josie

Allegedly Joe Bonamassa went out and busked the queue for one of his own monster sell-out shows and nobody recognised him.

Thanks for this - I don't know how peeps (on both sides) would feel about a closer link than that with the magazine? Feed each other content and promote each other to some extent??? Audio would be a perfect complement to the forum - I for one would enjoy listening to sound samples in the flow of a podcast which I don't bother to click on in a forum post. A good example of the value of audio but perhaps a bit extreme tech for some of us :-? Thanks to those who have offered to make this happen, I await with interest 🙂

Josquin des Pres: It's pretty dense though - imho the Stuart Clayton is much easier to learn from, as it's structured into smaller exercises and a more gentle progression with plenty of helpful explanations. The JdP is pretty much just the notation and gets harder pretty quickly. I'll go back to my copy to practice with once I've learned more from Clayton. Ymmv... https://www.basslinepublishing.com/bass-essentials/the-bass-guitarist-s-guide-to-reading-music-beginner-level.html

It's not just the muscles that are different. The muscles that move the fingers connect up through the forearm to the elbow and pull on the tendons there, differently and more stressfully than moving the whole hand at the wrist. (Try holding out your arm, wiggling your fingers, and then flexing your wrist, and watch, or feel with the other hand, what your muscles are doing up to and including your elbow.) That's why "tennis elbow" affects finger-grip (and is why I can only play with a pick).

A guitar player had an heirloom Hofner Verithin stolen from Manchester Cathedral, of all places, between sets recently: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/musicians-family-heirloom-guitar-stolen-14397134

As I said recently on another thread: That reminds me of a lovely story from Matthew Crawford's wonderful book The Case for Working with Your Hands - he's a specialist restorer of vintage motorcycles, and tells of a friend who had ordered a beautiful new bike and invited his friends to be there when it was delivered. To their horror the first thing he did was to pick up a handful of gravel and throw it at the gas tank. When asked why, he said "I don't need to worry about it getting its first scratch now!". So would my cats if I let them get anywhere near 🙂

As said above, "don't gig" isn't the same as "don't use". I'll probably never gig my EB2, but I get great joy from playing it (and it improves my technique) and so do my son and his musician friends, so I'm satisfied that it's well used and appreciated. I don't gig my fretless atm, because I don't play it well enough yet, but I'm working on that and its time will come. That reminds me of a lovely story from Matthew Crawford's wonderful book The Case for Working with Your Hands - he's a specialist restorer of vintage motorcycles, and tells of a friend who had ordered a beautiful new bike and invited his friends to be there when it was delivered. To their horror the first thing he did was to pick up a handful of gravel and throw it at the gas tank. When asked why, he said "I don't need to worry about it getting its first scratch now!".

Welcome! I notice you said "so far" - that's a lovely bass, you obviously know already it won't be the last... 🙂 Hope all goes well with your new band, let us know.

Victoria Smith? One of my role-model bass players. Watch her with Will Wilde's band and with Dani Wilde - she looks and sounds completely different but equally excellent. Will def see the Ramonas if they're near me, even though I'm not into the Ramones, just for her. I saw Will Wilde at the Colne Blues Festival last year with a dep bass player and it was a revelation. He was playing the same notes at the same times and it just didn't work. Victoria's bassline on "Angel Came Down" soars, flies, really gets the meaning of the lyrics. The dep didn't. (Ot, sorry 😞 )

Marillion. I've seen them twice at M'cr Academy in the last 18 months, utterly riveting, I've never felt an audience vibe so intense. Almost 40 years on, fresh new material but true to the best of the genre. The closest any of us will get now to what Pink Floyd must have been like live in their prime. I'm a pretty hardcore blues fan but I'd actually rather play bass in a prog band.

Depends on what and where. My 1966 EB2 is too fragile and valuable to gig anyplace I might have the chance. I don't gig my drop-dead-gorgeous GMR single-cut in Manchester because I'd be asking to be hit on the head walking back through the city centre to the train station, and I don't gig her at my local om because it would just look like showing off - it would feel like turning up wearing a silk evening gown. An interesting way of thinking about what my ambition is as a bass player, is to get to the standard where I can play venues where I would actually feel safe gigging either of them.

Oh yes. I work in a large university Computer Science department and at least six of us have instruments in our offices - I can think of three guitars and two keyboards, there may well be others. I have the only bass afaIk. I bought a cheap old Encore P to keep in the office just so I could noodle around a bit during lunch breaks, or after working hours waiting for the rush hour to calm down before going home. Turned out a few peeps I've known for many years were getting together after work on occasional Fridays for a jam best described as drinking session with a music problem 🙂 That was actually the first time I'd played with anyone else, and I still love those crazy evenings. And my students think I'm cool 🙂

Mostly from Timbertones https://www.timber-tones.co.uk/ It's rare to find anything interesting in a music shop in this country. I've had better luck in Nashville (not surprising). You cay buy punches to cut pick shapes out of credit cards, but I can't believe they'd feel or sound good or last long.

