Monkey Steve

but check that "working" for your main job also covers "working" when you get paid for a gig. I picked this up from a thread where someone was complaining that a mate had been caught by the police driving a load of gear in a plumber's van, which the coppers pointed out was insured for business purposes but only where that business is plumbing. The message seems to be that you need to tell your insurer exactly what you're going to use your car for, seeing what extra they will charge you for it, and if it's a lot of money, talk to a different insurer (or threaten to talk to a different insurer and see if your current one finds that they can do it for a lot cheaper after all)

yes, this has gone off at a little tangent onto instrument cover, but I think it illustrates how insurers think about this issue, that it's not whether you regard yourself as a professional musician (because you don't cover your costs) but rather whether the insurer considers you to be engaging on business activity when you are driving to and from gigs (because you are being paid a few quid to play). If you only have Social, Domestic & Pleasure cover then the insurer may well not regard you as being covered going to and from paying gigs. Potentially this means that you are not insured and the Police can fine you for driving without insurance when they stop you at 2.00 am to do a random vehicle check.

define "active"...

there seem to be two distinct threads here: 1. Which gig you went to would you love to be able to go to again? For me, probably Nine Inch Nails on the Downward Spiral tour at the Forum in, what Wikipedia tells me was 1994 2. Which gig that you didn't go to would you like to have been at? Tricky given the whole of human history to pick from, and there aren't many bands I like that I've never seen (especially with all the reformations these days). I'm really torn between Motorhead with Fast Eddie (only ever seen him do a guest spot with them, would love to have seen him in full flow), AC/DC with Bon Scott (obvs) or Led Zeppelin in their pomp

love my 1975 4001. If it had one more string it would probably still be my main bass. Slim, fast thru-neck, punchy sound, and more versatility than it's given credit for. That said, it is what it is. The slimness of the neck can be a problem for some, it can be a bit thin sounding and a lot of the versatility in the sound on mine comes from a mod on the electrics that someone did before I bought it (independent volume controls on each pickup when both are selected). My main bass is now a Warwick Stage 1 (queue jokes about that really being a Spector) and if I was blind testing them, the extra string aside, I'd probably pick the Warwick, as it's got more depth to the sound. Where are you Bassforradio? If you're anywhere close to Surrey PM me and you'll be welcome to pop round and give my Rick a try

only if you were getting paid for it getting your gear nicked from outside of a pub where there was a band being paid to play will be something of a giveaway

had to go through the "recently added" section on my itunes to see what I'd bought this year, and then work out which of them was actually released this year...it's not a long list. Basically it's a choice between Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes, Black Sabbath (the End, live), Gary Numan, the Flatliners (Inviting Light, bit of a cheat as it's a lot of older tracks collected on a new album) and Akercocke. Have to say, I really liked them all. Another vote for Akercocke - it's definitely the one I've listened to the most... ...but I should probably declare an interest, given that they're mates of mine and it's my bass they're playing on the album

The last sentence of this. Insurers don't have a great reputation for acting reasonably, or using common sense. What they do is point to the clause in your policy that says that they're not going to pay out because you didn't tell them everything that they wanted to know. Clearly there's a difference between professional musicians driving all over the country and getting a fiver and a few beers for playing the local once a month, and not all insurers will regard the two as the same, so the best thing to do is ring your insurer and ask. And get them to either point to the clause in the insurance document or confirm it in writing.

System of a Down are odd. First time i saw them was supporting Black Sabbath on the original farewell gig at the NEC in (I think) 1999. Great performance, full of energy, bouncing around the stage. Last year at Download...not so much. Though I do understand that there are a few, ahem, issues between some of the band members, and that was reflected in the performance. Marilyn Manson is another one - great when he's on the right drugs (Reading festivals in 2005 sticks out as being excellent), but dull as hell the last couple of time's I've seen him at festivals. And QOTSA...loved them back in the day with Nick Oliveri, but as soon as he was sacked the live shows (and the music IMHO) have been very, very dull. I don't think there's one right answer. If the music is great then I'm not too worried about the show...but if the music isn't great then I'll still stick around if the show is great fun. Basically I'm easy to please as long as the music and the show aren't both rubbish To pick up on Blue's point, I think this makes a huge difference at the covers/bar band level, where you hear the same songs every week at differing levels of competency, but you'll remember and come back to see the band with the frontman who put on a great show.

