uk_lefty

Watched some YouTube music videos yesterday and came across a few "upside down" guitar necks, a nod to Jimi no doubt. These were all around the 80s I reckon.... But the question is are they cool or not? And why? And would you?

Enjoyed that, never really taken the time to check out Meshell. Any album recommendations of hers?

Wouldn't recommend defretting it, partly because Warwick make everything in both fretted and fretless so should be easy to get a purpose built fretless. If you're really not sure try finding a cheapo fretless five Harley Benton or SX or something to see if you get on with it then invest more or minimise losses as appropriate. I took the plunge on a fretless five for my eighteenth birthday (quite a long time ago now!) It was a massive gamble but being a lefty it was my only affordable opportunity to try a fretless, plus I'd been listening to pearl jam "ten" a lot! Never regretted it and for years it was my only bass. You can play a fretless without sliding the notes for "mwaaaah" but you can't get "mwaaaah" from a fretted...

Definitely one of the more open minded band ads

So sick of this issue cropping up on eBay, it is just stupid! I always find being polite but firm, such as offering to call the luthier myself if they can say which one it has gone to, usually gets met with silence. Had this from a guy who bought a knackered bass off me on eBay. It was knackered, I put photos up of where it was knackered and made it clear it was knackered. Guy pays eighty quid, receives bass, two weeks later says it needs twenty quid of electrics work. He didn't realise I used to live in his home town so when I asked where he was having the work done he couldn't name the shop, so I directed him to one and said I'd call them to check it out but never offered to pay. He never got back to me. A few months later he had the bass up on eBay after an awfully bad attempt at de-fretting with the description "...I have owned this bass trouble free for many years". C0ck.

The G&L website occasionally sells necks and other bits as seconds for stupidly low prices. I bought a lefty all maple tribute neck, shipped and taxed from USA for about sixty quid IIRC. It's worth a look every now and then

When my band starts to earn me more than my day job it can take priority... That will be never. Can you get more advanced notice of possible gigs to try and manage your work and leave further ahead or are they mostly coming last minute? Don't know your work schedule but if it clashes with prime gigging time might be best to use your work schedule to drive when the band can and can't gig, where possible

True. Was just trying it out to see if it worked or not. It's a technique I'd like to learn over time but not sure where to go with it in terms of note choice, etc. Agree it's not the right fit for the full length of this song in this recording

[quote name='paul_c2' timestamp='1476893099' post='3158211'] Do you have a recording with the bass isolated? [/quote] No its just a zoom mic in the middle of the room. That's also only about the second play through of the song we did together so we were all finding our way

Thanks guys, have always struggled with double-thumb but never gave it much time to get it right, will get back to that. My band want me to play slap, I'd like to be able to, but only want to do it where it adds something. In that recorded jam there's an octave run that I think works, then a breakdown where everything goes a bit quiet and I play a slap fill, I think that's enough for the song and live I have played it almost entirely finger style. Thank you for the feedback, always good to have another view on things

[quote name='ras52' timestamp='1476884508' post='3158090'] Cool! [/quote] Nice one

My uncle loved music and I think I inherited my love of music from him. One birthday he didn't know what to get me so he bought me the best of sting and the police. I wasn't too impressed at the time but grew to absolutely love the song writing and of course the baselines. My brother then bought me a police box set some years later and I love it. Such great song writing.

Am sure there's loads of these but here goes... I'm trying very hard to improve on my funk and this includes slap. There is a song we dropped from our set because I wasn't happy with the slap part, found it too difficult to sound good while slapping. With my band we play a 90s dance track but with a bit of an edge to it. Here's one of our early rehearsal efforts on soundcloud (link copied below). I would welcome any feedback on the slap sections of the song. It's not a technique I claim to be anywhere near proficient at and though I think some of this is passable I'd like some constructive feedback on note choice and timing, or anything else! I do find note choice hard beyond octaves and dead notes to be honest... All views welcome. https://m.soundcloud.com/white-collar-fraud/step-it-up-best-ver

The 48 looks amazing. There's a great video on YouTube with a thorough review, apparently it's a great all rounder and even a good slap bass if that's your thing. Certainly one I would consider if I was in the market at that price point.

[quote name='PaulGibsonBass' timestamp='1476802742' post='3157381'] Yes, I loved his bassline on Poison Arrow. If it actually was him, it might've been Trevor Horn. [/quote] Quality song and baseline!!

[quote name='Bonin-in-the boneyard' timestamp='1476712840' post='3156527'] [b] Ibanez ATK 300[/b] www.zikinf.com/annonces/dispannonce.php?annonce=1340123 [/quote] Wtf?!??! I didn't even know those existed

On my precision it's on full except the rare occasion I play a song or section with a pick, then it gets turned down a touch.

Very good price. I had the same one but with flame maple body. Excellent instrument and wish I'd had more patience with it. This one also seems to have gold hardware which is a nice touch. Warwick black label strings sound great on these

Love playing with my band,it makes me nervous, excited, happy, feeling accomplished and feeling like I have created something when we work out our own version of a cover song. It has only ever felt stale when I had no band and learning new songs or playing old ones for no purpose.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1476452795' post='3154468'] As one of those "Random Players" I can confirm that the "interview" is simply a set of questions that they email to you and you send them back the replies, hence the cut-and-paste nature of the section and the somewhat silted replies. I thought carefully about what I was going to say and then got Mr Venom to spice my answers up a bit before sending them back, but it still came out somewhat stilted. [/quote] Don't get me wrong, I would love to be invited for such a thing (it will never happen) but without context of knowing the band or music style it's hard to read and enjoy. It has never once made think of looking up a band because some has said something interesting there and that probably does the interviewee some disservice. Or I'm a miserable stuck in the mud (yes I am).

[quote name='Bonin-in-the boneyard' timestamp='1476452269' post='3154458'] Jaco Bass http://www.guitarguitar.co.uk/left_guitars_detail.asp?stock=160308295924002 [/quote] When I win the lottery I'll not only buy it but invest the same amount of money in lessons to do it justice...

I'm not renewing my subscription this time round because I find it a bit weak really. I think it used to be every second month instead of monthly and the content was better. But now I find the interviews with the most random players at the front of the mag annoying "I don't slap cos it sucks" "I play with my heart man, I don't even know where E is!" And other such nonsense really annoying. The main interview is usually good, but the reviews are pretty much copy pasted, but there's a lot of repetition. Some of the features like showing a bass that was on eBay for a good price are just weird. Will probably get the odd copy for a long train journey but sadly I don't find it engaging enough to commit to buying for a whole year.

Invite local bass chat members round to help you sort it and trust them to offer fair prices for what they want

Gorgeous! And guaranteed supreme quality

Everything goes through my Hartke bass attack to add some subtle grit to the sound. Would love to have a trace Elliot rig available all the time but had to sell it ages ago so I get the core tone from my pedals and basses only. I play my p bass with flats and tone wide open for a deliberate clanky sound, but it's a damn good bass and retains the mid presence well even with clank and grit in the sound. For some songs I'll pull out the jazz and I have the bridge pickup fully up and neck pickup only on a touch, tone wide open, same pedal settings so I get a much more dry and snappy sound for some ham-fisted slap and finger funk. when changing basses in a set I'll rarely adjust my pedals or amps, just use the tone and pickup controls on the bass. Then the sound guy puts you through the pa as a deep sub rumble and none of it was worthwhile anyway...