TimR

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1431597458' post='2772903'] I'm not entirely sure about that. Every time I send something via PorcelFarce there is someone in there complaining bitterly about PO prices. And I think price [i]is[/i] the bottom line with companies like myHerpes... everyone [i]knows [/i]they are totally crap, but are prepared to take the risk because they are WAY cheaper than anyone else... [/quote] They're not complaining about price, they're complaining about the level of service they get for that price. Never heard of myHerpes. Doesn't sound a great name but if they're advertising as a very cheap service then you know what you're buying. As opposed to paying for a good service and getting a poor service. It's a mindset.

Seems to me ParcelForce are living in the past with the way they treat their employees. This has nothing to do with bottom line, profit, middle management etc. It has everything to do with the ethos coming down from the managing director. If you have a good director who is interested in his customers and workforce this will result in a much better culture where people want to use your company and people want to work for your company. Yet another company living in the dark ages. As customers we don't chose our delivery company on price. We chose them on whether they deliver the goods politely and in good condition and in a timely manner, and if they can't, we need the alternative arrangements to be conveinient.

I have only got one bass. Unless you count my spare bass and my spare spare bass. And the one in the loft.

[quote name='visog' timestamp='1431410144' post='2770900'] Perhaps it's me but this idea of a super-intimate gig does not appeal at all. I want may rock stars on stage with a full production, and at the fraction of the cost. Admittedly not as exclusive but then that's not one of my musical appreciation criteria. Supposing he breaks your toilet? [/quote] £750 between 16 people is less than £50 each. I saw Frank in Shepherds Bush. It may have been £20-£30. You're standing in a hall with 2-300 people. Albeit a great venue. The guy is sitting on a sofa in the same room. Magical. .

Surely you can't be self employed if you're paying PAYE and working an employer. Keep all your receipts and records of how much you've been paid for gigs. Talk to an accountant or CAB. It's very unlikely that you'll actually make much money out of music by the time all your outgoings have been included.

[quote name='phil.c60' timestamp='1431436923' post='2771320'] Hot Rod P bass with 90% volume on neck (P pickup) and about 15% on bridge (J pickup) with most of the treble rolled off. Keeps all the unwanted stuff down a bit plus it sort if seems unnatural to me to set anything at absolute flat out! Surely most controls work best inside their operating range rather than right at the end? With regard to dynamics, you can still play harder/softer regardless of where you start with the controls set. The only time this approach might be tricky is if you simply aren't loud enough with your amp on max and digging in but that's unlikely, surely? (or your amp/cab isn't big enough!) [/quote] The volume control on a bass is a cut control. It doesn't make the bass any louder. Only quieter. So if you turn down your bass you're effectively limiting the range of dynamics available to you. Or rather making that range more narrow and harder to make fine adjustments from your fingers. .

The signature can be anyone who receives the package on your behalf. It's a proof of delivery only. The delivery driver had chosen a spot that he feels is safe enough. Bear in mind that the bass will probably have already been exposed to the elements at several points on the journey. It's not kept in a controlled environment! If the driver signs for it and it subsequently goes missing then it's parcelforce you have the claim against.

[quote name='neepheid' timestamp='1431435485' post='2771285'] I made a bass cupboard out of the space which was vacated by the water tanks when we changed to a combi boiler: Thinking of putting a shelf above to put small bass related items on. Phase 2! [/quote] That's not a bass cupboard. That's a bass wardrobe!

[quote name='sykilz' timestamp='1431434514' post='2771269'] Actually, Royal Mail used to deliver starting at about 7a.m., and then do a second delivery, but the MANAGEMENT decided to go to a one delivery system, so it would be " better " for the customers...( for "better" read "cheaper for the company") [/quote] Anything after 6:30am is too late for me so I don't see any point in having two deliveries in a day. With the advent of email, actual post is ridiculously far down the scale of importance now. It's modernisation. Better for everyone I'd say.

All the way up. I play quietly in the quiet bits and loudly in the loud bits.

[quote name='Beedster' timestamp='1431417330' post='2770960'] Absolutely, and it is not 'quiet encouragement', it is explicit instruction albeit on a 'don't tell the punters' basis. My Parcelforce delivery guy, a nice bloke, left a parcel in my dustbin and it went off to the dump because the card he put through the door telling us it was in the bin went walkabout (it did turn up but some time after the bin had been collected). I asked if he was going to get into trouble for signing for it (it was signed for as delivered) and he made it pretty obvious he would have got into more trouble if he [i]hadn't[/i] signed for it. Most people are out during Monday-Friday 9-5 which is when Parcelforce do most of their domestic deliveries, if they didn't do this type of thing and had to keep taking things to and fro depots with all the handling and processing, their business model wouldn't work and prices would go up with all the consequences for competitive edge etc. They simply live with the fact that in a small percentage of cases - and it is small - things go wrong. Will the MD/CEO care about this, absolutely not, it's acceptable business risk. In fact not doing stuff like this represents higher risk from senior management perspective. Personally with most items I'd prefer the delivery gets to me without too much messing about and on the day I expect it. If that can be done via wheely bins, neighbours and clever hiding places, I'm generally happy. Until it goes wrong [/quote] Seems fair to me. I'm sure I've seen lockable cabinets for deliveries advertised. If you're planning on getting a lot of deliveries it might pay to have some kind of secure storage like that. Stays unlocked until the delivery guy puts something in and locks it. We have quite a few neighbours who work from home on various days. Someone always signs for our stuff.

I caught some if it. Will try to catch it on iPlayer later this week. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05tkm9m It was all about rhythms. 4 part series.

