Nicko

Corrected.I'm only making the point that the arrangements are now consistent wherever you buy from.

Yes it is, but the other side of the coin is that imports of new goods to the UK will be subject to whatever arrangements are made by the UK and the exporting country, rather than the tariffs imposed by the EU. Probably won't make any difference on instruments tbh but it might on other stuff we buy and might (or might not) balance itself out overall.

As far as I know it is available here. Provided the seller has the original sales invoice I believe its possible to claim back the VAT paid when it is permanently exported. In theory a UK seller who has paid £1000 for a new bass can claim back the £200 VAT and sell the bass at a reduced price to a non UK buyer who then pays import duty and local VAT on the S/H price. I'm not sure if there is a time limit but this is or whether it's specifically excluded for second hand goods, I think, the reason for the apparent "double taxation". I'm sure Steve will correct me if I'm wrong.

Reminds me of a mate of mine who went to uni to study Astrophysics, and ended up leaving the course because there were too many geeks on it. He really is quite intelligent but hadn't quite considered this possibility.

When I was a young kid I wanted to be an architect. Later I wanted to be successful with the laydeez. Sadly, neither of these things happened. I never wanted to be a performer or an engineer. Both of these did.

No, but I have ruptured one in my fretting hand. I was in plaster for months and then had to attend occupational therapy to learn to use the hand again without the tendon. The tendon concerned was one of those that holds the thumb steady so quite a significant one when you play a guitar, and when I started the therapy I was unable to make a fist or touch the tip of my middle finger with my thumb. The therapy did a great job but it was a bizzare process involving playing with a lot of medical plasticine. Although the joint isn't as it should be it doesn't impact my playing that much. Good luck!

Doesn't this assume that the vaccine is effective at preventing transmission? My understanding was that if not the R rate won't change significantly, although the number of hospital admissions and deaths will. There's even an argument that the R rate could increase as more are vaccinated because those that think they are safe will behave differently. I'm most definitely not a biologist so hope you can correct me!

Playing along to a song does not require you to know the key. Learn to identify intervals and you will be able to play along just fine, although a knowledge of the key is useful if you are planning to improvise its more a case of hearing what sounds good. Plenty of "correct" notes from a given key will sound pretty awful in the wrong place.

Most bands I've played with have less formal music knowledge than I do and wouldn't know a phrygian mode if it cropped when they started jamming something. The chances of me "needing" to play phrygian are pretty remote although no doubt I end up doing it sometimes. I agree it depends on the type of player that you are but as a guitarist turned bass player I tend to visualise the chord on my fretboard and pick out the chord tones to form a bass line or a lead line. This doesn't require me to "know" my modes although I'll sometimes backtrack and try to figure out what the hell it was that I played over the progression but actually I'm not sure it matters much if it sounds good.

It depends what you are looking for. I have an Ashdown Mi10 cabinet which is plenty loud enough for small gigs. I guess you could pair it with a Newt pedal amp if you really want but it should be with a Mi220 head. Neither setup would stop him bothering the neighbours though. If you are interested in the Mi10 PM me as I don't use it anymore.

^ this ^ When in a covers band I learn songs but I don't practice. Sometimes I'll learn a song for fun but rarely on bass. When writing originals I normally start with whats popped into my head - it might be a lyric, a bass line or a lead line.

I'm looking forward to seeing live music again. My own band hasn't survived for various reasons but COVID was the final straw. I have to say I'm not missing the band thing at the moment and never really enjoyed gigging - it was just something I had to do to make being in a band make sense. I have been doing some songwriting and even roped in a singer from a former band to do collaborations and that's something I want to explore ore in the future.

I think May is hugely optimistic. Your analysis of the R rate is wrong - if you vaccinate the most at risk 30% who are already being very careful it wont make a difference. The ones who either don't care or are too thick to understand how to minimise transmission will carry on as they do every time lockdown ends then this will go on for much longer. I agree with you that we will be in lockdown again in January, because of the relaxation over Xmas but lockdowns are becoming less effective because people follow the rules less on each one. I'm on the London outskirts - I went out for dinner yesterday and plan to go out again tomorrow as I suspect it's my last chance to get out before Xmas - we will be moved into tier 3 next week. Almost all the rise in numbers locally is due to schools and unless the lockdown addresses that issue this will ping-pong until a high % of he population is vaccinated. The only hope of getting back to normal more quickly is if we vaccinate the vulnerable and forget about the R rate for the rest of us. This would require a fundamental change in the scientific advice and I don;t see it happening.

LE is the lightest of light versions. I think it is now just called LE but when I got it I think it was Elements LE. It was/is a free package bundled with some hardware packages. I got my version back in 2013 as part of the Focusrite Scarlett package which I used very rarely and have only recently started exploring it properly.

