TimR

That's blurring the lines too much. A disk jockey is a person who rides disks. I think that tells you all you need to know.

Some instrument players aren't even musicians!

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1439394379' post='2842454'] Then you will be entranced by my soon-come Suite For Plank and Ball-peen Hammer provisionally entitled 'We've Got The Builders In'. It is a work for music and words wherein I myself perform the music and provide the accompanying narration. Here is what young people call a sneak peek: Bang! Bang! "Fakking Gunners sh*te or what?" Bang bang bang! "Wenger? What a fakking kant" Bang bang! "Gary! Gary! Gary! Yew ear wot I fakkin' said? Wenger. Kant!" Bang bang bang bang bang bang! Everything is art, you see. [/quote] That sounds similar to my O'Level music composition where I used our Hoover and kitchen blender to great effect. Alas long before sampling came along and ruined the creativity.

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1439379111' post='2842259'] Not at all. There are whole albums of solo bass out there. Indeed, whilst we all know there are solo pianists and guitarists recording, there are also solo soprano sax players (Sam Newsome), solo alto sax (Anthony Braxton), solo tenor (Joe Lovano), solo double bass (Dave Holland, J.J Avernel, Glen Moore, Miroslav Vitous etc etc), solo voice (Bobby McFerrin). Soloing without the support of a rhythm section has a well-established history and some of the stuff produced in this waty is really beautiful. [/quote] Traditionally with a pop/rock band setting, if everyone stopped playing for someone to play a solo, I suspect everyone would stop dancing and go to the bar. Even guitar solos wouldn't work if the rest of the band dropped out every-time the guitar solo started.

[quote name='NickD' timestamp='1439374248' post='2842199'] For me it depends on the definition of solo (and this goes for any other instrument too). If we're talking literally, about the unaccompanied 'show 'em what you can do' type thing, I'm off to the bar. If we're talking about the rest of the band holding back and allowing the bass to take the lead, within the context of the piece, I think there's a place for that in most genres. I'd listen to that. [/quote] With the exception of a drum solo, I'm not sure what instrument would ever play completely solo within a band context. You always need a rhythm and bass line to accompany a solo. As I wrote before when the bass solos you need something to fill the rhythm and bass function that you lose when the bass isn't fulfilling that role. It can be done to very good effect but it's hard and you don't often hear it. Possibly because the other instrumentalists don't understand what function the bass actually does. Just roots isn't it?

Jack Bruce?

That's what I was trying to get at with my post earlier. [quote name='TimR' timestamp='1439299668' post='2841651'] It's the DJ who is performing live. Not the music. I'm guessing that most cover bands don't actually play 'live' music, they play carefully rehearsed copies of something someone else has created. Although the music is being reconstructed by humans so there is the potential for anything to happen, even the rehearsed copy may not be what you're expecting, even if it's what the musicians are intending (although it's not always what they're expecting either ) . [/quote]

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1439312281' post='2841820'] I don't mind myself, as long as it's GOOD. Too many '[b]Singers[/b]' have no idea about pacing, building a set and working a crowd. I don't either, but then I'm not a DJ. [/quote]

Quite. And refusing to listen to or play certain genres seriously limits your opportunity for work as a bass player. Why would you want to do that? Play anything with anyone. .

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1439307673' post='2841759'] What does that prove?The inference is that, because they can sing and play their own tunes on acoustic instruments, it validates the playing of a recording of themselves in a 'live' setting. I don't accept that it does. But, then again, i am being a git. [/quote] People go to cinemas to watch recordings of people perform acting.

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1439306992' post='2841747'] I don't think people who go & see bands are that bothered about how the music is produced either to be honest, unless they also happen to be musicians themselves. All people want to do is go out & get wasted with their mates. If people were that bothered about the music they wouldn't spend half the gig they've spent £50 to see buying overpriced beer at the bar & the other half talking to their friends & checking their f***ing phones. [/quote] That wasn't really my point. If people are interested in rock music, they go to watch rock bands. If people are interested in dance music, they go watch dance music being played. There is some crossover of course, but I don't think anyone going to watch dance music is expecting it to be anything other than what it is. Conversely, if you went to see Madonna and she mimed the set, that's not what you were expecting and probably not what you paid for. Some artists have tried it and come largely unstuck when the fans have complained.

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1439306602' post='2841741'] There is indeed a big market for it. Doesn't stop it being tedious beyond belief though. [/quote] You are free to persue your own tedious interests, no one is forcing you to listen to blues rock.

