TimR

I guess I should rethink my plans for a Level 42 tribute band then?

I saw them at Wembley arena in the mid 80's. Mark King flew across the stage on wires in the dark with just the LEDs on his bass shining. It was very exciting....... ....to a 14 year old and his girlfriend.

No I'm pretty sure that there was music in the 80s that was manufactured purely for the clubs in Ibiza and to make money from. They'd bring out a tracks every week that were bought by DJs, played in clubs and thrown away. Similar to lift music, no one actually listened to it, it served a purpose and that was all. Sure it was music but no one really liked it. Cover bands would never be able to reproduce it and if you played it to anyone now they would think you were mad. I'm not talking about the Pepsi and Shirley type stuff which obviously had a lot of thought and emotion put into it and wasn't just a vehicle to make money out of.

So the shelf life of music is not dependent on time, but rather on the consumer. Novel. This means there will always be a market for old and tired music. If the consumer becomes tired of listening to it then the consumer must search out new fresh music. So there continues to be markets for both cover bands and originals and they are completely different markets. There is also another driving force - fashion. Teenagers don't want to be seen to listen to the same unfashionable music their parents listen to. Although plenty will do it happily at home I'm in my 40s, I lived through the 80s and my personal opinion is that most of it was really poor music. I have a lot of friends in their 30s who feel they missed out on the 80s and they love the tunes. I believe that all the dross has now been weeded out to leave tunes that have matured with time. 80s cover bands do extremely well.

[quote name='Bilbo' post='978014' date='Oct 5 2010, 09:42 AM'].... Like food, its better and more nourishing when its fresh, be that KT Tunstall, Trivium, John Taverener or Phronesis. ...[/quote] Very good point. At which point does it mature and at which point does it go off?

[quote name='Bassassin' post='977695' date='Oct 4 2010, 09:27 PM']I'm not sure anyone's even implied that it is, have they? J.[/quote] Maybe not on this thread. I take the original question as what is the appeal of playing other people's music? What is the alternative if you don't write your own? It doesn't mean you are somehow not a proper musician.

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' post='977705' date='Oct 4 2010, 09:35 PM']Is the dude in a Korean factory making Fender clones a luthier though?[/quote] Depends on how much of the clone he has made. If he has just assembled parts from a machine, no. Am I a carpenter if I can assemble an Ikea chair?

It's is not essential to be able to compose good music to be a musician. Does a carpenter have to be able to design furinture? Is he still a carpenter if he follows plans. I know plenty of musicians who play in west end shows every night , or orchestras around the world. They follow the dots. They teach by day. They are professional musicians making a living from playing music. When Mozart et al wrote music, did they require the orchestra to come up with their own versions of the parts they had written? Isn't The London Symphony Orchestra just another covers band? It is my understanding that you can only copyright lyrics and melody. All us bass players who believe that we are part of the writing or composing process just because we come up with our own lines are simply deluding ourselves.

[quote name='Dave Vader' post='977314' date='Oct 4 2010, 04:30 PM']Not so much Bilbo, I feel dirty, I play music I do not like, for money, I can feel a 17 year old version of myself chucking fruit at me every time I walk on to a stage. Still, a gigs a gig, and I am a shameless whore.[/quote] There's a fine line between being a whore and being a mercenary.

Excellent one that's Rob Holliday.. [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Holliday"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Holliday[/url] [url="http://www.flickr.com/photos/robbiegill/3483541810/"]http://www.flickr.com/photos/robbiegill/3483541810/[/url] Oh and no worries I've updated the Daily Annoyances thread

[quote name='Pete Academy' post='976281' date='Oct 3 2010, 06:52 PM']I was in my teens. Formed an original band. Didn't make it big. Decided that playing covers to people was better than sitting in my bedroom whiddling away. And actually earned money.[/quote] This is getting to be a familiar story here. I really believe that studying the arrangments, forms, and bass lines of hundreds of other people's tunes is the best way to learn. It does frustrate me that playing covers is seen as selling out as opposed to a valuable learning experience. I wish I had learned that before I started playing in originals bands. If I wasn't in a covers band I don't know that I would have had the patience or motivation to learn (study) a high proportion of those tunes. I hated the Beatles tunes with a vengance but I had to learn them, once learned they're a little bit more enjoyable. They pack the dance floors and at least I now know why. In the past I would have asked "What's the appeal of Get Back?" I still don't listen to the Beatles at home though.

[quote name='Protium' post='976340' date='Oct 3 2010, 07:46 PM']It was a joke, chill out.[/quote] Ok, you added the smiley now Felt like you were slamming me for not knowing about someone I've only heard of as a drummer in a genre I don't really listen to. I knew he played guitar and sang in Foo Fighters of course BUT if you slam me be prepared to do some work I'm still not sure that Prodigy have a bass player but that's just me being pedantic. Maybe I'll check out some of those other bands though, cheers.

[quote name='Pete Academy' post='976298' date='Oct 3 2010, 07:06 PM']That's exactly how Stoke is. In the 80s a cover band could make a living playing the workingmen's clubs and pubs in the Staffs. My estate alone had 5 clubs. The other day I drove past one of Stoke's most popular venues and it's boarded up, ready to be pulled down.[/quote] I blame sky TV , the Internet and cheap supermarket beer. <contentious conspiricy theory> The government want everyone locked up at home,. OR in huge beer warehouses in city centres where they can watch the people who dare to go out on CCTV. It's easier to police. </contentious conspiricy theory>

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' post='976311' date='Oct 3 2010, 07:16 PM']There is a bass drum, which will be going through those big subs.[/quote] Doesn't most of the "bass" in a bass drum exist in the 80-120Hz area?

