because you don’t have to invest too much time in learning many pop songs. This has led to many people’s insecurities being exposed because they don’t have the skillset to actually learn stuff that quickly. I think that Tim has a rather singular way of viewing the world due to his rather unique personal experience of life, but in this case I actually agree with much of what he has said. Others are reading far too much into his comments and taking it personally. To get back on thread, I remember reading an article in some bass magazine many years where was an article by a guy you may have heard of, but isn’t well known enough for me to remember his name. He was saying that there are three criteria that he considers when he is deciding whether to do a project or not: the music, the money and the people involved. If two out of the three works for him then he will pursue the project. I think that is still pretty good advice…

Very true

You can rephrase it all you like mate. The bottom line is the better you are, the more likely you are to nail things after one listen and the better you will be at busking...

Lee Sklar plays small gigs with his friends in local bars when he's not on the road with big acts. Probably the same sort of gigs that you and I do! We have had a few sign up to Basschat, but they don't tend to stick around (although Guy Pratt & Neil Murray occasionally post).

That's great, you are trying to improve as a musician. The difference between someone like me, who's quite experienced and not a bad player, and the top session guys is mainly about their ears (rather than just technique, etc). I like to think that I've got a pretty good ear, but I had a lesson with a guy who plays one live with a world famous band and has done loads of session work and it's a different world. He hears nuances on the first listen that it would take me weeks to work out, if I ever did (and I'm better than most on these types of things). We are all trying to play at a higher level, which takes work and requires experience. But some guys are already there and they can nail things first time that we would take ages to get.

That my friend, depends on how good you are! That's one of the big differences between the not bad bass player you hear in a pub on a Saturday night and the really good pro...

That isn't going to happen, just as it is unlikely that you will be able to play many Beatles songs after one listen. However, there are loads of great songs that you definitely can!

Know your audience! Some friends of mine played in a pretty successful Rush tribute band for a few years. Not really my thing, but there is certainly an audience out there. In some pubs, Mustang Sally will be the highlight of the set, but in others you will hear an audible groan and see everybody heading for the bar!

Y'know what it was like back in those days? You would go out for a quiet pint on a Friday and then...

Absolutely. How do people think all the Nashville session guys work? They all listen to a demo of the track once and make a lead chart, play it through once so that the producer can make comments and the second time they play it, the red light is on! The guys who get the work are those who can come up with the right parts from scratch and get them down in the first couple of takes! I think that some people here would be shocked about how most pros work on lower profile / paying gigs. If you learn enough songs, you start to recognise the patterns and chord progressions. I once did a last minute dep with no preparation at all (I got the call mid-afternoon when I was halfway up a hill on a MTB). I just told the BL to make charts for all the songs and I would busk it. It was all simple stuff (Rocky Mountain Way, Boys of Summer, I Love Rock n’Roll, etc) and I had heard all of the songs, even if I hadn’t played most of them. I just hid the sheets on a chair behind the PA (note, no visible music stand)! It went well – the only real mistakes were one song where he had forgotten to put the bridge on the lead sheet and another (that I actually knew) when I stomped on a chorus pedal that had been set to stun, which was quite an interesting take on the original part! Now, if even I can get away with doing that, then imagine what the real titans of the bass world can do – y’know, guys like Sklar, Pino & TimR…

I think that people just have different approaches, but I think that some just get enamoured with new technology and it can become (like you said in a previous post) a solution desperately looking for a problem. I essentially have one sound that (with minor tweaks) I use for every gig I do, which range from AOR originals to blues bands to a Led Zeppelin tribute. I’m sill getting decent gigs, so it must be working to some extent. Virtually all of my peers / acquaintances still use amps, even the guys who are proper pros. The only reason I could see for someone like me to have a Helix would be if I had to get to gigs on the train. I am unlikely to ever be offered a gig where I would have to have a Helix or whatever, but there are plenty where I would be expected to bring an amp.

Led Zep tribute gig at the Victoria in Swindon last night. Great little venue (albeit with a 'challenging' sound onstage) and a decent turnout who were a very appreciative audience, so all-in-all a good night. Long drive home to West Yorkshire in the early hours of the morning, not helped by three diversions on the M5/ M6 and then leaving my mobile in the drummer's car…!

I believe that Guy has something similar, which does a 'reasonable facsimile' of the effects that he uses, but not something that he is going to take out on the road. Anyway, gotta chip - got to get down to Swindon for a gig (from West Yorkshire)...

That’s essentially true. Gear is just a part of how you sound, but it all starts with your fingers and if you haven’t got that bit right then it doesn’t matter what gear you have. I would always suggest that people get as good a bass as they can afford that feels right in their hands and is credible for the genres that they are going to play. As far as amps go, a lot of pros use gear like Hartke, nothing esoteric at all, because its reliable / does a job and the company give deals to pros like them. Audiences only care what the band as a whole sounds like (and what instruments look like to an extent). They will compare your band to the one they saw a couple of weeks ago, as well as the major acts they’ve seen over the years. No one comes up to me after a gig to say they liked how I subtly used compression to get the bass to sit in the mix – to them if it sounds good then job done, they don’t care about why it sounds like that. If you’re not playing Muse covers, then its pretty safe to say they don’t care what effects you’re using, just if it sounds right. Having said that, Guy Pratt has just posted pictures of his current live pedalboard on Facebook. I counted 17 pedals and not a MFX among them…!

I suppose it depends on what type of band and what type of player you are. I've got a Pedaltrain Jr for live work that holds my power supply, wireless receiver, compressor and tuner. It has also got a drive and a chorus pedal that I use (very occasionally) for some gigs as well as octave and filter pedals that I never use*...! * I say never, but I sometimes use the octave pedal for playing 'I Wanna Tear Your Playhouse Down' and the filter pedal for the Rhubarb & Custard theme that I sometimes muck about in soundchecks 🙂