I very much doubt that a large proportion of the audience know or even care how the music is produced. If they did, they wouldn't be there, they'd be watching bands. There's an audience for all sorts of performance. If someone wants to stand in a field while a tiny speck jumps up and down and shouts on a stage with big TV screens, lasers and other lighting effects going on, that's up to them. I became bored of all that in the late 80s pretty much soon after it all started.

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1439297803' post='2841628'] They'd be better off making their band 'come alive' by playing something other than bloody blues rock. [/quote] I don't know. Our drummer seems to be out every weekend watching some band or other in various venues. There's obviously a big market for it.

It's the DJ who is performing live. Not the music. I'm guessing that most cover bands don't actually play 'live' music, they play carefully rehearsed copies of something someone else has created. Although the music is being reconstructed by humans so there is the potential for anything to happen, even the rehearsed copy may not be what you're expecting, even if it's what the musicians are intending (although it's not always what they're expecting either ) .

I suspect there are a lot of bands who don't have the experience of a really good bass player. I'm not talking about someone who can play blistering licks, but someone who can really make the band come alive just by locking in with the drummer on 8th root notes making them groove and not rushing or dragging. Hence you get adverts like that. They won't get anywhere because they're not looking for the right player simply because they don't know what they need. .

How many people participated in the end?

[quote name='tauzero' timestamp='1439215037' post='2840912'] You might be reinventing the wheel - there's a couple of bits of software available for the Raspberry Pi. Haven't looked properly at them as our guitarist does the DMX programming on a laptop. [url="http://lightput.com/"]http://lightput.com/[/url] (freeware) [url="http://www.qlcplus.org/raspberry.html"]http://www.qlcplus.org/raspberry.html[/url] (donationware) [/quote] Yes. My thought was to do programming on a laptop and then download the sequences to a Rasperry PI or similar. There's lots of third party software and hardware about. The key is getting the functionality right. What switches and knobs are required for a simple and basic foot controller while playing live. In theory you could program a whole show of scenes including advanced sequences with a single button to page through those scenes. With all the programming done at home.

You could be right. Don't know why it wouldn't be. It's just an Obey 40 in a foot case. Urm... Actually that gives me a better idea.

I would blame the death of 'nightclubs' on over priced drinks and pubs that can now stay open as late as they want. One poster was saying, the other week, that their band is now being asked to start at 10 and play until 1am. A group of my friends went to a festival on Saturday, not a band in sight. 10,000 people went to see the DJs paying £45 a ticket. That's a nice little earner.

Chauvet apparently do a foot-C. Bought out in Jan 2015. It looks like it might actually be what I'm trying to build! Not available in the UK and seems to be out of stuck in the U.S.

That's a very complex explanation. DMX is made up of 512 channels of data. The data consists of a value from 0-256. This value tells the 'fixture' on that Chanel what to do. For simplicity a one Channel red light would be off at 0 and full on at 256. And dimmed at all values between. A three channel par can might have Red on channel 1, green on channel 2 and blue on channel 3. Any one of 65,000 colours can be created using a mix of the three channel colours. That Par Can would have to be adressed and then would use the 3 adjacent channels based on that address. So the Par Can at address 1 would use channels 1,2,3. More complicated fixtures would use more channels. Add fixtures until you have used all 512 available channels. As an example you could have 4 Par Cans set to Adress 1 and they would all operate at the same time to the same colour using 3 faders. Or you could have 4 of them set to Channels 1,4,7,10 and operate them independently using 12 faders on the desk.

I like the idea of an 'expression' pedal to control values. Definitely an LED display for parameters.

I'm thinking. Everything programmed as sequences. Then a single colour could be programmed as a one stage sequence. Then two switches to page up and down and select a sequence, then a third to active the selected sequence. Maybe 4 and 5 for 'user programmed DMX sequence' which could be blackout, strobe or anything really. Maybe just 5 buttons for 5 sequences? Really I'd like to know how people use their current controllers at the moment and what the limitations are or if they don't have a controller, what they'd like to be able to do.

Seems to me there is a lack of programmable DMX foot controllers. I'm thinking of designing and building something aimed at bands. What features would you like to see? How many switches? My initial feeling is to build something that is programmed via a laptop and USB then taken to a gig as standalone. I think that would be the balance between ease of programming and portability and complexity of design. Fire away. It may never get off the ground but if I can pencil in some design ideas, get a few people interested, a working prototype might go places. Thanks for reading.