Oscar South

How many bassists does it take to change a lightbulb? None, keyboard player can do it with his left hand

I play in a Fusion/Noise-Rock improv trio called 'Ghost Ship In a Storm' (didn't find out it was a Jim O'Rourke track until later.. I wanted to be called 'Spectrum' after Billy Cobham but lost the coin toss). The other players are a Jazz/Experimental guitarist and a virtuosic drummer who can play whatever he wants... flawlessly. Anyway, we did a handful of gigs and got asked back a few times! Reliantly got drunk before each one and had a laugh. One of our sets was taped, I have the video somewhere (on a tape.. surprisingly) but I've only got the audio on my computer. Interestingly, a rapper joined up with us for a number and made up some words about cars, women and money. Here's the links to the whole set cut up: [url="http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic/sets/15th-jan_meltin-pot"]http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic/sets/15th-jan_meltin-pot[/url] One especially fun gig (actually might have been that one) we were drinking free at the venue so we were druuuuuunnnk, we were taken backstage by the promoters later on after our set and interviewed for a documentary they were putting together. When we'd been chatting earlier on I'd been saying how I can do backflips (putting my hands on a persons shoulder either side, mind) and this came up in the interview, resulting in me getting peer pressured to do it on camera ha. Luckily I survived

[url="http://www.reverbnation.com/thebetaspace"]www.reverbnation.com/thebetaspace[/url] [url="http://www.thebetaspace.com"]www.thebetaspace.com[/url] Hope you enjoy the music.

Hyperbass

fully enjoyed that story

One time sessioning for a christian rock band I played a sunday morning church service, had a lovely sunday lunch cooked for us at the vicars and we ate seconds of everything, we were SO FULL. Short trip onwards to the evening gig (methodist church in newquay.. if my memory is correct) and we arrived in good time.. to a fully cooked sunday lunch! Nightmare! Small portions this time.

Theory can be a big speed-bump for a lot of people, but its a lot of fun once you find how it fits into your playing. I'd recommend looking into some general study books (I found the 2 volumes of 'AB Guide to Music theory' (there's a pink one and a blue one) very interesting for classical theory, Mark Levine's 'Jazz Theory' is obviously the benchmark for that but I've also got 'Jazzology' which is MUCH cheaper (£10 compared to £35+) and I also found it very much more accessible for the every day musician. there is also a wealth of information on the internet (I liked this site back in the day: [url="http://www.tonalcentre.org/"]http://www.tonalcentre.org/[/url]. I'd recommend immersing yourself casually in some of that stuff and just gradually work it into your practise routines, mess about with ideas it gives you and let yourself hear the information as well as read. Also, if you write basslines, chord progressions, melodies, riffs etc., just figure out what notes you're playing and analyse your own compositions.. figure out on paper why they sound like they do. I've found that this is one of the most interesting and enjoyable musical experiences for me.. I frequently retune my guitars to any arrangement of notes then write parts, chord progressions and melodies on them, simply so I've got no idea what I'm doing and can have the enjoyment of finding out afterwards and learning what processes make up those sounds that I like to hear.

Good gig at Roadhouse Manchester and a quiet night at Revolver Birkenhead [attachment=54272:32443_39...285865_n.jpg] [attachment=54273:32443_39...480221_n.jpg] [attachment=54274:28461_40...357125_n.jpg]

Closest I think was a girl coming up and saying something along the lines of: "I really liked your playing, it looked like some kind of special guitar, what was it?" "Bass guitar" ... ".. Oh."

However much I say to myself 'Jaco is over-played/over-rated', I'm consistently proven wrong

Cheers, I play this a lot.. will check my own (cut cornered ) transcription against it.

I used to use Stringbusters religiously, but they changed their payment system and now my card (Maestro) won't work on it anymore . Emailed them and they said that a lot of people had emailed them about the same problem. Anyone know any other sources for getting hold of La-Bella specialist gauges in the UK? I'm really hurting to pick some up

Heres one from a smallish gig a few weeks ago:

[quote name='Marvin' post='831440' date='May 8 2010, 02:02 PM']You're a nice looking bloke Perhaps Doddy should direct the young lady whose 'Idiotic comment' was that she couldn't sing with a bass player in her band because it was too low.[/quote] Haha, well of course that wasn't me , I played it as a duet with a really good singer, was ace. That comment is amazing, I was told of another on par with that from a singer in rehearsal with my friends band, he had his foot on the monitor for a guitar lead part and the singer said "can you take your foot off the monitor please? You're making me sound flat". Hahaha.

