Muzz

Yep, probably the best voice at Glasto this weekend, very very good. I also enjoyed Khruangbin, and in a crossover with the Bass Snobbery thread, possibly the cheapest bass at the festival...liked the bassist from Inhaler's sound; yeah, it was a Precision through an SVT (just for a change), but it sounded bob on to me...in contrast, there were a couple of Ricks in the clips I watched, but none that actually sounded like one...

Flicked through a few (Bobby Plant and Co I thought were needlessly fey), but Supergrass were pretty damn good, especially in front of a fairly bemused-looking crowd, most of whom appeared slightly distracted, like they were wondering where the nearest non-medieval khazis were, or whether or not they'd left anything valuable in their tent...the bass sounded pretty good, tho I'm not convinced he needed four of them for that one sound. Still, as they say, if you've got em (and roadies to carry em), use em... The Pyramid Stage is also memorable as one of the last remaining native habitats of the 810 and biiiig valve head...if I ever get to play there, remind me to buy one. And a roadie, obv...

I'm sort of in between bands at the moment, and it's something I'm trying actively to do (keep moving), because I'd like lots of paid gigs...

Was chatting with SWMBO about it (as we do every year); she went in 87 (I never did; it was Donington or nowt for me), when it was £21 to get in, and her and her friends parked their van just up the hill from the Pyramid Stage. She's always fancied going back, but I've pointed out that it'd be a very, very different experience, and not just because she wouldn't be 22 and stoned for the entire weekend...

I've stacked my Compact (Gen1) with my Super Twin on a couple of occasions (as much for the look as anything, it was that kinda band), and raising the 12s up higher made them much clearer onstage. They might hit 135db, but who would ever run them that loud? My car will do 120 or so, but it's never been there... There's a lot of amps out there will do 2.67 ohms (Mesa Boogies, anything Class D with the right 800/900 power section, etc), so a 4+8 is a feasible modular combination...and I always wear attenuators onstage - it's not the bass amp that'll deafen you, there's the cymbals, for starters (and geetards with 1x12 combos pointing the wrong way, in my direct experience)...

I'd contact Alex at Barefaced, he'll give you the very best advice on this. It may well work - the 15" Compact and 12" Midget were originally recommended as a pair together...

Still waiting for mine (Jazz neck (actually slimmer)), too - no dots, either...it's only been 2 1/2 years...then again, we did have a bit of a global pandemic in between...

That's a pertinent point - at the Stranglers gig I went to (Manchester Apollo, not a 'problem' venue, I've heard many good mixes in there) I walked all over, thinking JJB's bass must just be sounding terrible from where I was standing, but no, it was at least consistent...I went and stood right behind the sound engineer, who seemed pleased (well, he stood there with his arms folded) - the main issue in that case wasn't the all-too-usual boom and mush per se, it was the fact that a big part of the band's signature sound (yeah, the bass), was EQ'd allll wrong for the band; it was a very Metal, scooped sound...almost like the sound engineer wasn't familiar with how it was supposed to sound...I've since heard it was better at other gigs, and as I say, it was their first tour with in-ears, so JJB himself might well have had his usual bass sound in his in-ears...

This ^ - see my 'Fun Lovin Criminals at Manchester Cathedral' post earlier...

I'm right handed and left footed. On the few occasions I've picked up a golf bat, I've never thought that... 😕

I know I'm approached Grumpy Old Geezerdom in a deal of areas, but I've walked out of the last three or four big stadium-ish sized gigs due to the sound being absolutely awful: usually inaudible bass mush, combined with a pointlessly loud cannon-kick, tho there were some specialities on top of that; the Foos at Manchester Cricket Ground had horrible swirling tops and mids bouncing off the block-like stands, and Alterbridge at the MEN was just painfully, blaringly, distortedly loud. The oddest one was the Stranglers at the Apollo recently, where JJB's bass sound (pretty much a defining element of the band's sound) was just inaudibly terrible (for the material - a typically scooped Metal kinda sound) - I've since heard that other gigs were OK, and the band had just switched to in-ears for the tour so, disappointing as it was (especially as the ticket still cost me the same) that one may well have just been the setup on the night, and the in-ear mix for the musicians might well have sounded different... Two of the better gigs I've seen for sound were Blackberry Smoke at the Ritz, where the soundman (I was standing just behind the desk) hovered over the board for the first couple of songs (without twiddling), and then left well alone, folding his arms and letting the band manage the volume dynamics from their instruments, and a recent Elbow gig at a small (100 or so punters) bar in Manchester, where they were refreshingly quiet but verrrry clear... Oh, and the Fun Loving Criminals at Manchester Cathedral, effortlessly proving that a 15th - 19th Century cathedral is possibly the worst place to have a loud, booming gig...maaaan, that was poor...

