Stub Mandrel

At my last gig I trod on my cable mid-song. That created a more effective and profound silence than any pedal.

Tonight, Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons, final date of the tour.

What sells well? Looks pretty? Their customers think sounds best? Years of experience? Is rare and exotic? What they have in the lumber room? CITE? Habit? Convention? Independently refereed scientific research?

Randomly found this...

Back to tonewood eh? I'm working on a carefully selected guitar body, mahogany with a maple top. Carefully chosen because it looks nice and no regard for its tonal properties 🤪

Clockwise or anti-clockwise?

I don't know if it's relevant, but my brother is of an artistic bent. He largely gave up on commissions because of this. He still paints subjects that he hopes will appeal to people, and also paints things just for himself.

I think I've been defending considering your audience as part of the creative process rather than "allowing them to dictate your creative decisions". I've interpreted your position as being agnostic to any consideration of how your music may be received; you appear to think mine has been that the artists should bow to any whim of the listener. That's not mine and may not be yours. But I think my attempt to further explore the subtleties of the artist-audience relationship (something I have mused on for 40 years or so) are just flogging a dead horse.

isn't the Boss TU3 also an active buffer? I heard somewhere all boss pedals are buffers? Yes, but you still need a cable from the bass to the pedal. Clearly, only active basses are going to work in a real-world situation.

Time really does sort the wheat from the chaff.

I found my router, and it already had a rounding over bit fitted. Possibly I could have gone with a larger radius cutter, but this one pretty much matches the thickness of the top (about 1/4"). I've sanded with 180 grit, managed to get out any imperfections left by the router and break all the sharp edges. Currently about 3/4 of the way through going over with 600 grit which is leaving it feeling much smoother. Debating whether or not to try a belly carve. I also picked up a set of Chestnut Stains 'samples' so I can do a red and orange 'burst border', then sand back and wash it all with yellow. Debating doing a different colour (black or purple) just around the sides, and whether to do the mahogany back as solid red or as a three-colour burst.

An excellent and challenging example. Someone who has changed direction more times than a terrier man avoiding the LACS... Arc Weld and LeNoise are pretty good examples of self-indulgence/artistic purity. But that said, every album he's produced (except perhaps those two) has been pretty much had a solid recognisable genre behind it, and therefore was very much addressing a particular audience in some way. Even the controversial Trans was explicitly an attempt to communicate something of his relationship with his son, and communication assumes an audience.

We all know precisely where your whistling comes from Mr Blank 😉

Suffice to say, I came back from an open mike night earlier (I didn't take part). Originals or covers, I think most singer-guitarists would be kinder to their audiences if they tried practising with a metronome once a year.

I grasp it, because I've done the same. But I don't believe it makes it any better or more worthy. The best part of music IMHO is the kick I get if I am able to be part of bringing enjoyment to large groups of people. Doesn't matter whether I'm playing originals or covers. Plus, there are plenty of covers bands who stamp their own style on the songs rather than copying the originals. These bands tend to be more popular because their sound and presentation is more consistent rather than jumping all over the shop. There can be a great deal of creativity in playing covers as many successful musicians have shown. To be honest, 'covers' is a misnomer for what most people do 'playing music composed by other people' is fairer - Snow Patrol and Mozart may not be in the same league, but possibly Snow Patrol offer more space for creative input.

I think it's fair to say that anyone who plays in a genre is having some thought about the audience. Just because the audience may not appreciate the minutiae of pickup impedance doesnt mean they don't have some shared appreciation of aspects of music. But art? In my experience art for arts sake tends towards intellectual masturbation. The fundamental purpose of art is either ritual or social. The aim is to create an emotional reaction in the recipient, whether deity, critic or the woman in the street. Ultimately to have any worth true art, and perhaps music most of all, is transactional.

Perhaps because you framed playing covers as a creativity-free process of mimicking someone else. If that's true neither Jacqueline du Pre or Paul Robeson were creative artists.

Actually we can learn a lot about stagecraft from that video. 1... if you are four-foot eight surrounded bi six-footers don't stand with your feet a yard apart. 2... Mullets - just say no.

Oi! I resemble that remark!

Last night my brother told me how he lent a strat (strung as a lefty) to a friend from an up and coming band who were second on the bill at a festival but hadn't yet got 'pro' gear. It didn't come back for a couple of weeks as the guy was away, but my brother got a message to collect from the guy's mum - as well as an apologetic note, it was cleaned, setup and with brand new strings.

That's why most hugely successful bands have producers like George Martin, Rick Rubin, Phil Spector and Pete Waterman to do the tweaking 🙂

Finally, got a replacement for one of my favourite 'best of' albums, Pentange- The Collection.

I'm waiting on the Godffrey 5-String and the Horace Fan-Fret.

No. We usually have very long discussions. The landlord is a Hong Kong Chinese and a rabbid communist. There's an artist who is a marxist, a bank trader who is a Labour/Conservative swing voter, a guy with a degree in politics who runs his own business and is as Conservative as they come, plus a load of other assorted characters. Nurse, artic truck driver, a cabbie. It's usually very lively on a Friday and Saturday. Just not on a Sunday. Sounds like you are trapped inside a TV sitcom that only goes out on Fridays and repeats on Saturdays.

I put together a nice walking line for Feeling Good. It wouldn't be my first choice of song to improvise a solo to, but our BL was impressed by my line, so I didn't get a choice...