I always wondered if the singing was what dictated the simplicity/elegance of the bass lines - I know that I sometimes struggle to play some more intricate things if I'm singing. On balance however I tend to think that he just understands the dynamics of the songs, and that the bass line is there to provide the melody and the drive, not the fireworks.

big Police fan, and tend to think that Sting is a very elegant, understated bass player. In technical terms he's overshadowed by the world class drummer and the not too shabby guitarist, so the bass doesn't scream "look at me!" but you'll miss it if it wasn't there.

love rap Anything Chuck D has done, Cypress Hills heavier metal moments (Skull & Bones Pt 2 especially, and Rise Up), and everything on an album called Loud Rocks - a mash of rappers with heavy metal bands, with special mentions for Wu Tang Clan's track with System of a Down but the rappers I listen to the most are some Australians called the Hilltop Hoods, especially the State Of The Art and Drinking From the Sun albums, with a very honourable mention for the Hard Road Restrung - took the money to do a remix of their previous album and hired an orchestra: spectacularly good. their last proper album was a bit so, so, but they've just done a Restrung version of that which isn't bad

I've had something very similar happen to me in the last couple of months. Got contacted by a friend of a friend (a guitarist, I know him to say hello to) who's spent the last year or so putting a band together and they had just started getting some gigs and coverage. But his bass player, drummer and singer quit for assorted (and apparently genuine - I did check) reasons, do I fancy it? I say why not, he says that he may not be able to do anything until the New Year for other reasons, but he'll send me some tracks to work on. No problem, I have other stuff going on. In the meantime I find a drummer and singer (just by chatting to a couple of mates in the pub) and forward their details - great, it's all coming together... ...get the message back that "something major has come up, not sure when I'm going to have time to get back to the band, it'll have to be on hold for now" Doesn't phase me at all. If the guitarist gets it all together and the band happens then great. But for now it's not happening so I'll carry on with other stuff. There's no practical difference to me whether there is a band which isn't rehearsing right now or no band at all. Don't need to burn any bridges or spit my dummy out, I only have a decision to make if the guitarist ever sorts his life out.

I'll mostly just play the bass without plugging it in. I've got an acoustic bass, but the action on that is a lot more difficult than on any of electrics. If I'm working stuff out or just practicing on my own then I don't care about the tone or amplified sound, and i hit the strings hard enough for the volume to not be a problem. Same for guitars, although I do tend to play my acoustic guitar at home more than the electrics, just because it sounds so nice. The only time i tend to plug into an amp is if I'm playing along with a track and need the extra volume

25 years ago my band was playing a fairly sizeable gig (for us) where we were providing the backline (and were second on the bill). The headliners soundchecked (using my Marshall Super Bass II head) and were fine. My turn - nothing's coming out. Fortunately a very experienced soundman was on hand to calm me down and introduce me to his DI box. Sounded great, and instantly cured me of my "it's my sound, it needs to go through valves" views. More recently, my last band was doing a new bands night at the Barfly, pretty full, we'd got some music press along, gig goes fine right until the last number, and half way through my bass cuts out completely. i spend the last couple of minutes trying to work out what's going wrong, but can't solve it before our set finishes. turns out that I'd been tightening the loose jack socket on my Warwick Corvette by turning what seemed to be a knurled nut on the outside but is in fact the end of the barrel of the socket and the tightening nut is inside the control cavity. So my tightening was in fact twisting the barrel against the wires, which didn't need much more encouragement to disconnect. D'oh! Last one, which happened a few times, was a wah pedal that was nicely arranged on my pedal board and plugged into the board's power supply, which worked at all rehearsals up until a gig and then failed completely as soon as I plugged it in at the venue. I remember more than once being on my knees unplugging and rearranging pedals mid set, and finding a battery for the wah. Now I know enough to set it up using a battery, or a separate power supply.

