chrisba

Sit Down by James. I was sitting in a pub watching a couple of mates playing acoustic covers, sitting around a table. The bass player wandered off to get the beers in, and I picked up his bass and asked how to play it. 3 notes later, I knew I had to get one of my own and learn how to play it. The rest, as they say, is his story.

Thanks, but I think I'll just get some lead-free solder instead.

I've got the opposite problem. I lent my ( very ) old soldering iron to my boss, who, rather inconveniently, died before returning it. I didn't feel it was appropriate to approach his widow for it's return, so I bought a new one. This is obviously designed for modern, lead free solders, but I've got a massive reel of the old stuff. The new iron seems to practically incinerate it rather than gently melt it. I guess I need to get some new solder to match.

Dropzone played the Purple Turtle in Reading last night. Much bigger crowd than I was expecting for a cold Monday night in December. Lots of cheering and dancing, and good feedback afterwards. Hopefully will get some more gigs there soon. ( We've played in the rather dingy basement before, but this was our first on the main stage ) I used their house Blackstar bass combo, I managed to make it sound like I wanted fairly quickly, but I'm pretty undemanding in this regard.

I have seriously considered making a 3 string bass, as I rarely use the G-string on my P bass. Pickups would be an issue, thought about using half of a 5-string p-bass set, but they are expensive and would force me into quite tight string spacing.

I think the boot is a great look. I need to get one myself. Perhaps two.

Well, Git is a general purpose insult for somebody ( usually male, I think ) that you don't like. Tight just means mean, miserly, parsimonious, very unwilling to spend money or use resources.

Yeah, I'd do it if I was really keen to get the gig and it was genuinely important to look a certain way to get it ( and keep it ) . I wouldn't do anything permanent, like a tattoo or a facelift, but fllers, make-up , hair cut and dye, yes. Don't want to open can of worms, but I assume the OP is male ? How differently would a female think ? My guess is they wouldn't think twice.

Played at a private party at a friend of our singer/guitarist, who has a house with a garden that runs down to the Thames and it's own private island. Every year, he has a mini festival over a summer weekend, inviting friends and neighbours , of which he has lots ( inviting the neighbours gets around the noise problems, but the pub next door complains if they play after 11pm, ironically ) "Stage" is on a patio, that normally has a sail cover over it, but as it was a beautiful evening, and we were on first, it hadn't been rigged. Amp was basically in the flowerbed to give me room to stand. Played a hour plus set, split in half by some great homemade curry being served. Lots of dancing and good feedback from the small but lively crowd. Mrs B enjoyed being pampered. I think there are about 6 more bands over 3 nights in total. Lovely, generous people.

We're similar. About 2m x 1m, with metal rings in each corner. We bring a lot of bits of string ( reasonably thick and decent quality, I think it's old tent guy ropes ). Never failed to find something to hang it from, usually try and loop the string over something and tie it lower down for a quicker removal.

I was in Corsica last week, and as we walked back from the beach, there were 2 accordianists playing typical French music in the town square, with loads of people sitting ouside the bars under the shade of the trees listening to them, some of whom were drinking pastis, and the rest of the square was taken up with people playing boules. So staggeringly French, it almost felt like a theme park. Adored the place, and sad to be home.

This looks useful, but I've yet to use it in anger... https://www.looptube.xyz/

I used an image generator to help create our last album cover. I asked for 4 men facing a setting sun in the style of Claude Monet. Chose this one from 16 options, some of which had 5 people. Our singer sometimes wears a hat like this. Had to remove a hat from one of the other 3, changed the colours completely by converting to b&w then recolouring the sun, and did some other tweaks. Added the text myself ( used Gimp for all the manipulation )

That's exactly what I started with about 15 years ago. ( OK, mine was red ,and the Rumble only a 10 ) Not got far from that really. Learned enough in the first few weeks to bluff my way through a gig or two, probably done about 50 more since, sometimes where the band has outnumbered the audience and sometimes to several hundred. Replaced the Squier with a Fender MIJ P-bass and bought an Ashdown combo for gigs. Still use the Rumble for practice ( which I don't do much now ) Good luck with everything...