Unfortunately, neither of these options is available. I may have mislead you as its Elements LE. No such thing as a rack instrument in Cubase 7 LE as far as I can see (when I said old, I meant ancient!). Cubase 11 runs on Win 10 and I'm running 8 on my PC and 7 on my laptop. I have a multitimbral VST synth that I use. In Ableton I can send the midi tracks to the synth and have different tracks playing on each channel, but in Cubase I can only have multiple textures playing the same single midi program on a VST track (great for the bass and synth tracking in eg Muse Hysteria - but rubbish for most other things!), or have multiple instrument tracks each with its own synth. I'd assumed that Kontakt would work in a similar way - which is why I asked the question and I think that's what you are saying in your response.

Thanks. Do you have something against Cubase in general, the fact that I'm using an old version or the fact that I'm so cheap that I'm using Elements? I don't have a massive issue with Cubase although the lack of MIDI tracks on the freebee can be limiting. Upgrading to a different version of Cubase would mean changing to a new PC. I also have Ableton Live Lite which I prefer if I'm using all VSTs, but the 8 track limit on it is more frustrating and I don't like it for using real instruments because I still haven't resolved the latency issues. I have considered going all out and paying for Reaper but I'll probably wait until I get either really frustrated with Cubase or need to upgrade the PC.

I am using an old version of Cubase Elements. It does NOT support addition of MIDI tracks - ie you can create a VST instrument track or you can create an audio track and that's you lot. I'm seeing loads of VSTs that are using Kontakt player - am I right in thinking I need MIDI track functionality to use it?

Not entirely sure about that. It's difficult to make direct comparisons between countries due to lifestyles, population densities and demographics. The English government seems to be getting an awful lot of stick for mismanagement but in reality they haven't been significantly different in approach to most European countries - maybe with the exception of a few days delay in the first lockdown. Scotland and Wales have managed the pandemic with an eye on making sure they maintain an independent approach but you'd be hard pressed to identify real differences in the strategies. Scotland has done slightly better than England when you look at deaths per million population, but I suspect of you stripped out Manchester and London the rates would be pretty much the same. Almost all governments have lurched between lockdown and relaxation and have suffered from the approach. More importantly between lockdowns I was able to go on holiday for a week and was baffled by the very different approach taken by the local businesses where I stayed compared to the restrictions where I live - the same rules and guidance existed but you wouldn't have known that from the way the businesses had reacted. I'm not sure if that is something to do with local guidance or some kind of local groupthink.

I hope that's not directed at me 🤔. I'm not claiming that the virus isn't serious. I do however have some reservations about the lockdown of the general population when the vast majority of fatalities are restricted to certain demographics, and the long term impact of the way the government has handled the issue. If you look back at my previous posts I have been saying that we need to observe the rules - if not because you are worried about the virus then because you should be considering the impact of further restrictions if cases rise.

I'm convinced of it. The stats count the number of people who die and where a positive COVID test was conducted in the last 28 days, irrespective of the primary cause. However, if you die of COVID 3 months after a test, you will be recorded as having died of COVID, or if you die of pneumonia as a complication of COVID and its mentioned on the deathj cert as a contributing cause the death will be counted on a different metric. The 28 day limit was brought in primarily because the stats were recording people who had tested positive months ago and died for unrelated reasons and is a nominal duration intended to minimise (not eliminate) the number that are over reported. See here Gov stats I don't doubt that the virus is causing significant excess deaths, but have suspicions that the 70k includes a significant number who have died due to the lockdown restrictions and who had not contracted the virus. My father died a few weeks ago from cancer having been in remission for a coupe of years. I'm pretty sure his decision not to receive treatment was partly because his life wasn't worth living when he was effectively a prisoner in his own home, without being permitted visits from his friends and family.

Oh dear, are we expecting a 4 disc prog rock concept sometime soon?

I have to point out that finding a loophole in the rules to do something you enjoy may be possible, but it isn't really what you should be doing. If everyone takes as much effort find ways around the rules as some people on this thread are suggesting the tier system is pointless and we'll go back to another lockdown very soon. I'm personally not a fan of the rules and think a lot of them are nonsense, but if we all break the spirit of the ones we think are stupid then we know what will happen.

As someone who really doesn't like the schmultz of country music, or country rock I think everything on the "Love Their Country" album by Me First and the Gimme Gimmes is superior to the originals once it received the punk treatment. In complete contrast I Second That Emotion by Japan is IMHO better than the original.

Yes. Although I have some sympathy if he puts this much effort into a whinge I'm not sure what his problem with more admin would be.

If they offer an another combo I'm not sure where you can refuse to accept it as a replacement, providing it matches the original details of the item you bought. If the original was faulty and they offered a replacement it would have been an acceptable solution - the court will take a dim view of you refusing the replacement because you no longer wish to deal with this vendor simply because, in legal terms, you have been f*cked around.