TrevorR

[quote name='Rich' timestamp='1460808201' post='3028950'] Root. Five. Repeat. I jest of course. I sat in with OldGit's ceilidh band on occasion and it was a lot of fun. [/quote] [quote name='Mykesbass' timestamp='1460808650' post='3028952'] As Rich says, but also play straight, don't try and swing it. Good fun to play, simple but quick chord changes. [/quote] [quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1460813609' post='3029013'] Get a set list and start working your way through Youtube. It'll be mostly 2 to the bar and Root and 5. Then maybe a few choice passing notes. [/quote] That sorta sums it up. Check out some reels on YouTube. Stuff like this... http://youtu.be/gzQAfkctLcM http://youtu.be/yRs5XbUrApk http://youtu.be/UW1qd4PtUxM http://youtu.be/wRVZrvbOEMU

[quote name='owen' timestamp='1460671690' post='3027840'] IIRC he was a fusion monster and then realised that fusion was not going to pay the bills. I probably read that on here somewhere. I could be wrong. [/quote] Yes, I remember him saying that in an interview in Guitarist back in the day.

[quote name='lowdown' timestamp='1460453429' post='3025766'] Fred bump. Just seen this on Facebook. Looks like the 80's and Dennis Smith is using a JD. It sounds lovely. [/quote] Recall watching NK at Live Aid and spotting that Dennis was playing a Jaydee but had a Wal leaning up against the riser as a spare...

Login' it! Nice one! PS Must get myself a Moomintroll for my bass!

My basses are set out below. For almost all the gigs I used to do with the function band it would be the Mk 1 Custom Series Wal and the Pro series Wal - which would swap between across the set. When the Pro got a bit delicate and needed TLC then the FrankenJazz joined the Custom Series Wal. However, I there was a gig where, for some reason I couldn't be bothered to take two I would almost always be the Mk 1 Custom Wal.

Well done, Lardy. There is nothing like playing with others to sharpen up your playing and push you forward. Lots of good advice above already. I'd also say, don't be afraid to simplify and just drive the song long with the roots of the chord. To help with flexibility in jams another thing to look at in your practice times is a mix of thinking about learning the various intervals in chords... Major and minor thirds, fourths, fifths especially. Then thinking about the shapes the notes form on the fret board. Try using tab only to work out fingering initially, then translate the line into intervals and shapes and how they move each time the chord changes. If you look at 12 bar blues like HJ says you'll soon see how those classic blues/rock and roll walking bass lines are just a shape that moves up and down the neck or across the strings, usually starting on the root of the chord. Then try playing the songs using a chord sheet relying on the fretboard shapes, not trying to sight read Tab. Very quickly you'll start to internalise the way that lines are built up and it will all become more natural. Then when a song goes, say G, C, D, Em, G you'll be much better able to make up your own line based on shapes and chord intervals based on those chords, even if you don't know the song or a specific bass line. An other beauty of this is that if they say we're playing this in A instead of G, then all you do is move all the shapes up two frets but still play all the same shapes! But most of all, have fun and expect to make a few fluffs at the jam. I can guarantee you everyone else is... You just don't notice them. That's normal!

[quote name='FinnDave' timestamp='1460132285' post='3022977'] There's a Thin Lizzy song that starts with bass, can't remember the name now, that I'd played for a a year or more in a band in the 80s, until one gig where the opening bass riff simply vanished from my head. The guitarist had to start, but by the time it came round at the start of the next verse, or wherever it repeated, I played it perfectly without thinking. No idea how that works! [/quote] Been playing bass since 1982. Funny thing is, when I sit down in an shop to try out a new bass Dancing in the Moonlight is pretty much the only bass line in can ever remember (other than The Chain, Money and Owner of a Lonely Heart - an I'm not starting up any of those three in a music shop!)

As with others, Strings Direct and then Stringbusters are my first ports of call.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1460096417' post='3022455'] Apropos of nothing at all, one of my favourite reads is Mo Foster's book "17 Watts?". If you've not read it, just go find a copy. Superb. The title comes from the moment when his first band upgraded their one, shared combo to a WEM Dominator, rated at 17 watts. They weren't sure what they were going to do with all that power ... [/quote] BEST. BOOK. EVER. END. OF.

I recently reviewed a book on the history of Yes. It was a really good read (for a Yes fan). It was written in a timeline format with interviews, clippings and stuff interspersed along the way. The author also introduced each decade of the band's career with a couple of pages of editorial and scattered his own reviews through the timeline. Funny thing was, though, while I really enjoyed the book I disagrees with every word the author had to say. His views on every album and song were 180 degrees opposed to mine... Pinnacle of the band's artistic and musical achievements? Tales from Topographic Oceans. Every second is pure listening gold. Me - Er, no. Best two tracks on Tormato? Me - The two that I always skip when listening to it because they are so twee sugary and saccharine that I can feel them stripping the enamel off my teeth while I listen. 90125? Rubbish, not a decent song on there and the production is crap. Me - What? Trevor Rabin can't write good songs, can barely play guitar and his singing... Yuck. Me - I don't think so. Close To The Edge? Well it's ok but no TfTO and there's at least one very sub par song on there (there are only 3 songs). Me - ??!?!?!!!??????? What???!?!? First Asia album... Just a few lightweight pop songs with bad singing (John Wetton) and crap drumming (Carl Palmer). Sold shed loads so it must be crap. Me - Erm, but I think every song on that album is a solid gold rock, pop, prog fusion. Love it. The strange thing was that my frustration and astonishment at his opinions didn't reduce my enjoyment of the book at all. Still a cracking read. Total rock and roll soap story...

