FinnDave

They were a great band, influenced many people. I went to see them in Manchester in the mid 70s but they pulled the gig as the keyboard player had broken an arm (or a leg, depending on where you read it) carrying a fridge (a real fridge not an Ampeg cab!) down some stairs. Superb drumming from Jaki Liebezeit, always.

Sitting here suffering in silence while my wife watches a documentary about Jackie Collins and I was suddenly shaken out of my lethargy by the background music - Vitamin C by Can. Unmistakable drumming and bass from my favourite Germans. Only problem was that the people being interviewed kept talking through the music - have they no shame?

Looks like someone got themselves a real bargain here: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2021/from-the-vault-property-from-the-grateful-dead-and-friends/wall-of-sound-the-amp-that-made-garcias-twin-sound?fbclid=IwAR2XOVCUcV8vmSxP3wHT2K4oHsnkpbNA1WgtixQ8rAubrXshoyAKYBGIxWE

Treat it as a job, with the bonus that there are some songs that you enjoy. When you're playing the ones you don't like, just think of the money.

I've played there a few times with The Wirebirds, agree that the acoustics are not easy. The brewer there is a Dead Head, and has been to see Frankins Tower. Saw him in Witney yesterday, he's hoping to get us on at the brewery soon

I wouldn't count a tuner as an effect - more of an accessory. I use a plug in tuner before each gig, then it goes back in my bag. I've had the same tuner for 16 years. I have never felt the need to add any effects to my bass playing as I am perfectly capable of sounding dreadful without any help.

These days, I mainly play small gigs where the PA is for the vocals and bass drum only, so my backline is what the audience hears. When I used to play larger gigs, the rest of band (especially the drummers) wanted me to use my backline so they could hear me (no idea why the monitors weren't enough for them).

Mine was subject to the usual brutal treatment a teenager is likely to submit a guitar to, but ended up in the hands of a school friend who was a far better guitarist than I was, and he managed to get it sounding pretty good. I'll have to ask if he still has it (or any bits of it). I think mine was bought from Woolies late 1973 or thereabouts.

A lot of the images are captioned as 'Audition by Tiesco'. I'm reasonably sure that mine only said Audition on it, but its parentage is obvious from the search suggested.

I agree, the pickup looks just the same as the pair on my first guitar - an 'Audition' which cost £19.00 new from the local Woolworths. Several other parts of it are also the same.

I played a social club in Banbury with a band I sometimes dep for a few years ago. The band was blues and old rock n roll songs, good singer leading the band. Nobody took a blind bit of notice of us, just moved away and ignored us. But we got paid, and for some reason, re-booked. The second time was just the same.

His phone number is on the website, he's a very approachable person.

I've bought several basses from Peach, excellent people to deal with. I particularly like the fact that they show pictures of the instrument you are buying, not just one pulled off the manufacturer's website. Bought a Vintera Jazz Bass from them 2 or 3 weeks ago and was able to choose which of the two they had in stock I wanted, using their pictures as my reference. One of them had a pleasing swirl in the grain of the fingerboard that I liked, and it looked exactly the same when it arrived, less than 24 hours after ordering.

Supposedly this week, but not a word from the hospital; yet. I'll get in touch with them in the morning as our post has been all over the place so a letter may have gone somewhere else.

Looks like fun!

Weird, but an honest description and not overpriced!

Too late, that was used in another thread when I mentioned my eye yesterday!

Nothing in the books at the moment, most of the post-lockdown gigs have been relatively short notice ones. Can't commit to anything more than ten miles away as my wife is having to drive me around until I get my eye fixed, otherwise the main band would be out every week.

Yep, the place rang last orders at ten and it's only 15 minutes from home. Wife collected me at 10.15 as previously arranged as I can't drive at night with my dodgy eye.

Just back from a dep gig in Witney, 2 sets of mostly blues plus a few I didn't know but managed to busk. Good fun, but booker wants to pay by bank transfer, so I won't get paid for a few days. Still the best way of sending an evening I can think of.

I saw them in 2018, poor Tom Constanten did very little - sat there looking uncomfortable. The band was OK, but no magic was happening.

I thought I heard something... The Grateful Dead - where to start? I have played with two GD cover bands, first was The Grateful Dudes, a Leicester based 6 piece (lead & rhythm guitar, keys, two drummers and bass) which is probably the top of the Dead bands in the UK. I was with them for two years and then left due to the amount of travelling involved. I now play with a lower key Oxford based band called Frankin's Tower. Again, two guitarists, two drummers (usually one on bongoes and the other on Cajon), bass and a female singer. More fun than the Dudes, but not the bigger venues that they played. Both had a similar repertoire. So far as listening to the Dead goes, personally, I have listened to the studio albums once each. I have a fair sized collection of Dead CDs on the shelf in front of me, the vast majority of which are live recordings. They tended to record every gig (approx 2,500) and a good many have been released officially. They also actively encouraged audience members to tape their gigs, even to the extent of providing a 'tapers area' so they would get a good sound balance. This led to an active tape trading culture, now largely replaced with on line recordings. Widely considered their best live recording was Cornell University May 8th 1977, which is available as a 3 CD set and is of consistently good quality. Get a bunch of Dead Heads in a room (or a field) and they'll argue all night about better versions of various songs, but for a single package, Cornell is the best place to start, in my opinion. They are still going though their tape archives and releasing new live CDs, the Richard's Picks series (named after Richard Latvala, their archivist until he passed away), Road Trips series & the current Dave's Picks (named after the current archivist). I am a subscriber to Dave's Picks and receive four per year, the most recent was a few weeks ago and is number 39. I missed out on the early Dave's Picks and they now fetch silly money on ebay. The easiest (and definitely the cheapest!) way to listen to the Dead is via sites such as https://relisten.net/grateful-dead which has recordings of just about every gig they played, likewise https://archive.org/details/GratefulDead?sort=-publicdate It's important to remember that though they tend to be remembered for songs such as Dark Star (very long, very spacey) and Playing in the Band, known to DeadHeads as PITB, a more straightforward song that could include lengthy jams before returning to the main theme, their sets also included a good many short, simple songs - Chuck Berry songs, country songs by Johnny Cash & Merle Haggard - just about anything. The Dead's versions of Dancing in the Streets is worth hearing as well - and great fun to play on the bass. That's enough typing, I'm going to stick a CD on and pick up my bass.