meterman

Ah right. I only ordered the Hofner flats because I knew they were definitely gonna fit in the piddly little holes in the tuners. I’m not usually one for much sustain anyway - I usually have foam at the bridge and palm mute as well - but I’ll be interested to see how they work out. I had a MIJ Fender Mustang bass for a while and the E was always pretty dead sounding, regardless of what strings I put on it. Hopefully it’ll work okay for me. Appreciate the tip-off though 👍

Oh and btw, if anyone needs to move house from Brighton to the South of France, and they need someone to drive the truck full of all their stuff I can absolutely recommend @Dad3353. He’s an honest bloke, he’s just done three years in Parkhurst and you can trust him. Lovely man ❤️ Total dude. The best!

I’m strictly an Orangina man these days. Been alcohol free since my bipolar meds were changed at the beginning of the year. The beers were for our neighbours, they were gonna come over for new year’s but they cancelled this afty so they’re up for grabs to BC’ers. Free collection only though

That was a bit wordy wasn't it? Here's the TLDR version: I bought a Hofner Violin Bass, it's excellent, here's a pic: All the best for New Year - Lee

In the summer I bought an excellent MIJ Squier Bullet Bass from Gareth of this very forum. And it really was excellent. It recorded beautifully and looked handsome, which always helps. But I ended up having difficulty playing it for long due to the state of my left shoulder, neck and back problems and this made me move towards something short scale and hollow bodied. I'd planned to sell the 34" scale Squier Bullet and buy a 30" scale hollow body bass, before emigrating on the 17th of December. I'd advertised the Bullet on here but it didn't sell so I was resigned to taking it with me but still getting another bass before I moved to France. And then maybe buying something online from Thoman.fr or Le Bon Coin once I'd moved. On the night of the 14th I googled 'Hofner Violin Bass' just out of curiosity and the search results threw up a load of results but at the top of the first page were a load of ads for Hofners, from Thomann, Absolute Music, Guitar Guitar etc. And among them was an Ignition series Hofner Violin Bass at a stupidly cheap price with 48hr delivery so I hit the buy-it-now button and hoped for the best. Me and my wife were fully occupied, still packing up boxes of our belongings for the move, so I didn't have much time to think about it but hoped it would arrive before we left for France. On the 16th I had a mate come down to Brighton to buy my old 1960's Philips organ. He's a pedal-steel player by trade but he's just got a studio space in north London and before he set off for Brighton he was looking for a bass on the Facebook marketplace in East Sussex. He hadn't found a bass but he did collect a Fender Twin from somehwere on the way. Then he got to our place and he saw the Bullet bass, picked it up, said "God, how light is this?!" and fell in love with it and we did a deal. While he was playing the Bullet, the doorbell rang, it was the courier guy with the Hofner Bass. When he handed me the box I thought it was an empty box, that's how light these things are. Even double boxed with bubblewrap it still felt empty. When I opened the boxes and got the Hofner bass out I was surprised at just how light it was. I don't have any scales so I didn't weigh it, but it's probably about the same as two packets of crisps or something daft like that. Big packets of crisps obviously, but you get my drift. Our move was being co-ordinated and handled by Douglas a.k.a. @Dad3353 and he knows a fair bit about Hofners so I handed it to him and he said, yeah they're all usually pretty light. Didn't have a lot of time to spare before the morning of the 17th so I boxed it back up ready for the move. I was sad to see the Bullet go but at least I knew I was going to a good home, and I did mates rates on it because I've known him for years and we'd done sessions together etc. All good. Anyhow we did the drive from Brighton to South of France (well @Dad3353 did, I just looked out the window and drank fizzy pop) and the day after we settled in I got the Hofner Violin Bass out, plugged it into a little practice amp and fell in love - It's such a funky sounding little thing, super light, and has more bottom end than it looks like it should. Couldn't stop playing it, didn't want to put it down. The neck is so easy to get used to, and the pickups are great. It has more sustain than I was expecting but flats and a bit of foam at the bridge should sort that. The whole feel of it is superb for the money, I can fully recommend the Ignition series violin bass if anyone is thinking about one, they're ace. I removed the guard as I prefer the look without one, and I couldn't get on with the roundwound strings that came with it though, so tried putting on a used set of Roto black nylon flats I had hanging about. But the E string was too big to fit into the tiny little guitar machine heads that the Hofner has. No problem, I've got a set of D'Addario Chrome flats that I'd had on my last Mustang bass, I'll just put them on. But no, the gauge is still too big for the tuners. Fergling little Bergstedts!!! 😡😆 So I've ordered a set of Hofner Contemporary flats from Thomann. They haven't arrived yet so I'm still making do with the roundwounds, but once they arrive I'll get them straight on and record some clips. Meanwhile, here's the obligatory pics: And because @Len_derby asked for a pic of it in the sunshine I took it out onto the balcony of our apartment and took a quick pic. It's not my best photo, but the sun was out and it was 14 degrees here. I was even wearing shorts but of course nobody wants to see that 😂 Anyway here's the bass in the sun: If anyone is on the fence about buying one of these, or can't quite make their mind up, all I can say is the one I got is brilliant. Wish I'd bought one years ago. If you see one at a decent price go for it 👍

