ambient

Can anyone recommend a luthier to de-fret a Zon bass ?

I played the Pink puffin or purple parrot or some such place in Camden a few years ago, pretty nice venue, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't pay to play.

It maybe makes more sense to befriend bands in London that play similar music to you, and support them. Maybe return the hospitality. You could also find which venues don't charge for you to play by doing this. A lot of bands from my uni play at the Good ship in Kilburn, I don't know if they charge you to entertain their audience, but it'd be worth finding out.

My main function band does everything from disco, funk, pop and soul 'loud guitar' gigs to acoustic gigs with acoustic guitar, upright bass, percussion doing jazz and latin tunes, including some regular 'pop' songs that we've latinised "). I think having versatility just adds to your chances of a regular workload.

[quote name='M@23' timestamp='1408636138' post='2532091'] Which Fenders? [/quote] Both the USA Fender 5's I had, a Marcus Miller Jazz and a standard Jazz, had through body stringing, the little metal cup things that fitted in the rear of the body used to fall out, the holes they fitted in were too big. The standard Jazz had a very badly cut neck pocket, 2 or 3 mm gap between the body and the neck, tapering to nothing.

Remember that a 5 string bass, isn't just the extra notes. It means you can play the low E, F, F#, G and G# in the centre of the bass, making this great for avoiding stretching down to the first frets. Aklo means you don't have to move about so much around the neck.

D'Addario half-rounds are great, probably my favourite sounding strings, especially on my Modulus. [url="http://www.daddario.com/DADProductDetail.Page?ActiveID=3769&productid=191&productname=ENR71_6_Half_Rounds_Bass__Regular_Light__30_130__Long_Scale"]http://www.daddario.com/DADProductDetail.Page?ActiveID=3769&productid=191&productname=ENR71_6_Half_Rounds_Bass__Regular_Light__30_130__Long_Scale[/url] They're not really very versatile though, but I personally love their sound.

They are extremely well built basses (better than a lot of Fenders), they do feel somewhat 'clunky' to me though, I have to admit. In the right hands, for the right music they're pretty much fantastic. Though they never seem to work for me.

I think Stanley Clarke's Alembic is a short scale bass, he's about 8ft tall, so I don't think size matters too much .

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[quote name='Dr.Dave' timestamp='1408442478' post='2530106'] And the last time any of them carried a 4x12 up a fire escape in the pissing rain was.....? !!!! I'm nearly 53. The youngest in Doc B. Few aches and pains but why worry? What it means is I have 35 years experience and my energy is focussed rather than raw - which means if we're on a bill with a band of 20 year olds they're more likely to be in bother than we are. I won't go on forever but not because of age - it'll be because I've done it loads and want to do something else. I'm aware a lot of younger folk in an audience look at us warily if they don't know us but so long as we continue to have them dancing on tables by the end I don't really give a sh*t ! [/quote] You might be surprised by Tony Levin, he not only does Peter Gabriel type gigs, he plays local bars and clubs when he's home. My point was the playing thing, I've never carried a 4x12 up a fire escape in the rain either .