The released that video 7 days ago, didn't they. I kept wondering "Real or April Fool?" Such is the degree of marketing cheese therein! Edit: Aaah, 25 March upload date... But it was 1 April it started showing up on all my feeds.

Not at all my area of experience but I must say that I'm sorely tempted by the new long scale Chowny's. Not that I need one, of course...

From 1988 to about 2000 and something I just used a 200w TE Series 6 1215 combo for everything, including lots of back line only gigs. No extension cab so must have been delivering about 120-150w to the speaker. That with a variety of drummers of different levels of Neanderthal tendency. Never needed to turn the master vol up over the 12 o'clock position (50%), but more likely to be around 11 o'clock. Last few years I've used a Little Mark 2 with two Traveler cabs - chosen for weight, flexibility and sound not for number of watts. Don't think I ever needed to turn the master volume up over about 9 o'clock, 10 o'clock at the most. That's 500 watts running at probably about 20% capacity... OK, I'm not playing metal or similar (mostly mainstream rock and pop covers - including Mustang Sally, Sweet Home Alabama, Crazy Little Thing Called Love and Hi Ho Silver Lining and loving playing them!) but I really can't imagine how much more headroom I could possibly ever need...!

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1460021283' post='3021793'] And whatever he plays now. [/quote] A left handed Les Paul for a fair bit of the time, it seems...

[quote name='tauzero' timestamp='1459966500' post='3021389'] Heavily reliced: [/quote] You have to pay extra for that, you know...

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1459968133' post='3021405'] I don't really care what people spend on their basses, what does amuse me is the amount of care they give them. To me a bass is an instrument to be played and used. It will pick up damage. All is good as long as the guy with his diamond encrusted unicorn hair bass doesn't get upset when a punter spills beer down it. [/quote] Yeah, that's where I am too. For the last 25 years I've played what is considered to be a posh bass at just about every gig I've done whether in a club, a theatre, a hotel function room or at the Dog and Scratchitt. I got my posh bass because I had kinda fallen in love with that make some years before and it was an aspirational item for me. However, it's also a musical instrument so it gets used, all the time. It gets properly taken care of but it is also used as a part of my everyday musical tool kit. Sure, it's picked up the odd little ding in the time I've had it but that's just life. Playing it gives me pleasure and that's what is important to me. And it that makes me play better then the audience benefits from it (irrespective of venue) as they'll get a better performance from me and the band - whether they could consciously identify why the band is playing well/sounding good or not. Never really understood the comments that you hear "...but I'd never take it to a pub gig down the Nag's Head..." Or maybe it's just that you get a nicer class of clientele at the Dog and Scratchitt? Doubt it, though.

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1459774801' post='3019428'] This is degenerating into a Tonewood debate. You are right that the materials have some affect on how the instrument sound but it is small on solid body bass. [/quote] Nope, it is a complex, real world system vs simple idealised system debate, in response to an oft quoted statement that nothing but the strings and the pickup have any effect at all on the tone of a bass. The differences are as likely to be how well the neck is seated, the nature of the joint, the construction of the neck and the body, the hardware used and a gazillion other things which have a lesser or greater effect. I wouldn't want to assert that any of those factors are small/minimal/negligible. Plus they all add up (or indeed subtract). Again, it's as much the nature of the "how can two supposedly identical basses hanging on a wall next to each other sound and feel so different?" debate? All the same factors apply. Otherwise, for example, different necks can't have dead spots or loud spots where the body/neck resonances cancel each other out or combine to cause a prominent note... But we spend hours discussing these topics too... And why does one note on a solid bodied guitar/bass have a predisposition to feed back (controlled or otherwise, presuming it's not just a faulty pickup) when others don't? All down to the effects of internal resonances... Don't under estimate them...

Posted a little update on the Wal History blog tonight. A rather tasty 5-string midi bass... Mmmmm... http://walbasshistory.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/gallery-wal-mb5-5-string-midi-bass.html

Well, that bass is about as far from a P bass as you're likely to get. Gorgeous looking though. What an amazing bit of spalting. Next stop, we need a review...

I really enjoy Bassjaymi's demos on YouTube. Interesting range of basses and I've known Jaymi for years. All round good bloke.

Well, if you like P basses, a Jazz might be a way to branch out. In the £2k range you should also be looking at Overwater J styles if you ask me.

+1 for ther Audere, put one on my Frankenjazz and it's a lovely bit of kit. Very musical circuit with a lack of silly, unusable extremes. Never used East but heard nothing but good things too...

Where about are you? Hanks in Denmark Street have the Overwaters/Tanglewoods in stock. Top floor right at the back. Lovely basses. Is a London trip accessible?

Wow, man! It's like the light just falls right into it! Cool bass. Will henceforth think of you as "Hotblack".

[quote name='sunburstjazz1967' timestamp='1459248326' post='3014684'] I'd take a versatile bassist with a jazz bass over a versatile bass with a player that is relying mostly on the pickup/tone options to get a versatile sound. [/quote] Fortunately it isn't a binary choice... [quote name='keefbaker' timestamp='1459249440' post='3014699'] With a forum name of "sunburstjazz1967" that's not the biggest surprise. But you're completely right that if your playing, hand position etc isn't versatile then a range of pickups and tones is going to do pretty much nothing for you. [/quote] Interesting that in a thread not a million miles away from here there has been(to quote Mrs Merton) a heated debate on the merits of basses which are sympathetic to changes in plucking style and position and provide the sonic rewards of doing so. I'd lump that in with pickup choices and tone circuits as one of the characteristics of a versatile bass. It's a truism that a creative player will sound creative whether they're playing a crappy single pickup bass or a bass with a gazillion EQ options. Nice to have a whole range of options though, whether pick up choice or plucking hand placement or tonal settings... For me anyway.