TimR

[quote name='Doddy' post='974949' date='Oct 2 2010, 01:09 PM']I seem to remember reading an old interview with Zender where he said something like although JK tries to treat it as a band,it is actually just him. Bearing in mind that the first single was JK and a bunch of session guys-including Andrew Levy on Bass. Edit...... In the Feb '98 issue of Bassist,it says that when Jay Kay recorded 'When You Gonna Learn' he didn't have a band-just a roster of 'help out' musicians.He actually put the 'band' together after that first single. So,as far as I see it,Jay Kay is Jamiroquai and can basically hire and fire a he sees fit.[/quote] Ah. So he's not at all like all the other egotistical singers then.

My spell checker hates Jameroquai! He/They have been though a hell of a lot of line up changes. Check [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamiroquai"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamiroquai[/url] for the list of former members. I don't think that he would be referred to as Jamiroquai if he was guesting on someone else's album with their band.

There is a third way. I saw a great covers band last night. I don't think any tune they played had the original parts though. The musicians had all adapted their parts to be so different that only the chords and words were the same. Tempos all different, bass lines and drums nothing like the original. The crowd loved it, they recognised the songs and sang along. My musician mates didn't even notice. Maybe I should get out more..... Music is fun just enjoy it. If you get paid it's a bonus. If you enjoy playing at home to yourself, just in the garage with your band, or to one man and his dog in a pub - is that any different to listening to a cd at home alone, with friends or a juke box in the pub? Maybe people take it all a bit too seriously.

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='974564' date='Oct 1 2010, 08:13 PM'].... The current method is still either 3A or 13A so when the 13A is too big what do they do? I am an electrician so have the nouse to use a 5 or a 10 but a 2 day trained guy will not. ...[/quote] I think we finally got there. As I said earlier in the thread I don't want get bogged down in this... Seems I did. My apologies. A good engineer or electrician will not make assumptions based on limited information. "I don't know I'll find out." is always an option. Nobody is expected to know everything. You made assumptions on the sewing machine and the fact that you were the best qualified person to write about electrical engineering on the forum. I have no doubt a Chartered Engineer and whole host of other people will have tears of laughter running down their faces reading the thread. You know your subject and I haven't disagreed with anything you have written. Let's move on from this game.

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='974511' date='Oct 1 2010, 07:36 PM']Tim, leave it. You are clearly out of your depth here. Being a pedant won't make you look like any less of an idiot.[/quote] I'm not out of my depth. I have not disagreed with anything Pete has said. He, however, said I was talking utter rubbish when I said I don't like it when electricians down rate fuses for no good reason. He then spouted off about how knowledgable he is on electrics quoting large bits of text to back up his claim. Pages of the stuff - most of it I have read for work, know and implement every day - most of it irrelevant - and very tedious. The original equipment designer will tell you what fuse to use, not an electrician who thinks the fuse is "slightly" too big. I see it all the time as have other posters. The electrician turns up, down rates the fuse, turns on the gear, all well and good, turns it off and goes away. Next time you turn it on the fuse blows. Great! The electrician never finds out about this because we, being nice English people who never complain, just put the proper fuse back in and don't say anything. This is fine until it happens to you at a gig and no one has a spare fuse or a screwdriver.

"These are examples and you should ensure that the correct fuses are fitted, by consulting the manufacturers instructions." Also known as the specs.

Thank you Pete. The you're an electrician FFS was not supposed to be a slur, it was supposed to make you think about the REAL world. Your theory is all correct but it is only theory and a best practice guide and this is a forum. Producing pages of text where you are second guessing installations and saying that this is what you must do is absolutely pointless. Every installation is different and requires a visual inspection and real world data before you can comment. Fair enough if you are an expert in industrial sewing machines with 2A motors, I apologise. As an electrician you should know this and blanket saying "Put a 5A fuse in it" without even seeing the equipment is just wrong! Just calm down a bit. That web site suggests that you size a fuse by looking at the rating and divide by 250 which you have already stated is wrong. Why should I believe anything else on it? I am well aware of the time/current characteristics for fuses. Tim BEng(hons) Electrical and Electronics engineer.

In fact I play bass to perform music. I want people to look at me and think "Wow, that's a skill to have. That must be great to be up on stage and be able do that". That's because that's how I feel when I'm in the audience watching a band. That's my motivation. Be it covers or originals.

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='974082' date='Oct 1 2010, 02:38 PM']I think people in cover bands don't realise that people playing originals aren't doing it to "get famous". Maybe they've been playing covers for so long that they've forgotten what it's like to play music for fun instead of for money. They could do to join an originals band and be reminded of why they started playing instruments in the first place.[/quote] I think that we're probably making sweeping generalisations. When I was in an originals band we wanted to be famous, we thought our music was excellent, we drew large crowds. I now know that the crowds we drew were not there because of the music but because of the excitment of being part of something great. Listening back now to the 3 or 4 hours worth of material we wrote, mabe 30mins of it was really great. None of it was ever performed well though. All the originals artists I know want to get signed to a record deal. If anyone knows of one originals band who just want to perform at home or down their local to a few freinds I would be interested to see/hear them. I have huge amounts of fun in my covers band. I've played 4 gigs this year and been paid £80.

