peteb

Young female (and male) musicians will most likely be on other social media platforms, rather than on a forum like Basschat. Like it or not, music (especially ensemble playing to the public) has been dominated by men throughout the centuries, going back to strolling minstrels in the medieval period. That's not to say that there hasn't always been female musicians, because there always have been, but it has historically been a male dominated arena. I think that it is great that artists like Ms DeTiger are getting recognition and have the potential to inspire young women to play instruments like bass, but those who want to become gigging musicians will have to develop a thick skin and not be too bothered by negative comment if they are to survive, just as young male musicians have to. It isn't for those who are easily offended or upset.

A guitarist not bringing a spare is unforgivable - I've gigged for more than 45 years and only once broken a bass string, while I've played gigs where the guitar player has broken three strings on one show (fortunately he had a couple of spare guitars and the guitarist from the other band changed a string for him while he was playing the other guitar). I will nearly always bring a spare bass, but on the occasional gig it just isn't practical. Whenever I find myself obliged to bring just one bass, I make sure that it is a passive.

Fortunately I had a spare and no one noticed that any thing was wrong!

Yep, a couple of times - wiring problems (last time was when a wire had come lose when I had just changed batteries, for a main stage gig at a big bike rally in front of 2,000 people).

But it is and always has been, same as any artistic pursuit (or even sporting for that matter)!

To be fair, it's just one guy saying "she's a girl and she isn't as good as Marcus Miller, it's all woke innit"! Everyone else is saying that it's a positive thing that she's up there as an potential inspiration to young female bassists. If your niece (or nephew as well for that matter) is going to make their way as a musician they will need a much thicker skin than allowing themselves to get upset by this type of nonsense.

Surely an element of diversity is essential in order for anything to survive and thrive - that's just how nature works...

I've never heard of her before, so I had a quick listen to a couple of minutes of the OP's clip. She might not be another Marcus Miller, but she's way above a 'reasonably competent player at an intermediate level' - sounds like a very competent pro to me. Of course she's got a signature bass because she's a 'marketable player'! As @Burns-bass says above, more young girls are getting interested in playing bass than before and Fender probably see her as someone who might be inspiring to any girl starting out playing bass, who may then aspire to her Fender signature model. Image has always been a factor in success in popular music and it always makes me laugh when any half decent looking woman who manages to break through and get a high profile gig gets comments along the lines of she only got the gig because of the way she looks - do you really think that Nikki Sixx would have his own signature model if he looked like Blakey from On The Busses?

I'm sure that is the most likely outcome. The Gary Moore example shows that the insurers cover themselves even when you would think that the artist has a pretty good case. You have to wonder what the insurance contract for the Oasis reunion is like...! 🙂 I suppose that it's no great surprise, given that the JA situation has been highly dysfunctional since the early days. Ferrell engineered events so that he had the other members over a barrel and they had to agree that he got the vast majority of the money from their initial success. I'm sure that he won't be overly happy that the other members all went on to have pretty successful careers after they broke up, while his solo ventures didn't exactly set the world on fire.

I wonder if the statement is the start of a process where Farrell goes into therapy / rehab or whatever in an attempt to get the insurance to pay out on medical grounds? It is very likely to end up in the courts. I remember that Gary Moore nearly went bankrupt when he had to cancel a tour when he injured his hand and the insurance didn't pay up (the reason why he had to sell the famous 'Greeny' Les Paul and a load of his other vintage guitars).

To be honest, that was my first thought - it's gonna cost them a lot of money! Things must be bad if they can't even manage to manage the situation to finish the tour (and thereby manage to avoid bankruptcy)...!

That's a cool little amp rack. I dunno what the power amp is like, but I would be happy with either of those preamps!

Dunno about that, but a great band back in their day!

Except in this case, the bass player put the singer in a headlock, gave him three quick bodyshots and then went and apologised to the crowd for the disruption!

Buck's Fizz - it all makes sense now! 😉

I started playing with my fingers, switched to a pick for six or seven years in the 80s and then back to fingers in 1990. I've no idea what picks I used all those years ago, only that I never felt 100% comfortable using them compared to fingers.

Pinetop Perkins carried on gigging until he died at the age of 99 and still had nearly a year's worth of bookings in the diary when he passed away!

It depends on not only how well they look after their voice, but also on the type of voice they have. Your Steve Perry type of vocalist are always going to struggle as they get older, where Sting, as good a singer as he is, hasn't got that kind of range and power that he has to maintain. A great singer like Tony Bennett didn't retire until just after his 95th birthday, whereas Steve Perry has done very little since his late 40s, but Tony didn't have to move the air and hit the notes that a high tenor like Perry does.

We're all getting older (including the audience), but there's many of us who will keep going as long as we can make it onto a stage! It is undoubtedly more of an issue for vocalists, especially the ones blessed with an outstanding voice. A couple of years ago we had to replace a singer in his late 50s because he realised that he just couldn't do it consistently anymore. We replaced him with a guy who is only a year younger, but still has the range and power that he always had (even though we are tuning down one at his request). There is no sign that he is struggling at all, but will he still be able to do it in ten years time? I'm sure that I will still be gigging, same with the guitarist, but will the singer still be out there?

Now that's a surprise! However, the masses have spoken and you appear to be in a minority (albeit a very vocal one).

Doesn't matter - we all know that Oasis are derivative. However, to millions of people they were the songs of their youth / a better time. Hence the reaction from an audience that you see whenever some pub band plays one of those songs. Here's Live Forever - knock yourself out...

I think that you are right there. After Live Aid, the industry started to see everything in terms of major events, where the event was more important than the music. As streaming started to destroy income streams from releasing albums, there was a move to make more money from huge concerts with high ticket prices, rather than long tours of smaller gigs to promote the new album. As albums were not making much money, why invest in developing a band? You can always find a stream of unremarkable, low maintenance, marionette type singers, put them with a tame producer and get a greater part of the publishing revenues and so on.

That's because Supergrass never wrote Live Forever, Don't Look Back In Anger or Half The World Away! But that's the way that it used to work back then. A band would slog around unnoticed for ages and then the industry would suddenly decide they were the next big thing and there would be a feeding frenzy as none of the industry players / labels would want to miss out. Many bands would then disappear just as quickly as they suddenly appeared. Oasis were packing out gigs like the Duchess in Leeds, as well as many other northern venues before the industry hype started.

I'm not too bothered about whether you're a fan or not, more about the context and the reaction that some people have to Oasis and certain other bands. A lot of my friends love Rush, but I don't like their music at all. However, I don't hate them! I'm a 60 yo Van Halen / Led Zep fan who plays in classic rock tributes and a few blues type bands. I am not your typical Oasis fan at all and my favourite music tends to come from the late 70s / early 80s rather than Britpop. However, I can appreciate that they were one of the last big rock and roll bands, that they made it all happen coming from a council estate in Manchester rather than some stage school or being a public schoolboy whose Dad knew someone who worked for a record company, and that they had some genuinely great tunes that really caught the public's imagination! They also came from a time when the country was in a far better state, so there is the inevitable nostalgia thing kicking in!