There's always a balance to be had. Sitting in a pit sight reading tends to sharpen your skills. Good luck.

My two 2x10"s lie on their backs in the middle of the sitting room. I have a sheet of toughened glass that fits over the top to make a centre-piece coffee table that any bass player would kill to have in their house. Anyway back to the real world... No.

At the last gig I drank lager.

I've had a listen to some of that this morning and it's not very subtle. As an example of playing behind the beat I'm not sure it's a very good example as an introduction. Probably too 'jazz' for most people.

Have you setup a profile on Bandmix looking for other musicians or are you just trying to find bands looking for a bass player. In my experience bands don't always advertise, but they do look (no idea why) and bandmix used to notify you if someone had look at your profile, even if they went no further. You can use that info to 'reverse engineer' an audition with people who look.

[quote name='blue' timestamp='1428006675' post='2737066'] ... I don't know what it's like in the UK culturally when it comes to dancing, but over here most guys can't and won't dance, so it's mainly the ladies dancing with the ladies. Blue [/quote] Nope that's pretty much the observation. The girls dance and the guys watch the girls and the band. If the band isn't much to look at then they need to play the tunes that attract the girls. Then the girls will bring their guys with them. Classic rock isn't ever going to drag people away from xfactor. The secret is to play bang up to date songs. It can be done well with a three piece with enough imagination. Previously this was always seen as the territory of the function bands.

I tend to ignore most of the wording in an advert. Most of it will be dressed up to make the band sound more attractive. As you say established, committed, busy are all very general terms.

Can you send me your setlist? Do you have a demo mp3 or video, or are you playing a gig with your current bassist/dep so I can come see you? How often do you practice and when? When would you expect to be playing the first gig with me? If the band doesn't have a setlist that gives you an idea of what stage they're at. A good setlist also give you a pretty good idea of whether they're in demand for gigs. It will be rare that the actual tunes they play are important to me in terms of whether they're the type of music I listen to. If they practice every week you could be looking at a hobby band who are not particularly interested in gigs. If they want me gig ready for a booked gig in two weeks then they're the band for me.

In think you've pretty much made it if you can regularly draw a double figure crowd.

[quote name='DiceSociety' timestamp='1430916969' post='2765884'] This link of john paul jones talking about, and demonstrating playing ahead of, and behind the beat is quite interesting I think. Skip to 11:50 on the link. Picture quality is pretty poor though, and it's a shame that his bass isn't plugged in. Oh well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaa1axJ63Qg [/quote] Led Zep and The Who are superb examples of where it is done really well in Rock.

Although I might start agreeing with ubit when he complains about pretentiousness if we're talking about abstract and avant guarde jazz.

[quote name='stuckinthepod' timestamp='1430909610' post='2765755'] Exactly. We had it at the weekend. Booked to play a new pub venue. We turn-up and it’s very “Wetherspoons” - modern pub interior. 50% of the wooden railed stage area is taken over by a fixed all singing dancing DJ booth. Set up the drum kit (enormous rack style kit) an there is so little space I’m off down one side almost behind the drummer, lead guitarist the same on the other side and singer has to set up mic stand on floor level - two steps down from the stage.. We had the first “turn it down” after 3 songs and another 2 songs later. No applause from crowd and a bad night was had by all. Possibly our worst gig ever. If you are venue that usually only supports talking and the occasional quiet disco or bingo why book a full fat rock covers band playing GNR, Sabbath, Zep etc? You didn’t enjoy it, Your punters didn’t enjoy it and we certainly didn’t enjoy it. For christ sake we are called St0rm K!ngs- what were you expecting - acoustic Carpenters covers! [/quote] I think it works both ways. And as I said upthread bands are generally too loud. Loudness isn't an absolute, it's what is appropriate for the venue. We're very careful which venues we approach and agree to play because we are aware of what is appropriate for some venues is going to be difficult (but not impossible) to achieve as a lot of the time the sound levels are increased by the audience which is beyond our control. We have played some of our best gigs at relatively low volume in small pubs but that does require a certain amount of musicianship. Particularly from the guitarist and the drummer .

[quote name='ubit' timestamp='1430913481' post='2765829'] I appreciate what you are saying now and think I am probably doing this subconsciously anyway as when I'm playing with a drummer in say a slow number, I will obviously try to lock in with him, but there's no way that I will be consciously listening to every drum hit to make sure I'm in time. Some of the swing will be supplied by me. I am also the singer which further proves I can't listen to the drummer all the time. Any bass hits will be "felt" and any that are slightly behind the drum hit will be so undescernable that you wouldn't notice this obviously. I get what you mean about the "feel" of a piece of music rather than just playing on auto, it's just the whole explanation that you are playing before or after the bass drum beat,that sounds like tosh to me as that would be clearly out of time. I think it's an understanding rather than dismissal that was needed and I apologise for any offence. I still think the crazy little thing videos are not the best example as the first one is clearly slower and not so "urgent" [/quote] Exacty. But the bass drum isn't the beat. The beat is the pulse is in your (and all the other musician's) head. The bass drum may well usually be on that beat but not always. Hence you're not actually listening for the drum beat to mark your time. You will be listening to it for other clues though. I thought if you listen to the two crazy little thing tunes in isolation from each other I was hoping you'd pick up in the amount of swing in the first one and the amount of drive in the second. I may strip the sound out of the videos and speed the first one up to the same speed as the original and see if it demonstrates it better. It may be that there is more room to add swing and feel it more if the song is slower but I don't think that is what is happening there. The bass players are two different people.