TrevorR

We used to do that one... good as a end of the night smoochy one. We had a sax player so it figured. Speaking of which, given our line up was drums, bass, sax and male singer who doubled on acoustic and electric guitar, the request that really flummoxed me was the guy who came up and asked in all seriousness whether we did any Depeche Mode or Yahoo. “Sorry mate, we’re not really set up for it?” “Huh?” Points at stage, “Erm, can you see any synthesisers?” “Oh yeah, fair enough.”

Our B/L would say, “We'll learn it for next time.” Which, since we did a lot of weddings, seemed to show very little faith in the bride and groom’s chances!

Had mine 20+ years. Still going strong!

I have one of these. They’re brilliant... https://www.zoro.co.uk/shop/welding--brazing-and-soldering/soldering-irons-and-stations/8100udk-expert-soldering-kit/p/ZT1000919X?utm_campaign=pla-Welding%2c+Brazing+%26+Soldering+-+&utm_source=google&utm_medium=shopping-pla&utm_keyword=ZT1000919X&istCompanyId=6aa6787b-063e-4414-802d-129f235df603&istItemId=wtqiiqqapm&istBid=tztx&gclid=CjwKCAjwpIjZBRBsEiwA0TN1r_QHzI0nyvV2mp1Fw8lTt4RtDR8n6eP8BwbluRR50aAwsY5iiVweEhoCZy0QAvD_BwE

And there’s a Levy’s one at Andertons about 3 links down on the Google search... ...the Union Flag ones look cooler, though.

Another AFH occurred to me. There used to be a guy who busked in the shopping centres near us doing his own songs and trying to sell his home produced CDs. His set up was... Acoustic or semi-acoustic guitar, Madonna style headset radio mike and an overweening sense of his own genius. Also an act which resembled a courts jester on acid. His attire also berfectly matched this approach. To be fair he put 110% into it. He would bounce around while singing and then, taking full advantage of his wireless set up, bounce up to passing shoppers singing into their faces and generally scaring children (literally - saw many a toddler crumble into tears as he looked up to him). My mate Pete called him “That Mad Busker Blokel Anyway, after several years lay off I decided I fancied getting back into gigging and saw a card I never a local music styles and artists listed as influences on the ad seemed great. All artists I pretty much liked. OK it was originals and I had been thinking covers but if it was any good... why not. I gave number on the card a ring and he seemed like a genuine, nice bloke on the phone. He suggested he could pop over one evening, bring a couple of his demo CDs to give me an idea of what his music was like and chat about his vision for the band. That seemed fair enough so a date was set... Fast forward about a week and there is a ding-dong on my doorbell. I open to door and my first thought is, “OMG it’s the Mad Busker Bloke! What do I do now?” Anyway, I invited him in and put the kettle on. The evening went well enough although a lot of it seemed to comprise of him telling me what a musical genius he was, how the music industry was missing out by not capitalising on his talent and how “This time next year, Rodney, we’ll be millionaires!” Other than this extreme level of (delusional) self belief he seemed to be pretty personable and the songs were... well, OK. And certainly better than when performed by a demented Timmy Mallet-alike leering in your face in the local shopping centre. In the end I, against my better judgement, found myself agreeing to come along to his band following Wednesday. Help! Anyway, at the time my job entailed semi regular trips to Brussels, Maastricht and Paris. Sometimes at pretty short notice. Well, the following Monday afternoon it all kicked off. On Tuesday afternoon it was confirmed that it really needed to get over there toot-sweet and Eurostar tickets were booked for Wednesday morning. I let “MBB” know that, regretfully I wouldn’t be able to make it and they work might be a bit unpredictable for the next few weeks til things settled down. But NEXT Wednesday,, what about that? He agreed. Sure enough, next Tuesday I was once again booking Eurostar tickets and phoning him to let him know. The following week when I called up and left a message on his answerphone to say I was, once again, off to the land of moules frites at short notice I never heard back. In hindsight, I think it might have been the universe being kind to me... I think that a few weeks I need his band and he would have driven me crazy...

Welcome to the UK Blue!!!! The pub scene is so very very dysfunctional when it comes to booking bands...

Well, I for one can assure you that I’m not an eleventh century King of Denmark, England and Norway!

It’s not how long your band name is, mate! It’s wot ya do wiv it!

Don’ do it @dyerseve! ‘Es not werf it! ‘Es not werf it!

AT LAST! Thank you @skankdelvar Three whole pages discussing the merits before anyone references David Hepworth’s book. Read it last year and I loved it. Packed full of great stuff and Hepworth’s writing style is really engaging. He puts forward some great arguments that 1971 is not the greatest year in rock necessarily but certainly an annus mirabilis given the album’s created and released. He also has the decency to concede that his view is strongly influenced by the fact that he was just the right age in 1971 to think this. Highly recommended if you’ve not read it!

Back at university I wrote a song because a friend called Liz complaining bitterly that it was OK for Marys and Carolines and Sues but no one ever wrote songs about Liz’s or Elizabeths! This was long before Counting Crows released Goodnight Elizabeth... It was a long time ago, I was very young!!!!

Well, knock me down with a feather, I’m so clever...

Jimmy must know my cousin, Kevin, then.

Johnny called to Jimmy. He said, “Hey man, I know your name!”

But like so many astronauts he found the return to Earth difficult to process. Ended up on heroin, I heard. We know that.

Such a shame, she doesn’t know that he’s gone bad. Had seriously bad effects on his dad’s mental health when he found out.

That really sucks. Talk to them about whether steroid injections (either intramuscular or into the affected joints) would help reduce the symptoms. Similarly explore if treatments like prednisolone or methotrexate might help. I had a bout of issues with a form of arthritis a while back and those all helped a lot. Will be wishing you the best when the docs’ appointment runs round.

That’s the way I look at it too!

Maybe but I always (ALWAYS) run my bass volumes on 10. I’d rather have the simplicity of a pre-set switch than have to remember that one volume is set on 10 and one is set at 6 and 3/4s-ish. Also in terms of the performance it’s a lot smoother to simply set one bass down on its stand, pick the other one up and hit a pedal. It was always pretty seamless. In terms of not causing dead air in the set that’s better than what I have often seen with bands... Mute line, take jack out of bass, take bass off, drop cable, double take trying to decide which to pick up first cable or other bass, put bass down, pick other bass up, put strap over neck, bend down to pick up cable off floor, try to thread cable through strap, plug in jack, unmute line... that always looks dead smooth!!!

Gone off to their new owners now...

That should be length to the silk is 31”

Hopefully should do. They were just an inch too short for me. Think the Kington tomthe silk is 31l”.

Bum and poo! So it turns out my short scale acoustic bass needed medium scale strings... upshot is I’ve got an entirely unused (not even clipped) short scale set of La Bella 750-T white nylon tape wound strings 50/65/85/105 and absolutely nothing to use them for. So, if you’ve got a use for them, as my little karma contribution you’re welcome to have them. Would just appreciate you give a fiver or something to your fave charity as a goodwill gesture to “cover” postage. PM me if you’re interested. First come first served. Probably just let me know first rather than sending all your details first. Will get back to to you as soon as poss.

Because the volume knob on a bass absolutely never gets accidentally knocked! I’m with you VB!