TrevorR

Fab! YES!!! That’s it! Thank you!

Aaargh, was watching this clip of Steve Winwood educating his young whippersnapper of a second keys player in the finer arts of the B3 when I thought, “Oh, I know that bottle blonde bass player with the Wal 5-string, that’s... erm... um... ah...” and I can’t for the life of me recall his name. So I’m throwing it out to the combined wisdom here. Pleeeez put me out of my misery. Who is that?

The cheap, knock off Speakons are getting a nasty reputation of getting stuck in sockets and only being able to be removed with brute force and ignorance (with a 50/50 chance of knackering the socket on the way out). Much Talkbass and Facebook chatter on this. I’d only ever use kosher Neutrik ones - anything else is the definition of a false economy. My Cleartone speaker cables have given me well over a dozen years of uncomplaining, reliable service.

Also highly recommend Cleartone cables... https://www.award-session.com/cleartone_cables.php

I have to confess that one of the biggest attractions of getting the Fish Out Of Water deluxe expanded reissue was that it had the original version of this and the B-side on it on CD for the first time! Sorry, Jakko it wasn’t because of your remix!

I put some La Bella Black Tapes on mine. Really like the sound and feel. Tried Whites... they were far too floppy.

I’ve actually got 2. A custom one I had made 30 odd years ago by the Welsh luthier, Tony Revell, which is now a bit too fragile to take out of the house... And a Faith Titan Neptune which sounds and feels great and works nicely fo “unplugged” style events... Here’s the Faith in action (apologies for the very mildly God-botheringness of the tune’s lyrics). Love the Celtic vibe to this song and the bass (resplendent in black tapes) comes through nice and clearly in the mix!

Just put this together on my FB page... The tree’s up. There’s Christmas music in the car... cue Noddy... IT’S CHRISTMAAAAAS!!! Time for a personal top 10 of my fave Christmas pop and rock songs... 1. I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day - Roy Wood: let’s face it, this one’s just Wizzard! 😉🙄🤦‍♂️ 2. That’ll Be Christmas - Thea Gilmore: the stereotypical British Christmas to a “T”. 3. A Merry Jingle - The Greedies: 60% Thin Lizzy, 40% Sex Pistols, 100% Jingle! Who could ask for more? 4. In Dulci Jubilo - Mike Oldfield: total earworm. I end up humming it all over the Christmas period. 5. I Believe In Father Christmas - Greg Lake: cynical but still wonderful. 6. Jesus What A Wonderful Child - Maria Carey: cue the lady getting her car serviced meme but played this tune on the bass a load of times and it’s always fun, especially when it goes full on gospel at the end. 7. Carol Of The Bells/What Child Is This - Point Of Grace: I think this was an M&S advert one year but I’ve played bass to this one a couple of times with the orchestral backing track. So fabulously OTT that even for a girl-band it’s practically prog-rock! 8. Ring Solstice Bells - Jethro Tull: speaking of prog, this one’s in 7/8... not strictly a Christmas tune but fab nonetheless... I dare you to clap along with it. Dare ya! 9. Jingle Bells & Run Rudolph Run - The Brian Setzer Orchestra: I’m going to claim a twofer for this one. A Rockabilly/Swing Band Christmas, love it and especially the horn section’s backing vocals on Jingle Bells... hilarious! 10. Run With The Fox - Chris Squire & Alan White: got this on single years ago. Fabulous song. Actually, maybe THIS should be at No 1?

Oh look! It's... ..."The Dark Night Rises"! Ba-da-da-dum Tish!

My only bitsa is my Frankenjazz. Body and neck bought from a guy on eBay called “Build-a-bass”, Hipshot tuners, Graphtech saddles, Audere preamp. Turned our to be a monster Jazz. Was going to swap the pickups but once the Audere was in never felt the need to. Maybe one day I’ll add some split “single coil” humbuckers? Similarly was going to add a high mass bridge but I like the old BBOT bridge plus graphite saddles fine as is!

Katzenjammer! Bonkers band in all the very best ways!

My personal nominations.....

Ooooooh, so wish there was any way I could justify taking it off your hands. Always had a little hankering for an SB900! Loved Neil Murray's back in the day when I was starting out on my SB700.