[quote name='paul h' post='974023' date='Oct 1 2010, 02:12 PM']... because I'm 40 and I don't want to be famous any more.[/quote] Yep. I sussed this when I was 22! It takes a lot of hard work and luck to get famous. I've seen some very bitter people who've spent their lives trying to get famous when none of their friends have had the bottle to tell them that their songs are not the great masterpieces they think they are. Lots of unsigned originals artists would do well to play in a covers band to get experience of exactly what music is all about before they even pick up a pen. Being in a covers band is HARD graft too. Anyone who has played a dinner dance will tell you that.

[quote name='fatback' post='973639' date='Oct 1 2010, 10:01 AM'][quote name='TimR' post='973315' date='Sep 30 2010, 10:54 PM'] Sometimes I wish I could get in a band that didn't have to reinvent the setlist at every bl**dy gig! <rant> Just because we've heard and played the songs a hundred times, putting them in a different order will not. 1. Make it more interesting. b. Make more people dance. It just makes it harder to keep my pad in order! </rant>[/quote] Are we in the same band? [/quote] I wonder if this is dependent on how often and the number of gigs you do. In my last two bands we didn't really gig more often than once a month but on the rare occasion we had 2 in a row on Friday and then Saturday even then the drummer changed the setlist. Is it a drummer thing? In both the bands the drummer was in charge of the order.

Goldwave is a free package that will slow down audio and a whole host of other things too. download helper doesn't rip the audio from the video AFAIK. PM me if you want to know a cheap MP3 site.

Sometimes I wish I could get in a band that didn't have to reinvent the setlist at every bl**dy gig! <rant> Just because we've heard and played the songs a hundred times, putting them in a different order will not. 1. Make it more interesting. b. Make more people dance. It just makes it harder to keep my pad in order! </rant>

[quote name='Mr Fudge' post='973265' date='Sep 30 2010, 09:58 PM']Now you are talking my language ...[/quote] I saw It Bites in Reading at Christmas. It was the same but smaller and there weren't any teenage sons. There were some women there though. I think.

OK. I'll play. I've checked my wife's sewing machine. It has a 0.75mm2 cable that goes straight to a speed controller that is rated at 1A. It has a 3A fuse fitted at the plug top. Now before you reply please go and physically check the sewing machine mentioned in the above post before jumping to any more conclusions. You are supposed to be a qualified electrician FFS! My amp has the same size wiring all the way to the transformer. Which is rated at 3A on the plate but as it's a transformer pulls up to 10x the current on start up. I'll keep a 13A fuse in it if that's OK with you.

A night with the O2 filled with blokes over 40 and their teenage sons?

The incompetent PAT tester took out the original 13A and put a 2A in. He looked at the machine rating not the cable. I'm not getting bogged down in this as we're talking about PAT testing in a band environment and this is derailing the thread. The PAT tester will spot damaged cabling and badly earthed gear and prevent it getting used. Usually portable band gear is not left powered on and unattended for long periods of time. If it does burst into flame there will usually be someone to spot it early on. In the real world of gigging the most likely fault is a cable that has been cut trough by the drummer's stands or had a heavy amp dropped on. This will cause a short and blow the fuse, or trip the RCD pretty quick. Essentially its all about managing risk, not just a paper exercise. I'm sure we all know a musician whose power cables are in a state and keeps promising to "get it looked at". Annual PAT testing gives him a reason to. Its a good idea to always put your own RCD on your amp as well! And get one of these: [url="http://www.martindale-electric.co.uk/index.php?products_id=225&osCsid=4daa3b72ca2550a9bc875dc9c7a085f8"]Buzz It[/url] to check the dodgy wiring of the pub before you plug your amp into it.

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='973157' date='Sep 30 2010, 08:28 PM']Utter Rubbish! I know what you are thinking and if the first thing the cable goes to after the kettle plug is its own fuse (which it will state what size clearly like most of amps) but if it does not or is a fixed lead item it needs the right fuse. House fires are a bit of a "pet hate of mine" mate and seen plenty because of your wack a 13A in attitude many resulting in death! This is why as some of you have said earlier that its a bit of a farce unless carried out by a proper sparky. TimR do you know the rating of .75mm flex? I will give you a clue Its not 13A. And have you ever tried to see how many amps a 13A fuse will take? Its about twice as much for plenty long enough to set a fire going.[/quote] I said leave the fuse as it is. Not "whack a 13A in". A proper 'sparky' will fit the correct fuse, assuming he reads the spec. that the electrical engineer gave him. Read the post properly.

