Low End Bee

Although it's not my genre, there look to be lots of ESP basses that fit your wishlist. Lots of pointy ones too. And as we all know Precisions can do more or less everything.

Hej Matt. I was in Upsalla two weeks ago. If you posted earlier you could have saved me from the family from and we could have shared a beer or two! Welcome aboard.

[quote name='alexclaber' post='562884' date='Aug 7 2009, 04:28 PM']I think it gets a lot easier once you're all out of your twenties! So do you write all your songs from jams? Alex[/quote] If any of us has written lyrics, riffs, chord sequences we bring 'em along. They all go into a song bank and we see what goes with what and polish and change as they go on. It seems to work really well. We often email each other snippets and bring our ideas for what to do with them to the next rehearsal. Sometimes one of us will have a song 90% done and we'll run through it and stick bits in or chop them off as we see fit. As long as we're not precious it works.

From chatting with other people in bands and from past experience I think I'm in a minority in being in a more or less totally democratic band. We always jointly write all our songs. None of them tell me what bassline to play or how to play it. No one has the final say on anything and we all get along very well socially. We'd never met before we all answered an internet ad 3 and a half years ago. It helps that we're getting on a bit. I'm 45. The other 3 are 35, 48 and 49. One of us is a delicate soul prone to the odd hissy fit but it's always over quickly and no offence is taken. It's such a relief after being in 'other peoples' bands with huge egomaniacs in the past. How does everybody else get on?

[quote name='thunderbird13' post='562846' date='Aug 7 2009, 03:29 PM']The only time that a band I was in that ever built up a following was about 10 years ago and then it was only 2 guys who turned up to boo the guitarist all night ! [/quote] We've now got about 10-15 who turn up regularly who none of us really know at all. They are friends of friends of work colleagues type people plus a couple who turned up by accident once because they thought we were someone else. We have a scout around the crowd before a show and 'love bomb' anyone we don't recognize.

It can't be much fun playing to one man and his dog. As a member of a 'mature' originals band I've accepted that to make it work we all spend at least 10x more time on publicity and bullying people to turn up for gigs than we do rehearsing. Nice flyers, lots of emails, etc. really work. I and the other band members ask everyone we know/meet to come and see us quite brazenly. Even people the people in my local sandwich shop turned up recently! We've got a nice quarterly residency at the Half Moon on good Fridays/Saturdays purely down to the quality of our presentation (printed flyers and appearing to be professional). The only support gig we did was the only one we didn't go flat out on promoting. There were a third of the crowd who came to the venue when we organised it previously. It was still fun though. We only started gigging last July but we've seen some excellent turn outs. Even when it's 6 quid to get in. By the way we're playing the Half Moon again Saturday 22nd August......

[b]sdgrsr400[/b] has kindly accepted the challenge. Thanks for the offer though tarcher.

I'm suffering this too. I can't wear a bass down by my knees these days. This is offset by the increasing 'middle' making the bass further away so I hardly need to adjust the strap to wear it higher up.

I've just got me one of them Wizard Thumper pups for my S1 Precision. I never use the S1 switch so I would like to swap the whole wiring and pots gubbins to standard volume & tone and keep the original stuff for if I ever want to put it back to standard (I love it but future GAS is nearly always inevitable) The problem is I'm a bit cack handed with my £4 soldering iron. I don't mind going gung ho on the precision I assembled myself. But I seem to always end up with excessive hum, crackling at first until I finally sort it and there's great big gobs of solder everywhere making the cavities look like a chrome plated plasterers radio. Anyone up for it nearish the Brentford area. There's a few beers in it

[attachment=29108:ad1.jpg] Eddie Hitler on fire as a friend commented [attachment=29109:P1050243...1567.JPG.jpeg] It's hard not to look like a hobbit when you're playing with a 6'8' guitarist.

Don't do what a, ahem, pro musician friend of mine did when I went to see him a couple of years ago and write the set list in pink highlighter pen. Walks on , red stage lights come on, stares at what appears to be a blank piece of paper now.

I use the programmable BDDI. It's brillant kit. Before I got my new amp I used to use it in the effects send of my Ashdown at gigs to bypass the EQ. I've used it DI through the PA often in rehearsals with no problem. I always use it for recording. It does a great SVT and warm sounding amp thing. Works great with a passive bass. I tried it with an active bass once but it wasn't half as nice?

My point of view is people have come to see you for entertainment and it's a bit rude to look like you've just got up on stage after a days hod carrying. Well unless you're in a band called the Labourers or something. I wouldn't say you need to wear gold spandex. Especially if you're a certain age. Just look a bit rock n roll or whatever your genre is. Black t shirts/shirts are really good for us middle aged spreaders too! One of us refuses to buy in occasionally which is a shame and we suffer visually from it. This is always confirmed with unsolicited post gig audience feedback.

What's wrong with Antigua? Personally I like 3TSB for 70s Fenders. Black scratchplate is a must. When they were new the natural finishes were thought to be Fenders for old gits (like I am now ).

That's bloody lovely. If there's a nicer looking bass I haven't seen it. Re mortgage time.

The 715X had it's first outing on a pub gig on Saturday. I just set the eq flat and put the pre shape on with the compressor set to about 2/10 and the horn switch on low. It sounded great and easily managed to dominate two noisy guitars and a loud drummer. It's a cleaner sound than I would have ever thought I would've liked but it still had lots of grrrr. I didn't even get to 4/10 on the volume knob. I just used the tone and volume knobs on the bass to change the sound to the song and I could really tell the difference. Very pleased. Don't think I'll need an extra cab. Any of the larger venues I play all DI. It's nearly as good as my new trolley which was definitely needed. It does sound horrible though when it clips too much on the input. If I put a boost pedal (thinking of using my Sansamp BD) in the effects loop will this up the volume without overloading the input?

I'll have a go at slap when someone invents a plectrum with a plastic thumb on it.

I'm going to try some earplugs (ER20) for the first time in rehearsal tonight. I got some ringing in the right ear after last weeks rehearsal. But was fine after a gig on Saturday. I'll be interested to see how they fare.

Did 18 last night. Two sets of 9 with a drinks interval. Up tempo at each end with any slower stuff in the middle seems to work fine.

The on in the middle looks cool Down to 4 now so 1832

I've a hole in my 2007 MIA P bass too. Maybe it's a stash pocket?

I like 'em. You've avoided brick walls and railway tracks. Good work [url="http://www.rockandrollconfidential.com/hall/"]How not to do it[/url]

Get some Danish Oil from Homebase. It comes in tints too. Goes on well with a lint free cloth.

Dunlop gator grip purple jobbies. Don't drop them as much as others. Thinking about going back to big triangles though.

If I'm being honest I've got four or five 'stock' ones that I enjoy and am comfortable with. I just fit them in with the route note with maybe a run here or there. I'm selling this as my signature style. I did use to try all sorts of stuff that was hard work. Now I keep it pretty simple on a new song (even if I've written it) and alter it over time.