NancyJohnson

Stuart Hill, Shudder To Think STT rhythm section went through two excellent drummers (Adam Wade/Jawbox and Kevin March/Dambusters) and the clip below features the quite wonderful Nathan Larson on guitar. This unedited clip from MTV's 120 Minutes is pretty awesome.

I love sitting here reading this. Can't say yet.

Johnny Thunders/The Heartbreakers - Live At Max's 1 & 2. 5/5

Thread resurrection! Generally I skip the adverts that You Tube push up, but I sat through a whole one for the Aclam Smart Track board. I'll admit that despite only running two stomps (a dUg and a Geddy 2112DI) I was intrigued with the Aclam. Never owned a Pedaltrain, but I did have a Temple Board; I hate that there's a necessity to stick anything onto pedals that cost a small fortune. Question is, do I really want/need another board just to carry two pedals, a PSU and a couple of ABY boxes? Answers on a postcard.

I think @skankdelvarraised all the salient points (with the exception of the prostitutes). I've been playing long enough and am old enough in the tooth to see this is not going to be a get rich quick/cash cow thing; it shouldn't impact on my day job and I don't see touring on the horizon. I could see them playing second or third on the bill at Rebellion. If I lived in East Landaan, I'd feel more excited about it. The main thing here is the travelling, expense thereof and the loss of my recovery time (weekends). I can record from home. I'm already shattered most of the time and this will just contribute to that. As things stand, I'm just waiting for the phone to ring, so to speak.

I'm not going to go into specifics, but last weekend I was asked whether I'd like to take up bass duties in a band fronted by someone from a band I adored in the 80s/90s. I saw them maybe a dozen times...Hammersmith Odeon was probably the biggest place, but they played bigger. They were on TV a lot, loads of albums/singles. I'm a little conflicted here, on the one side there's the positives (playing, creating etc.), on the negative it's two hours each way to the studio (other side of London from me), I'm not entirely sure what the timetable is (gigging/recording), so I need to firm this stuff up. I'm not even sure I want to do another band.

I had a set of black tapewounds donkeys years ago, possibly Rotosounds (back then there didn't seem to be many alternatives). I eventually unwound the tape and to my delight, revealed rounds underneath. These sounded infinitely better and for that reason, I've stuck with rounds ever since.

Not my thing at all. I know that in the past I've bemoaned the lack of innovation, new design/shapes etc, but this is an absolute munter. It is possible to do something new, I mean Musicman have a handful of love 'em/hate 'em shapes, but the Bongo and St. Vincent are wonderful things. Fender do it and it looks like an animator from Hanna Barbera designed it.

I have no real preference for active or passive, several of both. Stock active basses aside, I've got three (I think it's three) John East circuits installed on different basses and suppose the joy with these is that you simply have more control over the frequency bands you choose to cut, boost or sweep; active for me is very much about controlling the mids and boosting the low end where necessary (I find the top end on John East stuff a fraction too bright, but generally just leave the treble in the notched central position). You simply don't have that flexibility with a single tone knob, I mean, how could you?

I've never changed a set of machines on a bass, a couple of d-tuners. Dunlop Straploks on everything (if I'm buying anything sight unseen, I always order some at the same time). Thunderbirds, I'd always change the bridge (initially Supertones, then the more palm-friendly Babicz). Anything else changed is by necessity rather than desire. There used to be this argument (late 70s) that changing the original PAFs on a Les Paul to DiMarzios would add the the value of the instrument pending any resale. Perhaps that was the case then - very much a matter of out with the old, in with the new - I think we all know that now originality is key to getting top dollar.

Maybe you have a wasp nest in there.

I got mine in a big swappage/trade thing. 1979/US, all black/rosewood Precision for a pointy Hamer bass and a load of Laney kit. At that point I couldn't afford to change things about too much, so I just jumped at the deal. The pickup failed quite quickly. It went through several pickup (and pot) swaps, EMG, Wizards, Warmans...I think a Bart at some point too. The neck had a horrible dead spot range on the E and A strings; 2nd and 3rd frets. It weighed a ton. It was just horrible, really. I have a 1978 Aria Pro II Primary that is a country mile better.

I owned my first Fender for about 20 years and detested it.

It smelt of cheese, old smoke, alcohol, sweat and other things. I couldn't shake the smell out of my nasal passages for days.

OK, history lesson. This isn't so much a story about converting to flats, more a case of starting out, then switching and by necessity, throwing a set of flats on one bass. When I first started out, my initial bass had flats on it; I broke the G-string and for whatever reason (probably not knowing any better), I bought a round wound G-string. The bass got sold (complete with three flats and a round wound G) and I bought a Columbus Jazz bass. This had a set of nylon wrapped strings (essentially rounds with a flat black wrap); I unwound the wrap and behold round wounds, which I continued to use until a couple of years ago. I was depping for a band that asked for flats tonally, so I bought a cheap set off Amazon (nasty) and then a set of Fenders (nice). I used them for about a month on one bass and then switched that back to rounds. Still have the flats, but doubtful they'll see action again. Just not me.

Porcupine Tree.

Used my Spector yesterday during a rare studio outing. Looked particularly nice.

From years of playing sh*tholes, do not be coerced into believing that playing certain venues (ie the St Moritz in Wardour Street) because it's 'good for the CV'. NOBODY CARES ASIDE FROM YOUR SINGER.

Jeepers, we're talking about a comment made to me about 45 years ago, when everything buzzed like a wasp nest or hummed like a vicar. I threw it in there and now we have people sucking on their pipes, going (assume Terry Thomas voice), 'Well, you know old boy, the bloody electricity this side of the pond cycles at a different rate of Hertz than in the colonies and that's where your comment falls down I'm afraid, old chap.' When all this was fields we just made sure we were were all in tune with each other and that did. No piano, no easy tuning method (pitch pipes, anyone?), no internet, no rack tuners, no mobile phones, no apps. It was just, 'Can you play an E?' we'd tune to that and we were off.' You'll note the title of the thread is 'Tuning without a tuner'. That's what I answered, OK I was incorrect. Meh.

There is obviously a bit of logic to what I posted and the second part of this reply. It was a long time ago when someone mentioned this to me. Personally, I prefer tuning to H# off the sound of my doorbell.

Wasn't there some method of tuning a G via a 60 cycle mains hum?

I'm in the studio on Sunday. I think I might take my LT.

I'd concur...the crowns are way nicer than blocks/dots. On the subject of inlays, the first run of Forte basses (NS & 4X) didn't have anything on the board and that worked beautifully.

I'm just listening to the first Duran Duran album. I got a cheap copy of the deluxe edition a while back and never listened to it until now. It's really not aged that well and it pretty wretched. Assuming they played everything on it, observations? Simon Le Bon can't sing for toffee and they probably would have sounded better without Nick Rhodes musical and background noise contribution.

Honestly, no. What with the day job, long hours, the house rebuilding, the laying flat because my back went, no, not really. It'll happen.