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='972976' date='Sep 30 2010, 05:38 PM']And Im not sure who was on about a sewing machine but if it were an industrial one it would not have a 13A plugtop,I would of thought maybe a 5A fuse should be OK to cover the startup surge but I agree with him on removing the 13A that you usually find in everything.[/quote] This is a pet hate of mine. It seems prevalent amongst electricians. Leave the fuse as it is! The fuse is there to protect the cable not the equipment and sized as such.

I think one of the problems is that many people don't keep their gear in good order. We had a keyboard player depping with us for a dinner and dance once. During the sound check his keyboard kept cutting in and out. I traced the problem to 3 plugtops where the cables were practically falling out. Everytime he moved, the cables would move and pull out of the plug. Once we found the problem he said "OK, I'll just keep my foot on it all night to hold them in". I rewired the plugs in about 5mins and we were good to go. At another gig we soundchecked. All OK. We went on and there was a terrible buzzing. It turned out that the drummers rabbit had chewed through the extension lead that he was using for his fan. But it was ok because he had fixed it with insulation tape. There was also a stage (before cheap Chinese lighting) where people were making their own stage lights. I've seen some incredibly dangerous things! I found a local PAT tester who did all our gear for 50p an item. Visually inspected all the IEC leads, plugged them into his box of tricks, stuck a sticker on them with his signature and a expiry date. He only did one of the tests on the amps, lights and keyboard as they contain sensitive components. Gave us a book with his card and a list of all the gear tested and the dates.

[quote name='51m0n' post='972572' date='Sep 30 2010, 12:24 PM']I was replying to blackmn90, talking about whether you can tell a bassline is improving a song, he stated you would have to mute the bass (ie mute the track). Nothing to do with muting ringing strings here (which falls under my technically capable of playing umbrella IMO!)[/quote] OK, I misunderstood. "technically capable of playing" is a pretty big umbrella. Similar to "What makes a bad driver?" "Someone who can't mechanically operate their car." as opposed to someone who doesn't look at signs, hasn't read the highway code and takes no notice of other road users. A bit of a general answer.

[quote name='thunderbird13' post='972479' date='Sep 30 2010, 11:02 AM']· Playing over the 12th fret ( some people really hate this)[/quote] You ACTUALLY did that in an audition?

[quote name='51m0n' post='972450' date='Sep 30 2010, 10:35 AM']OK, so a bassist isnt a musician? Thats daft, to be a good bassist you first have to be a good musician. Every comment on here about what makes a bad bassist also applies in the more general sense as to what makes a bad musician, since all bassists (good or bad) are to a lesser or greater extent musicians. .... Personally I often find that the situations I'm tlking about the bass mutes itself! It literally does nothing for the track. 'Muting' it is unnecesary. There must be occasions where a bassline ruins a track, but I actually think this is rare as the rest of the band usually get to tell the bassist to stop being so daft! ...[/quote] Correct, but I will clarify exactly what I mean by muting. All musicians must be aware of note lengths. It's not just related to bass players. It's something I've noticed amongst bass players AND rhythm guitarists. Often they will leave the notes ringing until they play the next note. Often this is not a problem but will destroy the feel of a song and make the song sound cluttered if notes are not kept to their proper length. This may be a self taught thing. My son (6) is learning trumpet. The first thing he is doing is practicing playing quarter notes. With a trumpet you have to keep blowing right to the end of the note or the sound stops and you must stop blowing or the sound continues. With a bass or any plucked instrument you have to mute or you end up playing a dotted quarter note or worse...

[quote name='Bassassin' post='972268' date='Sep 30 2010, 12:49 AM']Schoolboy error - no they won't. Two of them will attend, while Peart stays home moping around and writing interminably dull, long-winded & self-important books about how much he hates this awful, awful job he has, and how much he prefers riding around on his motorbike. Jon.[/quote] Well he is Canadian. You DO know his history don't you?

[quote name='Conan' post='972359' date='Sep 30 2010, 09:18 AM']Let's not forget that not every member of this forum has been a member since the start. There are many of us who have never partaken of "the AC argument", so to stifle their input seems rather rude and unfair. Again, I'm not a massive U2 fan (I used to be, back in the eighties though). I like the simplicity but solidity. I like his tone and how selective he is. If fans leave a gig or switch off your CD and they are singing the bass line - I guess you could say that you are not a "bad bass player". A lot of this is motivated by jealousy I guess The "I could be doing that job" mentality...[/quote] Because this is the "What makes a bad bass player thread", not the "Adam Clayton is a bad bass player thread". I think he was cited just to spice things up a bit as any mention of U2 does in any thread. The thing about playing 8ths is they may not look very exciting or, to the untrained ear, sound very exciting on their own but its all about the groove. Are those 8ths on the beat, behind the beat, ahead of the beat? Where are the accents? There's a BIG difference between someone playing 8ths badly and someone playing them solidly and in the right place. 8ths on their own don't make a bad player but they do make a not very entertaining player who won't get much camera coverage on the TV. You have to do some dynamic acting like Flea or Harris to make up for that.