chris_b

Location/Venue: 20th November 1966, Hesdin Youth Club, Ruislip Manor, West London Your age: Old enough Your bass: Framus Star Bass Your amp: Nashville 60 watt amp and Crook 412 cab The set list (some of it): We were a Blues Band. First number was Spoonful. The rest was a John Mayall inspired selection Anything else that might be funny/interesting/embarrassing: As the singer said, "Thank you and this is the last number", all the lights went on. The caretaker was walking towards us across an empty room and said, "I wouldn't bother mate. They've all gone home!"

Things might resolve themselves and you might have a band after all, or a band minus a singer. Finding another singer might be easier than a whole band. One of the other guys might find something and need a bass player. Keep in touch with all of them, but in the mean time keep looking around for other opportunities. Definitely don't blow it out, keep on the back burner. On the other hand, they might be giving you the brush off. Call one of the other guys and see what their reaction is.

I think in real lift that's called. . . . your children.

A St Patrick night's story. Thankfully, before I joined them, a dreadful working man's club band I played in in the early 70's did a gig at an Irish club in Willesden. At the end they said good-night and started to switch off the gear. The manager rushed up hissing, "The anthem!" Jim the keyboard player struck up with God Save The Queen. The manager wasn't hissing now. "The Irish national anthem you fecking eejit" . Jim didn't know it so the whole club sang it unaccompanied. They didn't get rebooked, but back then it could have ended much worse!

The Arsenio Hall Show. This is an out take at the start of the show but with a band like this any theme tune would groove like. . . .

I used play with the guy who wrote this. . . . he played bass, guitar, keyboards and sang on the record. It was always fun to play in the band.

That's the problem with the Internet. You put a subject up and then have to watch while it morphs into something totally alien and takes on a life of its own. One that you never anticipated or wanted and then you find out there's no way of controlling it.

If you mean the sound effects that were used on the Peter Sellers, Bernard Cribbins records then I think they are still performance related recordings.

You're asking why a car with a turbo can out accelerate a car that doesn't have one. Preamps always add more beef to your sound. EMG replacement pickups usually add a ton more. And then you're wondering why the tone of a "reasonably" priced Mexican made bass doesn't compete! You're not comparing apples and apples. Upgrade the P bass pickups and you'll move it into the same league as your J bass. Good P bass pickups can be passive and they will still compete in terms of tone. My passive P bass has Seymour Duncan pickups and it is a beefy as my active J.

Les Paul was very innovative and came up with one of the first solid electric guitars, invented multi tracking, the harmonica holder, backing tracks and a whole lot more. Les was up to he elbows in solder and wire. George Martin and the EMI engineers lead by the requests and requirements of the Beatles reinvented how the whole world used the recording studio. Up to the Beatles the studio only recorded performances. The Beatles turned the studio into a creative part of the band.

All my basses have been signature basses. Mine.

In the late 60's, my Mum and Dad had tickets for a night of Strauss Viennese waltzes (conductor Willi Boskovsky) at the Albert Hall and Dad had to drop out at the last moment, so I went instead. I had pretty sturdy blinkers on in those days and was dreading it but discovered that a Viennese orchestra in full flow was a magnificent sound. I haven't been to another but I came home glad I'd been there.

The signature instrument is a marketing invention and has nothing to do with respect, musical integrity or any catalogues. There is only one question, "Is this guy popular enough to sell lots of basses if we put his name on them". Yes, gets a signature bass. No, doesn't.

Always go for separates. Then when you come to upgrade you only have to change one thing, not both.

Hey, at least you gave it a go. Most don't even bother to skim the surface.

As the owner of several of his 45's. . . . I think he can be!

I think you have to give everything a chance. Jazz and Classical are generally not for me either but I can listen to Bach and Mozart, mostly the string quartet and piano stuff, but I fare less well with Jazz. When I was in my late teens I bought several Charlie Mingus, Eric Dolphy and Archie Shepp LP's but I never got much further. I liked the old Charlie Parker 1940's recordings I had, but they "disappeared" many years ago. I don't subscribe to idea of "mature" musical taste. You like what you like. Give me some Delbert McClinton any day of the week.

His style is not for me, but he single handedly started a unique and completely different style of playing. Something that had not been seen on the electric bass before so Jaco is pretty special anyway you look at him. I did check him out in the 90's and bought The Birthday Concert when it came out, but my preference for Joni Mitchell is when she used less idiosyncratic bass players.

Sorry can't accept old coins. . . .

The tone and volume will be affected by the design of the pickup. For instance, extra windings will boost volume. I'm guessing you just want to equalise the volume between the basses? A multi channel switcher would do that while maintaining the tonal characteristics of each bass.

I agree, at that price a Rumble 15 would be hard to pass up. Probably wouldn't fit behind the sofa though. My kids have grown up and I'm not as cash strapped as I was, so these days I fully support the "Life is too short for bad tone" approach.

I don't think the comments were directed at you.

If you Google trolling you'll understand the difference.

I use my Barefaced One10 and my regular gigging Aguilar TH500 with the volume right down. It's the size of a couple of big packets of Shreddies and gives a better tone than any other small rig I've used.

Not really a disaster but a self inflicted knee in my own whatsits. In my first band I had some crazy idea about sounding more DB like and removed the frets from my bass. I took the bass to the gig that night. For some reason I also decided to wear dark glasses on the gig. I couldn't see a thing and with no frets the bass was giving me no help at all. Of course I was far too cool to take my shades off!