Barking Spiders

before I saw where you live I thought you meant Halifax in Yorkshire and thought 'yikes, she's easily pleased'. Reminds me, I have fond memories of my visit to the Alexander Keith brewery when I was there visiting my former sister in law.

Looks like it's been pulled out from the bottom of a builders skip. Never heard of Jim Richardson but then again I'm neither a jazz nor prog fan.

Because it's about pushing yourself to the next level and see how challenging certain techniques are to do proficiently.

Kind of ditto for me viz guitar playing. Dare I say it but I'm actually pretty proficient at double handed tapping and sweep picking. I choose NOT to do it outside of practice as I particularly dislike the music that features such techniques. I have no wish to emulate Eddie van Halen or Yngiwe Malmsteen. I'd much rather cop ideas from Keith Levene and Andy Gill.

I think it's good to look at musicianship from a perspective of someone who doesn't play any or such and such an instrument, i.e. being able to see the wood for the trees. Problem with playing bass or guitar is if you're too close to the instrument you praps don't hear what the punters want to hear. I don't play the violin, trumpet or piano but want to hear something melodic and memorable. I have eff all interest in listening to a load of high speed runs up and down the scales however expertly done. I enjoy quite a bit of bass slappage - when its Marcus Miller, Larry Graham, Louis Johnson - but outside of funk or other dance music it mostly sounds utterly shyt3 particularly when done at NAMM type shows by members of the public.

It's odd and also fkin annoying when you might express a lack of interest in so and so's display of fretw@nkery and the immediate retort is that you must be jealous because you can't do it. Thing is I bet many people can do all this flashy shyt3 but choose not to because they have the good manners not to.

Bluddy well love that era of Soul, the whole Solar/Boogie scene. Here's a much less well known - but seriously underrated - belter of a tune ..

They certainly put rock 6 string merchants to shame. Great threads too. Who are all the suits in the front row then?

Gloucestershire isn't blessed with great venues hosting mid-level well known bands other than the town/civic halls. The acoustics at Cheltenham town hall aren't great though legacy acts and tribute bands gig there mostly. There are quite a few venues hosting open mic nights and even though there's the 3,000 capacity Centaur at the racecourse Jools Holland's big band orchestra seems to be the only act that gigs there. Chelt's pretty good for local metal, punk and straight ahead rock bands (2 Pigs and Frog & Fiddle) if that's your thing and you don't mind crowds of gypsy's kissed students. I miss the Axiom where I saw a fair few good dance/electronica acts almost a couple of decades ago. The Cotswold Inn is pretty good for localish jazz, reggae and folk stuff. Seems to me most well-known ish bands that aren't over the hill opt for either Oxford or Bristol which are only 40 minutes or so away.

I've recently been playing a couple of Flaming Lips albums including Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots. This track, arguably their most well known song, never fails to bring a lump to the throat. It's obvious why.

In general I'm more interested in players of any instrument that have an unorthodox approach i.e. that may look to some like incorrect technique. I don't have big hands and long fingers and when standing it's more comfortable to fret the bottom string with my thumb rather than index finger, whether on bass or guitar. I never critique other players approaches because they do what they like doing or are required to do whether it's just playing 8ths on the root note or 'Clutterbucking'.

Growing up in the 80s for me it was mostly Derek Forbes, especially the Empires & Dance to New Gold Dream era. I also nicked my elder brother's Stranglers albums to try and emulate JJ's tone on tunes like Peaches. Never did though.

Ballcocks to criticisms is what I say. If it feels right for you that's all that matters other than keeping in time and staying in tune. Imagine someone telling James Jamerson his playing might benefit if he'd used a couple more fingers . You sound absolutely fine to me and nowt wrong with your right hand action or fretting.

I'm regularly playing Osam, the new album from Tosca, which includes Dorfmeister of Kruder+... Fkin love Tosca, IMO the most consistent on downtempo/trip hop acts.

