TimR

There are an awful lot of deluded instrument owners out there.

I had I not been playing bass for about a year. His death passed me by. A friend of my dad's gave me a Jaco study book and a video. Still have it somewhere. Might dig it out.

I occasionally play at a pub where 50+ year old women come into the stage area and thrust their drunken bodies up against me while I'm trying to play. It's not particularly unpleasant, more distracting but it makes playing quite difficult. If the situation were reversed there would be a riot. When I was 17, I worked in a packing factory, the women there were absolute animals. Again, if you've got a strong enough personality it won't affect you. Not everyone has a strong confident personality... You'll quickly get to a point where the entertainment is dictated by the morons as decent bands won't play there. So, ignore them and say nothing and wonder why the quality of bands starts to slide in your local...

Has anyone had much experience of syncing audio files from different devices. Say I used one H2 with external O/H and Kick mics, one H2 for bass and guitar and another for vocals. Is it easy to mix the results or are the clocks not stable enough.

[quote name='Count Bassy' timestamp='1506086547' post='3376385'] Hence the first sentence of my reply to TimR. [/quote] It's a bit of a confusing reply. If I come across someone being mugged or raped I'm sure I would make a bit of noise or at least call the police. I'm not totally sure those activities are even in the same league. Having a word with someone who is getting a bit rowdy is a different ball game to confronting a rapist or a mugger. I've had to have words with people at gigs. Usually they look guilty and say sorry. If you don't nip it in the bud they get more and more rowdy and end up pulling your gear over. I'm not a big guy but I've spoken to people on the train whose actions have been making people feel uncomfortable and they've apologised and calmed down. There are ways of approaching people that are non-confrontational and there are ways of escaping situations when they start to become confrontational.

He had some very serious issues. I thought I'd read he was having trouble holding his bass and standing for gigs but I can't find that thread. Might have been someone else. http://basschat.co.uk/topic/285588-alcohol-my-progress/

[quote name='Dan Dare' timestamp='1506025480' post='3376033'] Yeah. A lot of bassists do seem to be somewhere along the spectrum. [/quote] It's Internet forums. Mumsnet is just as bad.

[quote name='skidder652003' timestamp='1506014039' post='3375925'] They're all bollocks apart from that Marilyn Manson case which is literally cock and bollocks! [/quote] Is the bass player responsible for the singer's actions? https://www.spin.com/2014/02/fishbone-stage-dive-lawsuit/

[quote name='steantval' timestamp='1506011160' post='3375896'] Having a word with the idiot, the idiot may take offence and give you a bloody nose, just not worth the possible risk. [/quote] Or he may shuffle about looking at his feet uncomfortably and say sorry?

Well, not quite. There's not a lot I can do about all the rapes and muggings in the world that are going on. I can have a word with the idiot standing next to me at a show there and then and maybe make them think twice next time. I'm fairly sure I shouldn't have to wait until all the rapes and muggings have been stopped first before I approach him.

Here's a list of high profile nasty cases. http://www.nme.com/photos/20-outrageous-times-bands-were-sued-by-their-own-fans-1424248

I was on a ladder training course a few weeks ago and a guy had fallen 3ft off a ladder and broken his back. Took 12 years for him to get his compensation. In the mean time. He lost his job (obviously), his wife left him and he tried to commit suicide. When I was 18, we had an idiot at one of our gigs stage dive into the crowd. The crowd parted and he hit the deck. Very hard and didn't get up for quite a while. Accidents happen. I don't fancy having to pay for lawyers in a 12 year court case to prove that I did everything possible to stop someone jumping off the stage during one of our performances. Even if the disabled guy is 99.99% to blame.

I've seen lots of technically crap bands receiving a great response from an audience so I'd say a lot of the time it's down to attitude rather than technical competence. So I'd be happy to play in a crap band if they're getting the gigs and entertaining the audience. What I'm not happy about is playing in a band of technically good (or bad) players who think they're amazing but don't get a decent audience. I think there is a level for me where i am within a comfort zone. The Goldilocks zone of bass playing. Not too good and not too bad, getting gigs and entertaining audiences. Who is the best person to decide whether you (or anyone else in the band) is a good player?

[quote name='cheddatom' timestamp='1505818241' post='3374487'] Quite a few posters in here seem to have equated the wolf whistling and "smutty comments" with simply looking. Looking at/watching the dancers is fine. Whistling and making smutty comments is unacceptable, surely? [/quote] Entirely depends on context and on the nature of the performance. In this situation, it's not acceptable. There's obviously a few people around who can't draw the distinction and will be polarised either one way or the other. Plus it's the internet, it's either right or it's wrong, there's never any in-between. .

Dancers and acrobats have been wearing leotards for centuries. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leotard

As everyone has alluded to: There's at least three reasons why it's done. It varies depending on circumstances. It's art, not science. Just use your ears and retune your bass. .

No not old fashioned. Some people have always been like that. You just have a different set of values. Probably best you don't try and start a business.

This isn't new. It's always been the case. He even had the grace to come back to you and ask if you wanted to make a better offer. No money had changed hands and you didn't have a contract with penalties attached for non-delivery. Someone else needed the pedal more urgently than you did. He may have had a gig this Saturday and his had failed. Who knows. He's paid a premium for it, for whatever reason. Next time make it very clear that you want it taken off the market, you consider it a binding contract and you require it urgently. That might make the seller think a bit more carefully. Whether you can enforce it would be another matter. Alternatively he may have just been fishing for a higher price. As a previous poster said, it's not uncommon when selling a house to say you have other buyers interested willing to pay the asking price.

Kick it out into the garden.

[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1504445748' post='3364885'] Certainly 'do-able', I towed a trailer with my Renault Espace for a couple of years. Seven seated and the whole caboodle (drums, PA, backline...) in the trailer. The OP, however, was hoping to reduce ferry costs; I believe a trailer would scupper that, as there's be a supplement (could be wrong...). [/quote] Just trying to work out if he's just putting gear in the vehicle or people as well. If it's just gear, the people will need separate transport. I don't know the vehicle in question, it's not clear to me.

I had to move some paving slabs. I weighed them at 15kg each. 5 of them is the equivalent of one person. I reckoned just 40 of them would put me into 'overloading' territory. Might be worth weighing the kit before you wedge it all in, 6 people plus gear could get you into trouble.

Hire a trailer?

As far as the audience are concerned I suspect changing the singer is the only seriously tonal and visual difference that would impact a video or music recording. Guitar, bass and drums are just filling the music in.

[quote name='lurksalot' timestamp='1504134362' post='3362969'] Our singer has had the idea of putting the logo jpeg on a memory stick , with a lot of the modern TVs that seem to be stuck on the wall behind most stages , he thought it might plug and play , yet to try it mind [/quote] We were thinking of doing this too. Only on some kind of looping MPEG.

[quote name='fretmeister' timestamp='1504119245' post='3362849'] ... I never leave the gear unsupervised. It's just not worth it. [/quote] Not just the damage people can do to the gear but the damage they can do to themselves. And blame you.