I've mentioned this on another thread a week or so ago, but I had an odd problem with triplets in that if i used three fingers my forearm would seize up after not very long, trying to play The Trooper for a covers band. especially under the solo. Some days i could do it, some days i couldn't so i ended up using a pick It's come up again as a suggested cover for a new band so I thought I'd try to crack it properly, and the solution has been to play it with all four fingers, with ring and little finger hitting the string close enough together that it sounds like one hit. there must be something in my fecked up tendons that causes a problem with three fingers and is fine doing it with four. I appreciate that this may just be me...

yeah, this...or most of it From personal experience I've developed the most when playing with musicians who are better than me, both when I started playing the bass, and a few years ago when I got into a band with a load of semi-pros. And personally I never noticed how I'd improved at the time, it was just later when I could spot myself being able to do things easily that I'd have struggled with previously. But for all that, I do think you can have plenty of fun and satisfaction playing in a band where you're not pushing yourself particularly. You might not get any better as a bass player, but you can still have a very, very good time...

nah, more that it wasn't an issue big enough to be worth bothering with. It made absolutely no difference to the sound of the bass, and only a very minor change to the feel of the strings.

you seem to have missed the "but it wasn't a huge issue" part of my post

my old band de-tuned by a whole tone for everything, at the singer's request. Mine was a five string string was down to an A-D-G-C-F I didn't love it - the strings lose a little of their "snap" but it wasn't a huge issue, and I just stuck with my standard strings.

I think we might be suffering slightly from the differences between UK and US English On this side of the pond we tend to take "passion" to mean the effort we put into the actual, individual performance, the show we put on that night. Hence all the comments about passion being better than technical ability My reading of Blue's post is passion meaning more the internal drive behind wanting to do that particular level of playing/career choice (local show, national show, international headliners, etc)

yeah, this, and both ways - the amount of singers I've auditioned (or tried to) who make some initial contact, you send a reply, and that's the last you hear from the. Even a "sorry, I'm not interested any more" would be better than no reply at all. A few months ago i was told about a friend of a friend's band that was looking for a bass player and my mate gave me their contact details, for which I had to set up Messenger. I was not happy at having to expand my social media (though I now use it a bit more than I had thought i would, and actually mostly for another band who only seem to communicate that way). I send a message "Hi, I'm the bass player that your mate knows..." No response. At all. I wasn't hugely fussed at not joining the band, but felt it was a bit rude to not even say "thanks but we've found somebody else" Then at a festival a few months ago I get introduced to someone as being the guitarist from said band. Turns out he's a nice enough bloke, and seemed genuinely awkward about it all - they'd got an audition lined up with someone else when my message arrived so didn't want to respond until they'd seen how that went, hired that bass player and then put off going back to me until they forgot about it (or more likely, assumed I'd gone away) So imagine my surprise when I finally get a response a couple of weeks ago telling me that their bass player has quit and would I be up for trying out? i would love to be able to tell you that I haven't replied. But I'm just not that bloke, especially now that I know the guitarist. It hasn't come to anything yet, but if it does I may try and take over they keys to the social media

i'll use them or not use them depending on the note and the song. Sometimes it has to be done because of positioning for the other notes being played, and hitting the open note is much easier than the fretted one; sometimes it's a tonal thing where an open string doesn't sound right compared to a fretted note on a lower string (and vice versa - sometimes the open string will have the required tone) and sometimes I'll have worked out the bass line in one position and it simply doesn't occur to me to play it somewhere else on the neck I don't understand the "it always/never sounds right" attitude

reminds me of a band I quit some years ago. I left because I'd had enough of the guitarist - nice enough feller and an OK guitarist, but the band were pulling in one direction and he dug his heels in and refused to come with us. Lots of talk between the rest of us about him being the problem, should we sack him, round and round for months, trying to explain to him that we were running out of patience with him and that he should start doing the stuff the rest of us all wanted to do, etc. Eventually I'd had enough and told everybody before a gig (the last one we had booked) that I was done and this would be my last appearance with the band. Shook hands with the guitarist, no hard feelings (although he was minorly miffed as he was playing through an amp of mine which I took home with me, but didn't make a thing of it). He then calls a band meeting with everybody else and sets out the post-Steve plans: he knows they can get the bass player from another band that we all knew, so they'll be up and running soon... ...everybody else finally gathers the testicular fortitude to tell him that actually they all feel the same as me, so they're off too and he needs to look for a drummer and singer too,. Good luck! Mind you, we then formed a band with a guitarist that the singer knew...who sacked me after about six months (we did not see eye to eye). karma, eh?

well, we know there's a band with a vacancy...where's my last demo...