I still buy music on vinyl, have done since I was a kid. I don’t buy as much vinyl as I did maybe 10-20 years ago but I still buy it. I’ll buy CDs as well, sometimes at gigs, but often for the old “expanded-with-bonus-tracks” reissues. I even still have a cassette player, but that’s my problem haha 😂 A couple of projects I’m involved with have got vinyl LPs and 7” singles being released early next year and usually the label gives us a box of complimentary freebies which we can sell on Bandcamp or wherever. Which sometimes is the only way we’ll see any money especially when the vinyl is a ltd edition release. Very handy this year, what with no gigs etc. I’d be interested to see how long the vinyl revival continues, or if it’s just a passing fad. I love music and ultimately the format it’s presented in doesn’t enhance or detract from that. I do love finding old reggae 12’s or funk 45s still, that won’t change I don’t think.

You might be right. I remember playing in Germany and the Netherlands pre-92 and the carnet system was a pain, even just with taking the most minimal gear. I’m an old git though, so I’ve had a decent run of it. It’s the nippers just starting out who might be the ones to really miss out.

Most of my best paid work in the last 10 years has taken place in the EU, probably by pure luck more than anything else, and I think it would be a massive shame if UK acts were priced / carnet-ed / visa’d out of doing a run of European gigs. Apart from function gigs in the UK, it was always the European ones where me and the guys would get paid decent money and get really well looked after. Audiences round Europe have often been great as well, really up for it. We’ve got to at least get visa-free travel for UK artists to make it worthwhile. Unless you actually are an established top tier act, but even so...

A bit of Snooks Eaglin:

The bit where Lennon is crouching down with his knees tucked up in his t-shirt is great. Hope there’s more daft stuff like this in the documentary.

Really enjoyed that! I'm not a Beatles freak by any stretch, but that was great. Loved seeing them all just dicking about and having a laugh. Nice gear shots as well, Lennon's iconic Casino, Billy Preston on the silvertop Fender Rhodes and Ringo's Thermogloss maple Ludwig kit. Oh, and a Hofner bass as well 😎

Immediately after the JV series Squier continued putting out quality instruments that were really brilliant value for money. Some here have already mentioned the MIJ Bullet basses, but tbh I've played a lot of pre-90 Squiers and they've all been pretty decent. Even now they still do some great instruments. My go to guitar for live gigs is a s/h £150 Squier 72 Thinline Tele and it's ace. Might be Chinese or Indonesian, I can't remember now and it doesn't matter anyway. But definitely the early MIJ Squier Bullets. Prices started going up on them a couple of years ago, both in the UK and the US, Japan etc. They're just quality instruments and folks have started cottoning on to them.