Whether you like someone's voice is all about opinion sure but IMO you can also state objectively whether someone has a good singing voice or not. I'm a big fan of Talking Heads up to Speaking in Tongues and David Byrne's quirky vocals work well within that context. However, objectively speaking he's not really a singer at all. On the other hand I'm not a fan of Whitney Houston at all but I acknowledge that she could actually sing

Agreed, and to him you can add 90% of rock and pop 'singers' of the last 50 years, e.g. Jagger, the two AC/DC frontmen, Ozzy O, DL Roth, Morrissey, Bowie, Ferry, John Lydon, Joey Ramone, Bjork, Kate Bush, Madonna, David Byrne, Joe Strummer, Dylan, Bernard from New Order, Neil Young, Lou Reed, Axl Rose... People say, 'oh but their vocals suits their music'. Mebbe, but they sure couldn't sing in other any context, which 'proper' singers can. Fr'instance Bowie next to Bing on Little Drummer Boy sounds dreadful while both he and Jagger utterly ruined Dancing In The Streets

I might be considered one of the guitar Luddites. Like with cars, guitar design peaked decades ago; Gibson 335 and the Les Paul (late 50s), Fender Strat and Tele (early 50s), IMO later designs esp the flying V and other typically metal guitars are as ugly as fvck. I have an Epi Sheraton II as for my money nothing beats the 335 design. It is to guitar what the E-Type Jag is to the car. As those guitars mentioned have long been perfect why do any more to them?

I was talking about what is the difference is between a singer and a vocalist. There is are no alternative words for a bassist/bass player, guitarist, drummer.

I've Googled about for definitions re what's the difference but my take is different. Out in the webverse there's the view that a 'singer' is typically e.g. anyone who fronts a band and who doesn't typically have training, may not always hit the notes and can make up for lack of what's widely accepted as a traditionally good voice with one that's characterful or distinctive. A 'vocalist' on the other hand is considered to be musically trained, always sings in tune and naturally, as opposed to how Bowie, Ferry and that bloke in Suede sang/vocalised. I've always been of the opinion that 'singers' are those who can actually SING i.e. maybe have a 3+ octave range, are trained and can turn their hand to any styles. I've always thought it's vocalists who are not likely to have had proper training and who may only be able to pull it off in a specific band or genre. IMO most rock frontmen fall into this category while classical, soul and jazz performers belong to the former. Any thoughts on this matter?

If not, you can catch it on iPlayer over the next 27 days...assuming you're a Soul fan. Talking heads include the Holland brothers, Mavis Staples, Barrett Strong, Fred Wesley, Steve Cropper, Marcus Miller and Martha Reeves. Very good it is too.

Too darn right. I've heard no rock version of a classic soul tune that comes within a million miles of even being half as good. Whitesnake's Ain't No Love is overwrought compared to Bobby Bland's original version and The Black Crowes' take on the Otis classic just doesn't cut it. Just my 2 cents worth. Worse still are the many pub bands workmanlike job of Mustang Sally. The Wilson Pickett version still sounds the best (even more so than Sir Mack Rice's original) but I've yet to year a pub band singer with the pipes to do it or any Soul classic justice. To sing Soul you need to have a great set.

or better still... about music in general not just the bass as a good number of us I guess are music fans first and foremost

Over the last few days I've been playing a lot of trance from its heyday in the late 90s-early 00s. I'm less into the stuff with girly vocals and the somewhat formulaic breakdowns and snare rolls but the more progressive stuff, instrumental, multi-layered and without the breakdowns and snare rolls. Here's a particular fave from 2001

Yeeeahhh! Can't go wrong with George Duke. Who are the guys with him. Fkin excellent, the pair of them!

The thread on Stuart Zender got me briefly thinking about respected bassists whose reps are based on a small body of work. In his case it's mainly the first 3 Jamiroquai albums. There are a few other personal faves who didn't actually record much e.g. Michael Dempsey - really just the first two Cure albums plus Fourth Drawer Down and Sulk by The Associates Deon Estus - Wham's three and George Michael's first 2 solo albums. Stuart Morrow - New Model Army's first 2 albums and ....that's it! Derek Forbes - with Simple Minds 'when they were good ' period up to Sparkle in The Rain (half a dozen albums) over to youse....