TimR

[quote name='brensabre79' timestamp='1326994787' post='1504962'] Jimmy Saville may be responsible for twin decks being used to play two records back to back at some point in time. As for inventing the Segue (which is an Italian word by the way, like most classical music terms - that should give you a clue...) perhaps you should not trust everything you read on Google or Wikipedia... [/quote] Heresy! How dare you blacken the name of the late great Sir Jimmy Savile with your Itallian Clasical music nonsense.

Google jimmy Saville twin decks.

No I did as I wrote it

Jimmy Saville invented the segue. A segue is two tunes played back to back without the drums stopping. The simplest ones we do, the band hold the last chord of the song while the drummer counts in the next tune. A medley is a bunch of tunes shortened to their best parts and stitched together musically.

You all need to be on the ball and have one person 'stage managing' your show. Usually the singer or keys. When they yell what song is next during the outro of the song you're playing everyone just has to play it. Once you're on the stage the band is no longer a democracy.

It all depends on your and your band's ability. Copyright only extends to lyrics and melody. If the punters can hear the wrods and the tune then really it doesn't matter what the drums, bass et al are playing. Unless of course the bass has the melody or a very important harmony. If you're just banging out the chords you can pretty much put any rhythm in and "make it your own" no one will notice as someone else said (in not so many words) they're listening to the tune in their heads and remembering getting of with some bird in their teens. Mainly its all about attitude, confidence and being tight sell the band. Not the tunes or musicianship. Unfortunately Endings and starts confident and tight, don't get lost or miss verses or choruses. Occasionally it happens by accident but I've found its a waste of time missing out bits to make the song shorter or playing extra verses because you really like the tune. Eventually you'll hate it anyway and when you get deps in you'll confuse the hell out of them. Once you've been playing together for 6 months you get a feel for what songs will and won't work on first play through. Afetr several years you won;t even need to play them just listening will give you an idea. We learn them from MP3 - same key, same format, close as possible to original then simplify/elaborate to fit our line up.

There is a reason why you can only copyright Vocals and Melody. They are really the only recognisable parts of a song to most people. I'm sure its only when you become a musician that you start to identify which instrument is playing what. Only non-musicians and musicians who have trained themselves out of the habit listen to the whole sound.

I wasn't suggesting that you were in that type of band but you're right; the fact that the clubs haven't changed in 30 years is probably why they're still getting booked. We played a few of them, but we play a bit more loose arrangements which also went down well and we were asked back. Unfortunately/fortunately my band vetoed them. The problem is that they think they know what they want, at one gig the EM kept coming up to the leader and telling him what to play, despite the dance floor being full and people coming up at the end saying that it was unusual to have so many people dancing so early on on the night. One guy said we were exactly what the club should have on every week and it would attract a much younger group of people to the club as membership was falling because people keep dying. Lol.

I think it's true when they say you should always play with musicians who are as good or better than you are. I'm all for bringing on new musicians but if you're in a band of guys who've all been playing for years and who can pick up a tune in one night or even jam straight from chord charts, then you're going to need a drummer of the same calibre. Are you really going to spend weeks polishing a song just because one of you isn't up to scratch. It can become soul destroying and make you hate learning new material and limit the styles of music you play. The thread could equally be about guitarists or singers. Its always interesting to record yourself and see how well you keep time without the drummer. I played for years with a drummer who followed my timing but trod all over my basslines with his double bass drum pedal. If I stopped playing he sped up and I felt I was constantly putting the brakes on. It's very tiring. It's basic supply and demand.

[quote name='leftyhook' timestamp='1326709265' post='1500642'] Well said. However as I play in a.function band,where there are certain expectations from fellow musicians (" the bass drops out for 1 bar on the original recording"..blah blah) so variations have to be subtle. So my Firework 'personal exercise/challenge is playing the 'expected' notes, but how I choose to play them. Oh, and there is always the odd musician or two who notices your fingers doing crazy things [/quote] It's funny how there are so many different views on this. From everyone must play exactly the right parts, complete with authentic guitar and keyboard sounds, to break the track down to lyrics, chords and play it in your own style. Personally I hate the clinical sound of a band who've done the former and are phoning in their performance with plastic smiles and 'off the cuff improvised' moves and jokes (that they do everytime). I wonder how these bands keep getting booked. However There's a fine line between improvising a few fills and cluttering up a tune with needless noodling and experimentation is best done at home.