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arPwcboYs2s"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arPwcboYs2s[/url] This took me a bit of time , nice arrangement though

I played EADGC for about 2 years, Stanley Clarke was playing ADGC yeeeears ago but I wanted to keep a low E as well. Its 'fun', but not that useful, you can't really do anything much that you can't already do on a 4 string unless you're big into two handed tapping. I prefer a 5 string with a low B for solo accompanying vocalists and a 4 string tuned standard or some transposed variation of that for actual solo bass. I still tune up EADGC sometimes for a bit of fun but what you lose from the low B string far outweighs what you gain from the high C imo.

Hey, this is one of my all time favourite albums but unfortunately my discs gone astray in house moves . I never got the chance to read the PDF files on his pieces before it vanished, does anyone have a copy of it and would be willing to upload them? I'd really appreciate it if someone could. Cheers, Oscar

Its not too long at just 7 tracks, but I'm really happy with how its turned out, it was all just done with an m audio fast track box, sonar and an SM58. Here's a zip file of the songs: [url="http://dl.dropbox.com/u/134504/Loki%20E.P.%20mp3.zip"]http://dl.dropbox.com/u/134504/Loki%20E.P.%20mp3.zip[/url] [url="http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic"]http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic[/url] [url="http://www.myspace.com/lokiacoustic"]http://www.myspace.com/lokiacoustic[/url] Hope you enjoy them, would love to hear some feedback, Cheers, Oscar.

This thread is a counterpoint to some other threads/opinions I've read recently so its polarised in opinion purposefully. I see a lot of opinion on here leaning towards perfectly rounded flawless bass tones with precisely calculated acoustics. That's all well and good but I don't think sounding like a studio mastered track from a Steely Dan record or a bass expo demo is the best way live; give me a dirty sassy tone that bites back. Now granted I don't play the cheapest bass or have the cheapest amp in the world, I play a low end beat up Status with with the action as low as physically possible (you can see it not too far back in the pics thread) and a HartkeVX 4x10 with a HA3500 head (forget these tiny/loud bass amps, I want to move some volume of air even when I'm turned down). The formula is the same every time: LOADS of mids, use low pass/high pass ifs the room's trebly or bassy, volume reasonable so that I don't need to play hard to make enough sound. I've got a ton of effects pedals but the only one that ever leaves my room is a bass balls that has about a 10% chance of being touched at a gig. No need for effects, you can get the emotive response from dynamic headroom and how you modify your touch. With this gear though I play in every possible genre (that I can think of anyway) with no modification required, here are some live and recorded samples from a wide variety of contexts using different techniques and ranging from whisper quiet jazz/blues to ear bleeding wall of sound jam band and acoustic band. Exactly the same settings for each, this is my 'perfect' tone'. [url="http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic"]http://soundcloud.com/lokimusic[/url] [url="http://soundcloud.com/lespechesmusic"]http://soundcloud.com/lespechesmusic[/url] Forget thousands of pounds of boutique gear and experience, my amp/cab, korg pitchblack tuner and Status cost less than £800 combined, just get something with some edge and tailor the sounds with your dynamics. Flawless is imperfect.

[quote name='leftybassman392' post='810933' date='Apr 18 2010, 11:55 PM']I was going to make the same point myself. If you want to hear a good version of the bass line listen to Tal Wilkenfeld on Jeff Beck's cover of the song.[/quote] That version was pretty decent, I think though compared to Billy Cobham's bassists and Stanley Clarke's version it falls short a little. She does an exceptional job but those other guys are just out of this world.

[quote name='stonecoldbass' post='810138' date='Apr 18 2010, 10:49 AM']I think there's a billy cobham playing along book with bass part, drum part and chords.[/quote] If thats the 'Conundrum' play along book its awful, loads of obvious mistakes. Stratus is the easiest song ever to figure out, barely any sections. I'd recommend just sticking to it. Most of it is just Bm pentatonic.

Lets put our money where our mouths are, might be interesting . Any of you bass players with recordings of you playing guitar post em up, lets see what we're capable of. Here's me playing a song I wrote with a singer, I'm more of an acoustic player than an electric guitarist: [url="http://dl.dropbox.com/u/134504/Enniskillen%20Song.mp3"]http://dl.dropbox.com/u/134504/Enniskillen%20Song.mp3[/url]

A good musician makes a good player of any instrument, likewise a bad one a bad player on any. Only difference is a lot more bad guitar players tend to be arrogant above their station.

Theory is optional to music, its entirely for the benefit of the player; listener couldn't care less so if you like to play/write without theory then its perfectly acceptable. Its all retrospective analysis anyway, to apply theory to every aspect of music is to isolate yourself from the creative process. I love theory and I've internalised more books on it that is reasonable, studied it in composition and instrumental practise and drilled it all up and down on my bass, but its by no means essential. Its just a collection of names to apply to aural effects in order to easier categorise them, if you can interpret those sounds in a musically pleasing way without needing the text labels there's no reason you shouldn't do it.