NickD

The Delanos are my favourite pickups I've ever had. My Elwood L5 has the Haussels (J and Humbucker) through a preamp and sounds great, my Jake 5+ is passive with Delanos (P and Humbucker) and it blows it away in terms of output tone and versatility... it's just something else. If it didn't require re-routing the L5 would have had the Delanos stuck in ages ago.

Like Cato, and coming of age in the 80s I remembered Chicago for soppy, overblown, over produced AOR dreck... which to be fair was no worse than their peers at the time. So I had to get on Spotify to find out what these BC lunatics were going on about. It's pretty tidy, totally not what I expected. More like Tower of Power than 80s hair rock. I'm liking this a lot... thanks!

Just the crowd loving it. That's all for me. Dancing or transfixed.... I don't care, people love music in different ways. 1000 people or 10.... I don't care, we're playing for those that are there, not for those that aren't. (All the band mood stuff is a given at this point, If we're not on the ball, the above can't happen)

I'd have to have a 'Wrongo' decal made for that!😊

34 at the moment. I did have a 35 inch Skyline 55-01, but realised it was about more than scale length when I got my first Maruszcyck. The Lakland went when the 2nd Maruszcyck came.

The B3 is built for idiots... so it's great for me. I have a patch set for each tune and treat it like 3 pedals for each. I have the Zoom expression pedal and find it a really useful addition. Some patches I just use it as a volume pedal, which is useful enough in itself, I also use it assigned to pitch shift. My favourite though, in a one guitar band is to assign it to gain on the Sansamp sim. I have the sim set for the bulk of the tune but then use the pedal to slide in a little more grunt when the guitard isn't filling out the song so much in solo passages.

I bought a pair of PA tops from Happy Jack. Predictably a delightfully smooth friendly experience. Cheers Fella!

I bought a Steinberg UR12, which came bundled with Cubase AI. It'll take instruments or mics, the version of Cubase came with enough VSTs for my purposes (I mostly only use drums and piano anyway). It's an absolute doddle to use. Everytime I open it there's a screen that pops up offering and upgrade for 49 Euros, basically more of everything, but I honestly don't see the need at the moment for my purposes.

They were really good, they were just a fish out of water in that situation. It was hard to feel sorry for them though... I knew (roughly) how much money they were making!

My Jake! I kinda bought is as backup for my Elwood L5, figuring that a J type and a P type would cover everything. Wrong, the P type has everything covered by itself. The Elwood is lighter, a pleasure to play and weighs nothing. It has a lovely range of tones from the preamp, but for all its simplicity the passive Jake blows it away. I had them wire it volume, pan and tone as that's what I prefer, and it's just perfect. The output from those Delanos is monstrous too. Occasionally, usually in practice, I miss the 24 frets and easy top end access of it's brother, but it's always my first choice.

Years ago, doing the British forces circuit in Germany... A massive Officers summer ball, an all night job in a series of huge marquees, with a lavish dinner to start, ending with a Champagne breakfast at 7am. It's once a year, they all put money into it, the ladies spend a fortune on ballgowns, and they're really up for a good time. Our first set was around midnight, to be followed by another band from the same agency. We were a 70s glam rock caberet thing... wigs, makeup, lycra, platform soles and a strap-on Richard customised with microphone innards... best not to ask!😂 If was frenzied, and fun, and sweaty, we left them panting for more. We knew our audience and we knew our job. Next band up... An ELO tribute, a really subtle, arty ELO tribute. They were incredible, imaginative and excellent musicians. I loved them... but they might as well have been the worst band in the world. They were in every way 'better' than us, but they just dropped the feeling in the room for an hour, just when the alcohol is taking over and they needed keeping on their feet. You could easily spot the musicians in the room... as they were the only people left watching. We managed to pull things back together in our second set in the early hours, only to be followed by a longer and artier set from these guys with dramatic vignettes and album tracks and long musical segues between them. So much work had gone into it, that much was clear, but they had no business being there. It can't have been good for them, being outgunned buy a haphazard team of snotty, smutty 20 something rockers, and it made it bloody tough for us in that second set too.

The Steve Gadd Band at Ronnie's last night. A class act all round... I dream of putting a band together half as sensitive to each other's space, and capable of such subtlety and dynamics. Jimmy Johnson was superb, and the compositions of his were the standouts for me. I could have listened all night.

I bought the fretless version as a toe in the water, but in Black. I can hardly fault it (apart from the fact it came with roundwounds... why do they do that?). For the money I think the quality is ridiculous. It's nicely put together, nicely finished, tuners feel a bit cheap but it stays in tune, and the neck is really nice to play. Obviously I can't comment on fretwork, which is where budget basses often show their budgetness? (budgettery? Budgetation?). Tone is half decent too, and there's a lot of flexibility from the controls. The preamp is a bit hissy if you turn the treble up, but I only did that to test it... In normal use (or my normal use) it's fine. I'd gig it without a second thought were my fretless playing not so crappy.

I've no time for that bandy legged, aren't I hard, Poundland Stevie Wonder-U-Like dwarf... but my God he always got lucky with rhythm sections.

Gutted for you. It's just like mine, but mine has the 19mm, and it's perfect.

I hauled that around Army bases in Germany back in the 90s... wigs, makeup, lycra... the whole shebang. It's loads of fun to play and you can go a bit mental with it... as long as the main tune is there the punters will go for it regardless of how you play it. Handy tip... Wig Wam Bam medleys very well with Little Willy, which is fun, slightly smutty, and used to go down a storm.

If I could figure out how he put together his lead distortion effects, I'd never work with a guitarist again!

It can't just be the Ronnie Scott premium. I'm off to see Steve Gadd there later this month and it was around half that price.

Sort of! I started with a pick in Metal bands, then went with fingers because I thought I should. Over the past few years I've gravitated to a weird hybrid. I play some 2 and 3 fingerstyle but spend an awful lot of time muting on the bridge while playing with my thumb, or with my thumb and first 2 fingers like a classical guitar style. Sometimes I use my thumb like a pick too, with my forefinger gripping it... It's all weird, but it works for me.

Almost everyone asked those questions... And those who didn't probably wish they did!

Great stuff, thanks for the warning!

There's no answer but the one that suits you best IMO. Do both, they're both fine and both worth learning. Look at your influences, who's sound appeals to you as a start? At the end of the day the only thing that matters is that the sound you want to hear comes out of your speakers... how you achieve that is entirely your business.