I’ve always been in the “signature bits as they should be/other bits, recognisably the song and in the spirit of the line” camp like many others. It strikes me that this whole debate never existed (and certainly not to the polarised degree you see in some other places) before the interweb gave the “self-appointed universal law creators” a platform to criticise people. A couple of anecdotes from my wedding/covers band days... We were a really entertaining band who always put on a great show which got a fantastic response each night from the punters (whether bridesmaids, the corporate management team or denizens of the Ferret and Sack). But the main line up was: Singer/Acoustic or Electric Guitar (depending on set/song) Bass/Backing Vocals Drums Sax Female Vocalist Sometimes second electric guitar But we were doing songs by, for example, The Jam (EG/Bass/Drums), The Doobies (3 EG/Bass/Percussion/Horns/2 Drums), Motown (Funk Brothers), James Taylor (AG/EG/Keys/Bass/Drums), Lynyrd Skynyrd (3 EG/Bass/Drums/Piano/Honkettes), Elvis (AG/Archtop EG/Double Bass/Close Harmony Quartet)... and so on and so on across a pretty diverse party set. When the format of cover band and the original artist are that far removed from each other the question of whether the bass player was playing exactly every note and nuance as per the original recording seems a little moot - and, frankly, potentially counterproductive. Despite wanting to get the lines as mostly right or, at the very least, fitting with the spirit of the original there was one song where this was impossible. Going Underground by The Jam - the only song in the set where the lead singer/guitarist fundamentally changed the key to suit his voice - shoving a capo on. That either moved the signature bass riffs so key notes were either down below the nut (if played in the proper shapes) or way up the neck where they really just didn’t sound right. Plus he and the drummer played a funny rhythm which clashed with the bass riff somehow. Bruce Foxton’s classic line just didn’t work. So in the end I just made up a sympathetic bass part which kept some feel, energy and spirit of the song. And boy, did we ever give that song welly, attitude and energy - it was great to play! And you know what... in the 10 years I played in that band can you guess which tune more than any other had punters coming up after the set telling us we’d totally nailed it just like the record? Yup - Going Underground, just about the one that was further from the recording than any other. So when anyone says in an internet debate that “Unless you play it note perfect you’re letting the punter down any they’ll hate it!” just remember this story! So long as they can sing along with tunes they love, jump around, dance and have a good time feeding off the energy of the band the punters couldn’t care less.

Playing the Gustafson basslines isn’t a bad job either! Two of my all time favourite bass players. Very jealous you got to see Alan Spenner before he passed away.

Oooooh olive ash top. They look so gorgeous...

Very tempted by those Bass Collection basses - sadly no reason to justify one (hmmm... never actually owned a P bass though... hmmm). For many years we had a great sound guy who cut his teeth working doing engineering on albums by OMD, Queen, Steve Hackett, Gary Moore etc. He always made things sound great and rocky and he loved the combo of my Wal and MarkBass amp.

Been there with a previous (sometimes tetchy) worship leader. We kept getting this low frequency boom/feedback type sound on stage in rehearsal which was annoying the Leader. He told me to turn down a couple of times. I did until I could just hear my amp over the drums. It kept happening and I realised it was the keys amp resonating the acoustic guitar into low frequency feedback.It happened again and the worship leader was actively annoyed (at me) by now. I told him what I thought the problem was and he, effective told me to shut up, stop making excuses and just turn my amp down. Having had enough by now I quietly removed my bass, placed it on its stand, turned off the amp, unplugged the cable and coiled it neatly on the floor in front of me, turned to the drummer, winked and tapped the side of my nose and stood with my hands in my jeans pockets. The band started to run through the song again and the low frequency noise started again. The worship leader was furious by now and yelled while starting to turn around to confront me, “OH FOR GOODNESS SAKE TREVOR WILL YOU JUST DO AS I ASK YOU AND TURN YOUR AMP D...” I sweetly smiled at him, shrugged and said, “You really do need to do something about the acoustic guitar feeding back.” He never said sorry though...Bit of an ego issue, that guy.

Me neither - sounds fab, though!

Setting the bass peak at 40hz seemed bonkers to me. Do most active circuits do that? Seems unlikely. Thought I’d have a look at my Audere preamp’s spec... I do love how that preamp sounds!

Yup you read it right. Now you can get your own little mini Lemmy to make sure you get no sleep ‘til Hammersmith. https://www.nme.com/news/music/lemmy-action-figure-unveiled-for-ace-of-spades-40th-anniversary-2789684?fbclid=IwAR1lHDHuKywi8Jm60zQ0t_VBy4wpfVZTj9fQjFYPcHTcsZgETTEYemN3JDw Just make sure you buy yours quickly before Mr Hall and his m’learned friends kick the door in and slap an injunction on it for selling fake Rickies, infringement of trademarks and trying to pass of the teeny plastic accessory as the real thing!

White chocolate or Classic? 🥴

Her trio work is pretty stunning. She’s got such a great feel as a player. She certainly has the bass chops but she always strikes me as so much more melodic and tuneful than a lot of the shreddy jazz bassists out there. Worth checking out some of her live gigs on YouTube...

Already mentioned but for me my “Do” doubles are: Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of War of the Worlds, and Out of the Blue, ELO Probably cheating but I’ll add it anyway: Star Wars - Original Soundtrack, John Williams and the London Symphony Orchestra. Got it for my birthday in August 1977. Loved it then, still love it now.

Another vote for an Aria SB! They’re lovely (if weighty) basses. Here’s my SB700. My first ever bass. Still love it!