Happy Jack

Picture the scene. It's August 1979, my mate Will knows a dealer who we've agreed to meet in the public bar at The Nashville. We're at one of the chest-high 'planks' that ran along the North End Road frontage with our beers, waiting for yer man to show, and we realise that the place is filling up with tribes. London was really tribal in those days ... punks, skins, Teds, neo-mods, football hooligans on a Saturday, you name it, and the tribes never, ever mixed. Will had the self-preservation instincts of a lemming so he flagged down a passing skin and asked him how come? "Great new band on tonight, mate, Madness. You gotta see them!" Will and I looked at each other. Madness? Never heard of them. We scored half an ounce of Lebanese and left ...

And ... back to Page #1. Here's a review from 1977 (not rock'n'roll but deffo retro doowop):

They were given the whole weekend, so clearly they were still a very big draw.

I'm aware. I was there at the time. I'm older than my avatar makes me seem ...

No, I always felt that Horse Lips was an insult ...

I never actually got the chance to see Giggy Pop ...

Ain't no law says you can't be in two bands at the same time. Playing a genre you're not fond of will broaden your horizons much more than doing the same old.

Actually, ALL my basses were originally played by Bill Wyman (except the ones played by Paul McCartney), but I don't like to talk about it. Does anyone really fall for this sort of bovine fertiliser in 2023?

Big place, London. If you're looking for jams for you to go to yourself, best narrow it down to (at least) a point of the compass. 😉 Also, these jams happen on different nights of the week, as you'd expect. Are you a midweek jammer or are you looking for something to do at the weekend?

500+ gigs at pubs, clubs & festivals, playing with everything from 3-piece to 8-piece bands and we've never yet needed more than a single 13A domestic socket. That's backline, PA and lights. I realise that other, bigger bands may well have greater demands, but at the pub/club level it's very rare to need anything special. IMHO

Ha! I remember reading that at the time. 11 bloody years ago ... seriously?

17 Watts remains the best.

I still wear my Dudepit t-shirt.

Paging @Bassassin ...

That's major surgery, and it's unlikely the neck will ever be as strong again as it was when it left the factory. You'd never get back the money you'd have to spend to sort it properly. Not impossible (check out some of the Gibson neck repairs on https://www.youtube.com/@twoodfrd), but if I were buying it (and I'm not!) I'd be looking to source a new neck.

Pah! There's nothing there that can't be fixed with a couple of 2" woodscrews ...

Wow ... three controls, three flick-switches, and a selector, all for four strings through two pickups. On the old Hofner control plate (two controls, three flick-switches), if you set the switches just right then you could prevent any sound coming out at all. Marvellous! Small boys for goalposts ...

Just go with black. You can't go wrong with black. Black is black. I want my baby back.