uk_lefty

I guess I did this but it wasn't as straightforward as simply a better opportunity. I had become really close friends with the band over the five years and felt really bad about leaving, but I had to. There were lots of contributing factors: Set list barely changed in five years; Arguments over what to put in the set list, which links to it being more about what some of the guys wanted to play Vs what worked for our audience; Playing random gigs hours away for little or no pay, but not happy about playing for good money forty minutes from home; Rehearsal time being spent mostly on waiting for singer and drummer to arrive, forty mins drummer set up, then fag break, then a little bit of rehearsal before next fag break; Being awkward with gig enquiries, only wanting to do the same gigs for people they already knew... So we spend all our gigs playing the same set to the same people; All of those things built up and led me to quit. The final straw for me was a gig being booked on a date everyone knew I was away. With no rehearsal. I found out about the gig through a Facebook post. So I wished them luck with the gig and advised they get a dep because I was, as in the diary and as I had answered when asked, away at a friend's wedding. I auditioned for another band, got the gig, then quit the first band. It was the best thing I could have done. I am now setting up an 80s band with the guitarist from band number 1, four years or so after quitting. He and and another have come to a handful of my gigs. The story among the first band is that I was never available for gigs and I was holding them back... Well, if you count missing one gig because we had a baby due around that time and another because someone booked and announced a gig despite knowing I was away... Anyhow, all water under the bridge. I saw the one who had the biggest issue with it all a few weeks back and it's all good. The silly thing is with the first band I was really close with them all. It's just that two of four of them were great friends but not great band mates.

That dent is odd, and no mention of it in the description! It's a nice looking bass for sure.

https://ebay.us/m/hwxR17 Interesting looking bass! I have no idea if the price is right, just a quirky looking thing.

Auditioning a singer turns out to be harder than you think... We've still not done it. Undeterred we will continue with the guitarists friend providing vocals for now while we get the songs tight. We had a vote on the rest of the songs to learn, each band member given a list of 80 songs and a scale of 1-5 to score the songs. 1 = I'd rather quit than play this; 5 = we absolutely MUST do this. There was some interesting patterns in the data, but it has given us a solid top 10 to work through next. Practice tonight. Can't wait

This is quite long... Basically, these are really good if you're a beginner in the world of IEM. Just in case anyone is wondering what these are like... A few weeks back Thomann were doing a deal on IEM kits. Not huge discounts but enough to tempt me into it. I have said in the past that I wouldn't go IEM, I felt I would feel disconnected, not be able to hear the audience feedback, we'd have nobody to check if FOH sound was any good... Well, curiosity got the better of me. I bought some Sure SE215 earphones for £85 and the T-Bone IEM 75 for £125. These were the special offer prices and the exchange rates are the time. Thomann threw in some cleaning kit for the earphones, I also didn't realise that the T-Bone system came with its own earphones. I tried the earphones at home, I've heard so much about custom molds, number of drivers... These just sounded bl00dy good plugged into my multi-fx. They're comfortable, with memory foam squishy bits to stick in your ear hole and moulded plastic to sit snug within the ear. Cannot fault them. I tested them out on a recent gig where we had a pro sound engineer at the venue and a big stage. I don't have a wireless for the bass anymore so just a long lead, but I could wander around freely. The T-Bone is dead easy to set up, I just put it on top of my amp so it had good lone of sight to my receiver. The receiver is a nice little unit that clips to your belt or guitar strap, takes two AA batteries that had no problem in a 2hr gig. I didn't get to test the range over more than five metres but it was fine for that. Sound quality... What I noticed was that by using this set up I still got enough ambient noise through that I could hear the audience and didn't feel disconnected. In my ears I needed to turn the volume up to a sweet spot where I got all the instruments through the earphones, I started off dead low and turned up slowly, initially thinking I had one of the guitars missing from the mic but I just needed to get to the right spot. Through the gig I had the vocals absolutely crystal clear and I wasn't straining to hear lead guitar or backing vox as I sometimes do with monitor mixes. I was able to have my bass amp a lot lower on stage volume than usual too. After the gig my head felt so much clearer than when I play with a monitor mix and custom earplugs. It felt like a real game changer. I played the next week at a gig without IEMs just to feel the difference and for this weekend both gigs will go through IEMs. I'm pretty sure that the T-Bone and Sure set up is akin to playing a Harley Benton bass through a Fender Rumble 15. It's great for its price point, very usable, but more expensive kit will bring out more nuance. Right now, I don't need that nuance, I'm just enjoying what I've got! Transportation-wise I just received a £20 flight case off Amazon that I've been able to get the set up into very snug.

Still looking... 346 views but no replies

This sounds like something I should do. Would save me a lot of cash in the long run!

Third session with the drummer and guitarist, second with our multi instrumentalist sax/ keys player. It's coming together nicely, of course song endings where the originals have fade outs and tricky bridge sections are a bit ragged but the core foundations of all the songs on the list are there. Meeting up every second week feels good for learning songs thoroughly and at our own pace. Having a live sax player in the room doing "the heat is on", "Maneater" and "careless whisper" is just bliss. Singer options are drying up, we really only have one so we are putting a lot of hope into this one guy... Having said that, the guitarist's girlfriend has sung at the last two sessions. She's never sang with a band before or through a mic and though she's sometimes a bit flat, etc. she is better than a lot of cover band singers I hear. So we always have her on hand! We are going to book a gig in for early January to put fire under our feet to get sorted with a solid set list and get tighter as a unit. There's a venue we know well, we will offer to do it for free on a random night so it's kind of a soft launch/ pressurised rehearsal.

Yeah I had the Hohner quite a few years back... I am hoping for an Aria SB to appear for the right price or even an old headless Status

Hi, the one for sale is mine. Depending on whereabouts you're located you're welcome to have a go on it before committing (or not) to buying

There isn't a "wow" emoji.... That is special!

Yeah, it's a fine looking bass but that's brand new Status money so.........

I know this is not the wanted section but being left-handed is a bit niche so... I've started up an 80s band, but this time it's going to last! So, I'm on the lookout for an 80s style bass: Status, Washburn Status, Aria SB, Ibanez Musician or something similar... If anyone has anything they are considering selling, or knows of something up for sale somewhere please let me know!