Doctor J

This line of thought - you don't like slap because you can't do it - is just a little bit silly lads, let's be honest. You wouldn't say "You don't like technical death metal only because you can't play it" out loud and expect it to be taken seriously, so let's accept that people have different tastes and move on. Statistically, yes, someone who doesn't like slap bass is less likely to be proficient at it you'd have to think that it's quite likely, probable even, that they haven't spent time practising the technique as it's something which doesn't have a home on the palette of musical things which give them pleasure. How many slap fiends spend time getting their Atheist or Obscura chops together in order to find out they actually don't like it once they master it? Not many, I will wager. Playing an instrument is supposed to be something you enjoy, no? It's interesting to see other techniques on guitar and drums mentioned. Just like slapping on bass, guitar shredding and double bass drumming have their time and place and I hope we'd all agree it's not all the time and everywhere. Also, like slap bass, they're frequently the party-piece techniques rolled out when someone wants to show off their chops rather than tastefully play a piece of music. A very brief scan of Youtube will back this up. As a result, it's easy to understand why people take a dislike to them as they frequently soil an otherwise pleasant listening experience. In the right context, however, they can have a very powerful impact but it has got to be musical, first, and technical, second. You see, slap isn't the problem, it's the many bassists without the good sense to employ it tastefully 😁

There are few things as sad as seeing a dog try to learn how to slap.

Great colour, very nice indeed.

Three rockers? Here you go

I left it a bit late to start this month so it's rough as bejaysus but I'll live with it. The pic made me think of the classic TV show Kick Start and, from there, the other great theme tunes of youth TV programming from my childhood. I've gone for a TV theme tune of sorts. This is the show where things go wrong, though, so any chord progressions and melody must be wrong too. Curse my childless loins for not having actual children to exploit for vocals, so the tightest pants available were donned. I do apologise. As ever, Pearl Export drums into the cheapest mics and pre-amp Behringer sell. Hamer Chaparral bass and Bacchus Empire guitar into an Eleven. Vocals too, actually. Synthesis via Reason.

I understand that. To me, a bass is a bass, age isn't a factor and I don't place a value on the age of an instrument. I'm attracted by the spec of something but I don't lust after something just because it's old. Many do, I get that, but referring to the OP's question I'm very much in the Emperor's New Clothes camp, controversial as it is.

Why? Probably because I remember when you could get them for less than a tenth of that. A friend bought a used JV Squier P for, if I recall correctly, £90 in the early 90's. They're budget instruments, albeit very decent ones, selling at what are, to me, insane money. Are they in the same league as the kind of basses at the same price in the FS section here such as EBMM Stingrays, Sandbergs, Warwicks, US Fenders, etc, etc, etc? To me, no, not even close but I understand the allure of hype and old exclusivity although I don't see the value of it. As you say, whatever floats your boat, but the thread was started with a question inviting responses and opinion, hence me offering mine 🙂

Very nice. Congrats.

Their random screams can be unsettling, so it's not all bad

I think we have quite similar tastes. I was put off slap towards the end of the 80's when seemingly every local rock player started thinking every song in their set needed wildly unsuitable slapping and popping. It was truly nauseating. Dark, dark days, they were. There were some notable exceptions, as you say. Billy Gould, Tim Commerford for sure and I'd add Denis Pepa's sterling work on the wonderful Act III as players who could utilise the technique in a way which was musical and interesting, rather than the usual "HEY YOU LOOK AT MEEEEEEE!!!!" Youtube has become a cesspit of gratuitous thumb abuse though, thankfully, many of the preview pictures show the thumb in position over the strings and one knows not to bother pressing play. For all the talk of using it tastefully, when left to their own devices, especially on supposed "gear demo" videos, many bassists cannot resist spending most of the time sticking their thumb in places it shouldn't be. Horrible, just horrible.

70's ones which have been worn for years onstage and in the studio, infused with smoke and sweat and look like they have a story to tell. They have those authentic crease patterns and just feel more comfortable. You just can't replicate that feel or mojo with new jocks, even ones which have been relic'd by an expert.

😂 First things first, is that body tonealder or regular alder?

Add 10 to that. 1991.

Squier were high-end in the 80's?

If you want something old, buy a good Japanese bass from the late 70's or 80's, something along the lines of a high-end Yamaha BB or the likes. They're now just as old as the oldest Fenders were when they were made and people started losing all rationale over the value of 30 years or older instruments in the 80's. Plus, they started out as good quality and consistently well-built basses too so, if you believe in the road-worn feel, magic wood and pickup fairy dust, they'll have all of that too at a fraction of the cost of the very worst 70's and early 80's Fenders. Seeing JV Squiers sell for over a grand these days... what have they done to my beautiful planet?

They both should've quit in the early 90's. Both have lost the fire and released some utter rubbish (albeit million-selling rubbish) in the last 30 years.

But... the bass is the only part worth listening to?

Nice! I'm looking forward to hearing about it.

Where's the fun in that? 😂

Let Arthur Barrow tell you what it was like https://www.arthurbarrow.com/frank-zappa

Overnite Sensation, Apostrophe (') and One Size Fits All, you just can't go wrong with them. Hot Rats is spectacular. I'm particularly fond of Absolutely Free and We're Only In It For The Money, from the Mothers stuff. The Beeb put together a decent documentary shortly before he died, well worth watching. I particularly love that, in a one hour documentary, they gave 10 whole minutes to a performance of King Kong, that was a massive inspiration to a band I was in at the time 😂

No, not the same analogy for solidbody instruments, that is the entire point.

The working title of the movie was "Who the F*@% is Frank Zappa?", it was always intended to be an exploration of the man, not the music. There's lots of talk about his music out there but not so much about what made him tick. To his eternal credit, Alex Winter was behind the whole idea from day one, he put it all together from scratch.

He was very much not from drug culture but I can see why he'd be lumped in with it. He was operating at a very different level😁 If you're unfamiliar with him but vaguely familiar with his music I think you'll enjoy it a lot. He had a lot of strings to his bow, so to speak, a really fascinating character. My earliest memory is actually listening to my Mother's Mothers of Invention records, so Zappa was my musical starting point but, even for me, his music ranges from sublime to unlistenable. There is a bit of both in the movie 🙂