Take it to someone else's house. It has to be mains interference. When you plug into your computer soundcard you are earthing the unit so the noise is eliminated. Alternatively turn off some appliances in the house. Try fridge/freezer, dimmable or fluorescent lights

OK Thanks.

Quite an old thread this. Now a few second hand ones on ebay c£35-40. Anyone any views good or bad?

People will expect you to buy it anyway thinking you have got a good deal when you knock the price down. Seems odd in this day and age not to have lots of pics emailed to you of any damage so you can decide if it is good, very good, excellent or immaculate. I've had conversations with peole who've advertised cars as "immaculate for age". I think "good condition" is probably the lowest condition you can reasonably sell something in.

Busk it. Have fun!

When I was trying to become famous I worked as a temp. I could practically work whatever days I wanted. I told one boss that I wouldn't be able to work the next day as I had a gig and the agency would be sending someone else tomorrow. He said "Oh good, I was going to get rid of you anyway. Don't come back." I didn't.

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1323955323' post='1469115'] .... Get to know a good accountant too. [/quote] In fact get to know her very well and marry her. Then you can do whatever you want.....

University is a great place for networking. Making contacts that will do you well in the future. Network will fellow musicians (including yeras above and below) but also network with people who are going to be doctors, lawyers, politicians, film proiducers too. These are the people who will book your band or ask you to write material for them. Get to know a good accountant too.

I think as you've said your PRIMARY instrument will be Bass. I'll suggest that you'll also have to be able to play or will at least have to learn piano as your secondary instrument. I played with a drummer who was in his second year of a music degree with percussion as his primary instrument. Awsome drummer, his second instrument was piano and I've never heard anyone play piano like it. I would say he was a better pianist than drummer! So wen you graduate you should be able to do all that sequencing stuff that you're worried about becoming the norm and add your own live bass parts As an aside and not really that relevant. There will always be a call for 'real' musicians. I'm fairly sure that there is (there certainly used to be) an agreement with the MU that anyone miming on a TV show must be a memeber of the Union. Even those pretty girls that look like models you see miming to tunes you know don't have real musicians playing on them, are registered with the musician's union. I may be wrong, of course, it may have changed. My friend joined the union as a tuba player and has done lots of shows despite not being able to play tuba - I kid you not!

I have a Jackson charvel with pointy headstock in White. More of a bass used by Bon jovi and the like really but if you are interested I could be persuaded to part with it.

Definitely go for ER20s as a minimum to start with but if you sing get vented plugs. There is a sticky on earplugs here: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/533-ear-plugs/"]http://basschat.co.uk/topic/533-ear-plugs/[/url]

Music is a language. The notes are the letters, the bars are the words and the phrases are umm phrases. I can have a conversation with my 7 year old son, I understand what he says and he understands what I say, but I can also have a conversation with my friends down the pub. Both are equally enjoyable and valid. Just the older you get the more words you learn and you start to hear the same phrases used time and time again. Well at least from the wife I do.

Yes. I think the most important thing is to get into a band as soon as you can, don't worry about how good you are. I started in a band playing 3 chord wonders and plodded along on the root for most of them. As we leaned more tunes I had to learn more and harder basslines. Knowing that you have to learn a song by next week will give you focus.

[quote name='Jigster' timestamp='1322920081' post='1457299'] of course, if you're playing some toilet in darkest West Mids and it's the band, the sound man, the bar man, the bar man's mate (cos he's got nowt else to do) and three punters, I don't suppose those low freqs are going to have all that much to bounce off and the sound...as Zep might say..stays the same [/quote] The high frequencies bounce off hard surfaces and are absorbed by soft surfaces. The low frequencies are omni directional and are not absorbed by soft surfaces. Adding people reduces the top end meaning you can hear more bottom but also means you can push the overall volume up a bit.

For a start you pickups do not capture the sound of your unamplified bass. They only attempt to transfer the characteristics of the resonating string. What you are hearing when you play unplugged is a combination of the string and the bass wood vibrating, you can't capture the sound waves coming off the wood. If you speak to Alex, he will probably tell you that his cab design is a compromise. He did try to build a three way hi-fi full frequency cab but found that fully transparent cab is not required for bass. So the barefaced cabs are 'fairly' transparent. Another factor is that unless you play solo, you need to redically alter the bass sound so that it sits in the mix with the other instruments. With an upright you will find that a lot of the frequencies it produces are masked by the other instruments and this happens naturally or is done by the sound engineer. If you don't you'll run out of headroom and everything will turn to mush.