[quote name='Protium' post='976280' date='Oct 3 2010, 06:49 PM']Missed Dave Grohls abilities as a totally awesome multi-instrumentalist [/quote] Why the GTFO? The guy's "a totally awesome multi-instrumentalist " and you give me a one line answer? What other bands has he played in and what instruments? As I say I thought he was a drummer. I'm not one of his followers. Does he play bass guitar on the Prodigy album? - show me a link. Who plays all these multi instruments that he is playing on the album for the Prodigy when they go on tour? As I say "educate me."

[quote name='Protium' post='976268' date='Oct 3 2010, 06:41 PM']GTFO[/quote] What have I missed? Educate me. According to Wikipedia - Grohl played drums on the tracks 'Run With The Wolves' and 'Stand Up' on The Prodigy's 2009 album Invaders Must Die.

All a port does is tune the cabinet to make it resonate at certain frequency. This makes it more efficient at that frequency in a smaller box. The idea being that you don't need a massive cabinet to carry around and your 15" or 10" is still able to produce useful frequencies up to 5kHz. Nice harmonics and clear sound from one speaker cab. That's why we use 15" and 10" for PORTABLE bass cabs. Once you start talking about 18" and 21" SUB speakers their response is not very flat above 1Kz. So as someone already said they will sound horrible. Note this is not the same as a full range 18" bass speaker that some use for bass guitar, again usually in a ported cab. The PA will have crossovers that cut all the frequencies over 50Hz going to the cab. The Prodigy will probably not be too concerned about tring to get their subs into the back of their family hatchback along with the drum kit and then fitting it in a service lift or carrying it down a fire escape in the rain in the middle of the night.

[quote name='Delberthot' post='976037' date='Oct 3 2010, 02:56 PM']They tour with a full band - Dave Grohl played on their newest album [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bq46OY-FHIc"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bq46OY-FHIc[/url][/quote] Ahhh my eyes. I couldn't make out anything from that video. Isn't Dave Grohl a drumer? According to their website he laid down drum tracks.

[quote name='skankdelvar' post='975906' date='Oct 3 2010, 12:46 PM']True. But they [i]can [/i]be moulded into a variety of interesting shapes. Ideal for friends and family with Xmas just around the corner.[/quote] You'll still get your hands very messy and once your friends and family have unwraped and played with their gifts I doubt they will want any more of them from you.

You can't polish a turd. With a covers band you know you don't have a turd to start with, You still have to do the polishing, very rarely does a song work just by simply copying what's on the record and sometimes it doesn't work at all. With an originals band you don't know you have a turd, then spend far too long polishing it hoping that it will sparkle. I think if a song works on acoustic guitar or piano then you have a winner. The only easy bit it that the covers band already know that people will like the song. The rest of the work is the same.

[quote name='maxrossell' post='975509' date='Oct 2 2010, 10:56 PM']... You get a function gig, you learn a handful of standards, play for a couple of hours and you can walk away with £300 in your back pocket and you get free drinks all night. And usually you get treated with respect, and if you're any good you get a bunch of repeat work. ...[/quote] If only. Maybe this myth is why the covers bands get so much stick? [url="http://wiki.basschat.co.uk/info:industry:function_rates"]http://wiki.basschat.co.uk/info:industry:function_rates[/url]

[quote name='flyfisher' post='975455' date='Oct 2 2010, 09:56 PM']I suspect TimR was referring to MCBs in the consumer unit rather than every plug or device - an example of where technology advances can be incorporated into updated regs and replace rather imprecise fusewire and minimise consumer error at the same time.[/quote] Indeed. It would be interesting to see how many fires have happened in where an incorrect plug top fuse has been fitted where there has been an MCB at the consumer unit. As I said very early on. It's about minimising risk (with the available funds. You can never eliminate all risk unless you have limited funds.) We already know that the regs allow for a "short" length of cable to be fitted after a large fuse to get down to a smaller rated fuse in distribution systems. depends on what you perceive the risk to be and whether an MCB will contain that risk. My brother has MCBs and RCDs they're tripping all the time. I've told him why.....

I think the answer is staring us in the face. MCBs

[quote name='Marvin' post='975364' date='Oct 2 2010, 08:00 PM']But that still makes little difference to his argument. The size of a driver is, as Snicks pointed out, only a small factor in determining the sound. The fact that keyboards will go down to 27Hz is somewhat academic because you can't hear it. Personally I'd rather have what determines the qualities of a loudspeaker system explained by someone who makes them rather than just uses them. Having spent the last few weeks reading material on, and asking what seems like an infinite number of questions relating to drivers and loudspeakers, from those informed responses this guy comes across as a complete idiot.[/quote] That's odd I can hear the bottom A on my piano perfectly well. You just need huge amounts of power to get the same percieved volume. Hence loads of big speakers. What context are you asking about loudspeakers? If you are looking at standard bass speakers their response falls off dramatically below 100Hz.

No, you're Ok pete. I have no problem with your knowledge, my problem was with you not answering the original question simply but resorting to writing pages of info to "prove" you were a "proper electrician". No one was ever doubting this. You are right about Maplins doing the 5amp. However unfortunately it was the 5amp fuse in my amp that blew and I had a very frustrating trip to B&Q to see lines of 3amp and 13amp fuses, but no 5s or 10s. Hence my B&Q question, it wasn't meant to be a dig. I believe that eventually the UK WILL go to 3A and 13A as you say eventually we will get dragged to European standards. I hope we don't end up like the Italians. One of our guys found a live 415v cable with bare ends coiled above one of our Milan office ceilings.