Which reminds me of that gag that ends "Tony Curtis doesn't have his hair cut like that." "He does if he comes here." 😀

I've only ever commented on someone else's bass at a gig twice in my life, once when after some drink had been taken I approached the bassist from Limehouse Lizzy during the break (he was at the bar in a small club) and asked how come he was playing a Stingray...he said "Because I like Stingrays", and he's a big bloke, so I smiled, nodded, bought him a drink and we chatted about Stingrays (tho as a trib band I thought it was a valid question...they'd gone the extra mile with all the other stuff), and the second time when a bunch of kids (and I don't mean the 50-somethings 'bunch of kids' here, which can mean anyone under 30, I mean young teenagers) were playing before us in a bar (they were very, very good), and I had a chat with the bassist/singer's Dad, mostly to say how good I thought she was/they were, but also to gently suggest that a short(er) scale bass might make her life a bit easier - she did seem to be struggling on the full-sized Jazz she was playing - and he was actually very interested, having thought short scales weren't 'proper basses' - he was an ex-guitarist, after all... Other than that, yer honour... 😕🙂

This is one of the issues when I finally get my Shuker JJB P...I'll have to set time aside to loathe myself...on the upside, it'll confuse the other lot... 😕😁

Oooo, we could have another...I might be able to persuade him to finish and bring my frickin JJB P with him... 😕🙂

It does happen, both ways, and from uninformed punters and some musicians, but usually not from bassists, IME; from the fairly common punter "What's that?" "It's a Shuker" "Tell you what you want, you want a Fender, my mate's got one" and the punter who definitively told me my Fenderbird was 'Wrong', and no-one played them (I did mention John Entwistle, but that apparently cut no ice), to the other side of the coin: my Shukerbird started out as an Epiphone, the only two bits of it that still remain are the body wood and the neckplate, which proudly reads 'Epiphone' - our old guitarist said to me "You should change that, Epiphones are cheap". Nope, I like it that way... :0) I was delighted to play the biggest gig of last year with my £150 BB414, and there was a kinda reverse joy in playing a corporate gig a few years ago at OT Cricket Ground with a Harley Benton bass that cost me (brand new, delivered) a fifth of the cost of a ticket...and I told everyone, too... 😀

Quite the reverse, especially in small towns where punk came with the tabloid horror stories; there might have been other kids (and we're talking kids here, as per my original premise) who were keen on hearing just punk music, but you had to find a venue first, and 'We're a punk band, can we play the youth club Thursday night?' was hardly met with universal approval in the 'burbs...when the Pistols, the torch-bearers of punk in the media, were having gigs cancelled, it filtered down. The bands I was in and around as a kid generally played all sorts of stuff (the cheaper synths were a big draw; a CS10 meant you were something special), and a live band could get an audience just on the strength of being a live band. As we got older, more venues became available (like licensed premises), and there were even dedicated punk clubs (or club nights, at least), but we were already playing in bands (of all sorts) by then, which, as I've mentioned, punk didn't suddenly create...

There were always lots of possibilities of music outside those two options...

Having been bang on the right age at that time (13/14/15), and awash in a sea of friends, acquaintances and various other Herberts all determined to be in bands, a sea numbering dozens and dozens of wannabe-players of all levels of talent, disposition and enthusiasm, I can confidently say that the old saw of 'Punk made kids want to be in a band' is utter, utter drivel. Kids wanted to be in bands anyway; some of them played exclusively punk songs, many of them played some punk songs, and some played none. Granted, very, very few played anything off Tales From Topographical Oceans, but that was mostly because it was a lot trickier than Teenage Kicks (is that even a Punk song?) when you're rehearsing in your Nan's garage, and besides which, a Minimoog or a Prophet cost as much as her whole house...

I did that on a regular gig we had on a tiiiiny stage in a City Centre pub: the stage was so small it was kinda forced on me, but the house speakers were a deal further forward, and the Rumble 100 on the window sill (with most of the bass dialled out) was a great monitor...

A rare (these days) gig for me: an afternoon set with the old lineup (now sadly mostly defunct, given the singist/geetarist is off solo raking in the cash, and the drummer's been on tour with Heather Small, playing the likes of the Palladium and the Bridgewater Hall, plus he's got the Albert Hall, an album to do in Abbey Road, and a round of the festivals upcoming, too) for a previously-committed charity festival...nice to play with them again, a fun 45, and no heavy lifting...back for tea... Now back to the setting up of a new band...

I should add that my Big Rig is both the Compact and the ST; they're the same width (verrrry important for a fairly OCD bunny like me), and are Stacktastic together...having said that, I've only used them both on two occasions, both to intimidate a stooopidly loud geeetard and keep the 'We need a big backline' singer happy, in the Rawk Band I'm no longer in... I like the height thing from the ST (the Stacktastic even more so) - I had just a BB2 at one point, but although it could fill an aircraft hanger with bass (and literally did so on an RAF gig), standing next to it a lot of it went past my ankles. You can go too small with cabs...

I have an old-school 15" Compact and a Super Twin (after a few in-between cabs, like Bergs, Schroeders, other BFs, yadda yadda), I'd suggest for a 'It'll definitely cope' single cab solution that the Super Twin is pretty damn good. The only thing I'd change mine for is, as Chris says above, two Super Compacts, but then that's a specific requirement of mine (I'm doing a lot of smaller gigs, so modular suits me these days), and not the OP's...

Depends. Did he die of a stink-related illness?

There are some songs which remain timeless, some of which go back to the 60s, tho a lot of them are known by Da Kidz because of covers by more recent artists, but Dad Rock isn't a complimentary description for a reason. There's a sparse few venues round here which put on Classic Rock bands, but maybe I've been spoiled by playing in a band that played all sorts of music to very good receptions; lots of singing and dancing - I've also played up until a couple of years ago in a Classic Rock band, and the gig audience were blokes even older than me just sitting there or standing at the bar with folded arms. I've had a go at forming a band with a good mate of mine, but it stuttered at the first hurdle when he didn't want to playing anything recorded after about 1985...he hasn't been out there in a band in a while... It can be hard to adjust your clock/calendar, when even Foo Fighters stuff goes back more than 25 years these days... I've just checked, and one of the songs which always goes down well in the noisier bits of the set is Smells Like Teen Spirit, which is firmly post-rock, and that's 31 years old...