Obrienp

I’ve had the pleasure of owning two of their/your products: a 0-15 Westside Special (UK importer special), which I really regret selling and a D28P (never gelled but a great guitar). Wishful thinking perhaps but I somehow believe the management are not Trump supporters. Please don’t disillusion me. I hope your job is safe.

Hmm, thinking through the implications of the posts a few pages back about steel and aluminium: the US doesn’t have indigenously produced aerospace quality steel and very little aluminium, so will their aerospace industry by obliged to continue using imported materials at a 25% premium? If so, does this mean that Airbus is going to become more price competitive globally? Perhaps not the outcome Trump was thinking of. P.S. I know this a bit simplistic and a lot of composite materials are used in the aerospace industry but there must be a cost impact on Boeing, et al’s manufacturing costs, which will transfer through to pricing (or they have to take a big hit on their profits).

Agree. I think Jeep are part of Stellantis; does that count as American? However, by the same token, is a Range Rover British, or Indian?

I read in the Guardian that there is a movement to boycott US goods across Europe. As pointed out above this could be problematic as not many US brands sold in the UK are manufactured in the USA. However, it must damage the US holding companies if they get no revenue from their brands. How far do you take it though? Do we avoid Cadbury’s products because they are owned by Hershi (whose own chocolate smells of vomit by the way). What about Kraft Heinz, etc, etc? Incidentally, I’m writing this on an Apple product……. I am seriously considering getting rid of our Amazon accounts and all our Echo (Alexa) devices. Prime video is full of rubbish anyway but I would miss the convenience of Amazon shopping. Ditching Netflix, Apple TV and Disney + feels like a step too far. I’ve already ditched AirBnB (involved in DOGE). I could get by without buying any more US branded musical gear but I would miss my D’Addario strings. The problem with exercising these consumer choices is that there are consequences for their employees in the UK. I doubt there will be much affect on tax revenue, they all seem to avoid paying their fare share of UK tax.

Yep and the USA is the biggest market for a lot of UK produced luxury goods. Take that market away and it will be very difficult to replace.

Is this a statement specifically about older people in the USA, or are you talking about old people globally? If the latter, I think it is a bit of a stereotype and not necessarily true. “The rest of the world is progressing towards 2030” because of the work put in over the last 30+ years, in the face of extreme resistance from vested interests, by people who are now old. Vocal minorities, supporting populist right wing policies do not represent the majority of older people and in fact, sadly there are quite a few younger people involved in these populist movements. The majority of older people, despite, what the media may say, are not necessarily against progress and happy to let people live the life they want to live, provided it does not involve harming others.

I’ve given up on Schaller strap locks. I’ve found the strap buttons gradually unscrew themselves; perhaps from binding as you describe. I had them suddenly come off twice during gigs. I didn’t think I moved around that much. I’ve gone over to Loxx now and not had any issues with them.

Going away from tariffs again (sorry), we can start quantifying the amount of blood Trump has on his hands as a result of his recent decisions. It currently stands at 20 Ukrainian civilians (as far as we know). He doesn’t seem too bothered: Putin’s actions are “what anyone would do” and they are pounding the Ukrainians more than they were before. Both statements are true but it is the complete lack of concern that he shows for the loss of life that I find completely inhuman. No previous US leader would have said what he did, even if their decisions had caused the loss of life. They would at least have said they regretted the deaths and didn’t condone Russia’s actions. His language suggests he approves of it.

I bought a medium scale jazz neck direct from China off fleaBay. It has binding and block inlays but was unfinished. It cost around £60 if I recall correctly. Anyway, it is more than half decent. A bit of fine sanding and a couple of coats of Rustins matte varnish finished it nicely. There were a few sharp fret ends and the nut was a bit rough but didn’t require too much work. The heel was a bit wider than standard Fender, so I had to ease the pocket on the body I was putting it on. The neck profile is interesting in that it starts very jazz like but gets quite precision like towards the 12 fret. Quite reminiscent of Ibanez SRs. It could well have been a factory QC failure because of the fret ends, nut and heel dimensions but try finding a medium scale jazz neck in the UK, especially for that money. I’ve gigged this neck on a P body and it is more than fine.

Well, it seems to go a long way further back than the last century for Ukraine. It’s like every invader and empire has tried to eradicate their culture and sense of identity, and in many cases just ethnically cleanse them off the face of the Earth but despite that, they have sprung back.

Interesting reading. Perhaps could be summarised as, after a period of European dominance in the middle-ages, Ukraine has been shafted by every passing empire. In some ways, quite a similar history to Poland.

I’ve been reflecting on what looks like the USA and Europe parting company, perhaps even the break up of NATO in its current form. It might not turn out as badly as we might fear. Trump is pushing Europe to stand on its own feet. What he might not have thought about is that a unified and strong Europe might not need the USA as much. In fact, Europe might end up independent enough to be able to pick and chose which US initiatives we want to support. We might even decide we don’t want the US presence on our soil, we don’t want them spying on our citizens and we don’t need to share intelligence to the same degree. Flies in the ointment? Well there are plenty: we would need an alternative to GPS and Starlink. Many more European owned surveillance satellites. We need our own systems in our nuclear arsenal (rather than equipment supplied and controlled by the US). A much larger and more productive arms industry able to replace high tech weapon systems like the F-35, it goes on. It’s not something we can do in the four years that Trump is going to be in office (we hope). I can’t see the UK wanting (or being able) to go down this road but the French have always liked to plough their own furrow and do seem more capable when it comes to getting big projects going. Discuss.