Yes, tried leather and didn't get on with it at all.Too floppy, and gave me a dull blurry sound. Same with felt. Ymmv 🙂 http://www.timber-tones.com/bass-guitar-368-c.asp

This. There does seem to be a fellowship of bass players, I've found it in other places and situations too. I think it's something to do with choosing a relatively uncommon and under-appreciated instrument. My older son aspired to be a cathedral organist, but was never quite good enough. But he had encouragement and support from some of the very best organists in the country. it wasn't a competition, it was a community.

No but I could try to get something, I'll post it here if I do. Seems most fretless players aim for a upright db, sort of rubbery sound and use tape-wound strings. I'm trying to get a silvery shimmery slide sound inspired by the slide guitar in some of my favourite blues bands. Somehow the chrome flat-wound strings and the hardest sharpest pick just work together really well to achieve that.

Nothing to do with speed, but the difference in sound is clear. I've seen good bass players switch between pick and fingers between songs, or even mid-song, to get the right tone or attack. I can only play with a pick (right elbow RSI, limited use of my fingers) so I've explored that a bit and it's striking how much difference in sound one can get from different picks. Stone sounds different to wood sounds different to resin. Sharp sounds different to rounded sounds different to blunt. Atm I'm mostly using sharp hardwood with my electric fretted main squeeze, sharp stone with my flat-strung fretless, and blunt resin with my fretted acoustic. And they're rather lovely things...

I've told this story before elsewhere - we only had classical music in the house when I was a child, but I can clearly remember, aged about 6, sitting on the floor beside the one speaker of our mono record player tracking the cello lines in Mozart string quartets. Nobody suggested it, it was just instinct. So of course many years later when I discovered the Byrds, Eric Burdon, etc it was the bass I latched on to and wanted to play. My mother beat it into my head that I would never be able to, and I believed her. Children believe that sort of **** and it can cripple them for life. Finally at 59 I just got angry and decided not to believe it any more and went out and bought a good bass and found a good teacher. By then I was well into electric blues, and the first thing I learned to play had to be a classic 12-bar. The first time I played a turnaround was a huge, demon-killing joy. You were wrong, Mum. I still enjoy Mozart cello lines though, thank you for that.

Welcome! You'll get plenty of encouragement here. Hope it goes well 🙂

There's some discussion and suggestions here: and lots of good resources here:

The route my excellent teacher took with me was - first and most important - what do you want to play? What would give you joy hearing it coming from your own instrument and your own fingers? I'd loved the blues for years, the first time I played through the root notes for a 12-bar was a joy, the first time I played a turnaround and understood it was an utter revelation. I'm very grateful that he then steered me gradually into the RGT exam syllabus. Naturally I had some resistance to taking exams, but it's very well designed, everything in there is important to playing well, and much of it I wouldn't have bothered with if I hadn't been going for the grades. It's well worth getting hold of the early grades study material and working through it, even if he doesn't want to actually take the exams: http://www.rgt.org/exams/

The problem I used to have with Mr Josie (before he became abusive and I had to move out) was not how much stuff we each had, but how we kept it. I had at the point I moved out - in the house - about 4 basses, 3 guitars, and 2 amps, all in my broom-cupboard "3rd bedroom" music room. (Also 2 basses at work and one in Nashville - that's another story...*) I own three pairs of shoes and no handbags 🙂 He had a relatively small amount of walking and climbing gear, which absolutely had to be strewn about underfoot everywhere. * The bass in Nashville is my beloved 1966 Gibson EB2, which my son who lives there is "looking after" for me, and which I don't expect ever to bring back to the UK. Too fragile and valuable. He has her hanging in pride of place on the wall, he loves her almost as much as I do. I try to go back twice a year to play her as much as to play with the grand-sprogs 🙂

This. One of the main reasons I left my ex-band. Except it was the drummer 😞

Last September I got to play a couple of songs in the jam at Carlisle Blues Festival. Was handed a beautiful Fender Jazz which had sounded wonderful played by its owner. It turned out to have fat tape-wound strings and a very high action (fine if you're trying to make a Jazz sound like an upright db and you're used to it...). I was nervous anyway, but barely had the finger muscles to get the strings down to the fretboard, and when I did they just seemed to stick there forever. I could only play about half the number of notes I normally would. Ok that's down to me not the bass, but it's certainly the worst situation a bass has ever landed me in 😞

http://rgt.org/exams/