15 years ago I'd bought an 8-track cassette portastudio from a bass player friend and the first couple of tunes I recorded on it to test it out ended up on a 45rpm single. The gear I used was a mixture of decent (Gretsch drums, Gibson ES-335 guitar, Hammond organ, '78 Fender Vibro Champ) and not-so-decent (cheapo copy of a Coral Electric Sitar, a Shaftesbury short scale Tele bass copy, a single Radio Shack PZM microphone and a C-90 cassette). I overdubbed all the parts one by one. I'm not Prince obviously, but I can knock out greasy funk tunes. As per my nom de forum it's got a Meters vibe to it and I was recording tons of Meters-y kind of stuff on cassette at the time (2005-6) but this is the only one from then that got a vinyl release at the time. Anyhow, it's Christmas and because I forgot to send any cards out this year, have some greasy funk instead. Greasy funky Christmas everybody! 🎅

Actually it was raining when I woke up this morning and I must admit I was entirely unhappy about it. I didn’t move here for rain The estate agents promised 376 days of sunshine per year. I’m beginning to wonder if they were being less than truthful.

I’ll do a full NBD tomorrow. I’m still physically knackered from the emigration / move and still have to put flats on it today before I really get stuck into it. I should do a NMD as well. At times it was a brilliant laugh thanks to @Dad3353

Ohhhhh, rickets!!! My other favourite was diphtheria. 🤤 I’m waiting for the Hipsters / 1940s beard wax / Peaky Blunders crowd to start taking these conditions on. It’s gotta happen.

I received a Hofner Ignition violin bass just a few hours before moving house earlier this week. I haven’t had time to plug it into an amp yet but I’ve got a good feeling about it. I’m unlikely to ever play it at stadium volume, mind. But I’m sure it’ll be fine 👍

IMG_2545.MP4 Quick and dirty sounding phone clip from earlier this year, just after I’d bought the MIJ Squier Bullet bass from Gareth. Nowt special, just the same old loosey goosey Motown noodling I always default to, but it keeps me off the streets. Flatwound strings, palm muting and the amp is a 1978 Fender Vibro Champ that didn’t quite know what hit it. Rough style 👍

I was given a cheapie fretless 30" scale acoustic bass as a swap for a mic stand some years ago. The brand on the headstock said 'Swift' and the previous owner had put a little sticker above it saying 'Taylor' so yeah, I had a Taylor Swift acoustic bass. Corny as heck, but I'm ok with corny. It had an under saddle pickup which was crude but it recorded a lot better than I expected it to. I put a set of flats on it and it was a great wee thing to play around with at home and record with. At least, until the top bowed. Then the bridge lifted off. Then the neck heel separated from the body and it more or less folded in two. But for the 18 months it was playable I loved it. Would be tempted to get another fretless acoustic again. Just not a Taylor Swift one.

Jerry Donahue I met many times, as he used to stay at a friend’s place whenever he came to the UK. Such a fantastic musician but so humble and easy going. I’d stand there open mouthed watching him play seemingly impossible licks. Gerry Conway I also met a couple of times and possibly freaked him out a bit by being a total fanboy, pumping him for stories of recording with Cat Stevens, Sandy Denny etc. He seemed totally bemused that anyone would rate his playing. I would have loved to have seen Fotheringay 👍 Quite jealous!

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Zappa yet! I've tried getting into his stuff many, many times and I just don't enjoy it. If I want to listen to music with comedy lyrics I'll stick on a Grumbleweeds LP or something. But from all the Zappa records and live performances I've heard and seen footage of, there's no doubting he generally had top flight players playing pretty intricate stuff at a very high level. I just can't sit through a whole album of it. Captain Beefheart on the other hand, all day long, but that's a different skill set I guess.

Spot on. 😎 Also the Kenny Clarke - Francy Boland Big Band too. Double drums, especially in a kick-rrse big band takes a lot of skill not to overplay. But their MPS Records period was just amazing. Some of their live recordings are tight as you like and fierce AF with it. I should post some up in the "What are you listening to now?" thread really.