Yes, it was a gross simplification. Basically, what the winning sides told them after they lost. The victors get to write the narrative. However, the German people did have collective guilt for their past militarism, the Nazis and the holocaust. That led to their post war consensus on military spending, how their military could be deployed, etc, which was the main point of my post.

Post war convention was that Germany should not build up its military. I believe there are clauses in its constitution to that effect (although that may be an urban myth). It was part of their collective guilt, having been responsible for two world wars and also reflected the anxieties of their European neighbours. Certainly Schulz said that their increase in military spending to support Ukraine was a major change in policy and the post war convention. Also during the cold war, Germany weren’t so much relying on the US for defence, as putting up with a huge US and other NATO nations’ troops presence on their territory. They also footed the bill for many of the bases which were treated as US and other allies’ territory. Berlin was under the control of the quadripartite powers: USA, France, UK and Russia, although the latter allowed the GDR to call their apart a capital city (which was not recognised by the other allies).

A great point, well made. The world seems to have gone into reverse on saving the planet. It is almost as if they have decided to precipitate total climate catastrophe as quickly as possible. BP are the latest to cave in to shareholder pressure. Perhaps they want to have another pop at polluting the Gulf of America to celebrate its new name! Meanwhile many automakers are backing out of plans to go electric by 2035. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza are an environmental catastrophe that has yet to be calculated. I would not be surprised if the costs of repairing the damage, exceed the cost of creating by an order of magnitude.

I didn’t vote for Brexit and I was upset when the (slender) majority went that way. However, I have always believed that the UK would be alright in the end. We will eventually recover from all the ill effects but you have to ask why we would want to put the country through 30 years, of vast extra expense, turmoil, disunity and general misery to come out the other end roughly where we were when we started. The current state of the world order means that we need to integrate militarily, politically and financially with the Europe we recently left, because we can’t count on the USA doing the right thing, or having our back. Effectively we will need to create a whole load of extra treaties and agreements, which will bind us as tightly to Europe as we were when in the EU but with few of the benefits of membership, so really worth all the extra expense and disruption then!

Great venue for a first gig! Proper stage and decent house PA. Result!

I don’t wish anybody to lose their job. However, a lot of the current financial difficulties of HE in the UK have been caused by the fall in foreign students in recent years. These students were a real cash cow for Universities because they paid absolutely top whack. The cash flow from foreign students may well have been hiding the systemic flaws and mismanagement in HE in the UK and England in particular. Whatever the case, with less money coming in, there is bound to be an adjustment in the sector. The reduction in foreign student numbers is in large part due to the immigration and other policies of the last government. The Conservatives set about making the UK a less attractive place for foreigners to come to study. They also devalued the UK’s stock globally making it look less welcoming and frankly less prestigious. Unfortunately, the current Government doesn’t seem to be doing a lot to repair the damage: educating foreign elites is a projection of soft power and influence, as is foreign aid.

Interesting article here. Since the vote in the UN this week, my mind has been going in this direction. The USA actively sided with our enemies: Russia, North Korea, China, etc. Russia is actively waging hybrid war against Europe and the UK and the USA has sided with our enemy. Can we trust the USA under Trump? I think not. Some of this does verge on the conspiracy theory at times but it is thought provoking. The special relationship seems to boil down to the UK being the USA’s poodle: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/feb/27/britain-defend-itself-us-military?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

You all look so cool in your gig pics! Any pics of the bands I play in look like entertainment day at the old folks home and we are the residents! 🥴

Never really associated Apple with servers. I think they discontinued their last attempt. I guess AI servers are gong to be very specialised. I wonder what the business case is for taking on the established server companies.

Yep, a lot of people actually prefer the tone you get with a BBOT. I just appreciate the better engineered appearance of a Babicz, even the Fender high mass bridge (good value too).

Nice if you can get a bass that is exactly what you want. I guess that is why Public Peace has the Maruszczyk/Mensinger configurator and luthiers make a living in the face of cheaper mass produced products. Thing is, you pay a lot more for the individual parts that way.

I often modify basses with better parts. I always try to keep the original parts, unless they were replaced because they were defective. If/when I come to sell, I reinstall the original parts, not because of what the OP said but because you never recoup anything like what you spent. You get much more selling the parts on their own. The problem comes when you have to do a bit of woodwork to fit the upgrade parts. In that case you have to leave them on the instrument and hope the upgrade appeals to a buyer. I can understand why some people get put off by “upgrades”. Some are pretty bizarre and some are poorly executed.

The way Trump and his Team are going at the moment, I think Armageddon is not far off.