Muzz

Which pays into the situation (from probably five years ago now) when our BL/singist/geetard had a side gig playing old people's homes...I'd imagined he'd had to learn a whole new setlist, but the majority of requests he got were for Beatles and Stones-era songs...

Bugger...quoted meself instead of editing...as you were, sorry about that...

Tim, the title of the thread is 'I hate gigging'...it's not really a surprise how much moaning is on here, is it?

On the Dad Rock thing; a good friend and ex/sometimes BL of mine is in a well-regarded (rightly; they're very, very good at what they do*) Status Quo Trib, and yeah, they travel to gigs, but that's as much because they play to big audiences, whether at festivals or their own gigs, and their calendar's booked solid this year. We played (the old originals band; we were the only non-Quo band on, to some bemusement from the audience) on the bill at a Quo Festival in Glasgow last year, and both nights the venue was full. There's a sizeable audience out there for all sorts of music, even something like Quo, which has been considered 'unfashionable' and sniggered at in various places for decades now, if you're prepared to seek it out and cultivate it. I suspect lots of people that might have sniggered would kill for their following, even as a Trib... * Which is, as the saying goes, a lot harder than it looks...well, it should be, after all...

So, is this tour Primus pretty much playing Rush? I wouldn't mind seeing Primus as Primus, but from the videos I've seen, there's Rush tribute bands out there doing a better job...

We've just lost 20 or so gigs after a falling out with the venue which had us booked through to the end of the year and I'm gutted. IME with the band I've done most gigs with in the last decade, the poor gigs are few and far between, even reading some of the grim stories above I'd still persevere, tho as I say, some notable car crashes aside*, that's not been my experience with this band... * And mostly due to external factors, like the agent that mis-booked us (a guitar/acoustic trio) as a 7-piece soul band for a NYE gig once...

And this is the key to Volume Wars, which we've all experienced, I'm sure...after triggering my tinnitus from a gig years ago where a dep geetard put his 112 combo on a bar stool just behind me, and turned up and up, I (belatedly, unfortunately, in the second set) pointed the thing at his head and hey presto, he turned it down, I do this all the time now...happens with 412 users who stand directly in front of their cab in rehearsals so it's projecting mostly below waist height; get them to stand across the room and suddenly they're managing their volume levels better...

Well, the much anticipated/dreaded Paddys Night debacle didn't turn out half as rowdy as I'd feared; France won (so Ireland didn't, tho it was interesting to see a bunch of Ireland rugby fans cheering for England for a while), and the place wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be - I suspect the Paddy's Day crowd had caned it on Thursday and Friday, so it was a more normal crowd. Still packed, still a queue out the doors, but not the mayhem I'd anticipated... Few new songs thrown in by the BL: 'Do you know Tennessee Whiskey?' 'Erm, I've heard it.' 'In A. Two, three, four...' All good, tho - a slightly shorter gig, thanks to the rugby (two sets rather than the usual three), paid and home in good time. Even got parked outside for nowt (a major achievement in the centre of Manchester). Good to be back.

No pic, sadly, but Satdy night's rig was a Fender Rumble 100 (with proper Eminence in it) popped onto a windowsill behind me, all the bass cut, and DI'd into the house PA. Sounded great with all sorts of tones from the Helix...

Pretty shady, to be honest.

I thought my Shukerbird had the worst upper fret access of anything I'd ever encountered, but it appears we have a new winner...

I've always found writing my part for originals much easier than learning covers (for a given value of 'cover', obv - some straightforward i,iv,v stuff is obviously easy), although I did have an odd experience over the last couple of years when we revived a 30-year old originals band for a few one-off gigs, and I had to re-learn my original bass parts I hadn't played in three decades; there was an amount of 'What was I doing/thinking there?' going on... Interesting covers can stretch you out of your comfort zone (in fact I'm always pleased to have to do this) and expand your skill set more readily than originals...plus there's the additional challenge of making an interesting cover out of the source material which works with the band members available...this is made trickier by the fact that my main covers band is a trio...case in point; we have La Vida Loca on the potential new songs set (picked by the geeetarist/singist/BL); I'm dying to rehearse this and hear how he's got this in his head for acountic/bass/drums... 🙂 I do love both, though...

Not so much a 'How was your gig' as a pre-emptive for tonight's gig: Irish/sporty bar in the city centre, on Paddy's Day Weekend, three sets, just after the last game of the Six Nations, when Ireland may win it all. I've told my other half to expect me back home clutching the evening's cash and covered in Guinness...I think I'll take my cheaper basses...

That's odd; I emailed Jon on Monday about my JJB build, and got an email back the same evening...having checked back through the trail, I got a reply to all the emails I've sent... 😕 Fingers crossed...

Then there's lyrics that aren't really lyrics, but word-shapes and sounds, like the work of Liz Fraser with The Cocteau Twins... I like a lyric; as has been said it can anchor the part in a song which might otherwise trip me up if I'm multitasking...but the opposite of that is our BL getting bored and inserting his own, which are fine when I'm expecting them*, but I always had problems when we did the Chili's By The Way, and he'd just throw in any two-syllable words which came to mind while I was busy concentrating on getting the bass line right... *'Those who think they've got chlamydia, Sit Down next to me...'

Worst 'selling' experience I've ever had was trying to give away a pair of sofas; I'd clearly said 'Free to collect', and even reiterated it further down in the description, with the sizes and 'You'll need a van big enough to fit both'...that kinda thing. The number of people wanting free delivery was equally irritating and depressing, and one woman even turned up in a small hatchback (after saying she'd collect, asked me to hold them, etc) on her own, and demanded to know what I was going to do to help her take them away...

After a good deal of EQ faffage, I settled on John East's EQ offerings a long time ago, and now they're in almost all my basses (as much for consistency as whether the basses were drastically in need of it) I have (including my Dingwall, my bitsa Shukerbird, and my main Shukers) and have improved everything they've gone in. Mostly U-Retros, of various vintages... They're a very 'musical' control, but the mid-sweep is the key for me...

Skoda Superb Estate. Greenline 1.6 diesel, so 70+ mpg driven sensibly. Thanks to a BL brain fart when booking a gig from Manchester to the New Forest ('It's near Stoke, isn't it?' FFS...) we had a go at doing it all in my car. Three of us, the drumkit (not a big one, but not electric, either) PA (RCF sub and two 12" tops), lights (two sets of smallish 5 x LEDs), all the stands, guitar combo, two guitars (one acoustic in hard case), 212 bass cab and cased Walkabout head, and dual Mono gig bag with two basses. And all the leads. Averaged 65mpg over the trip, but I had to drive fairly carefully over any bumps...yeah, it'll carry quite a bit... 😀

Ahhh, 'rockumentaries'...it's a grey area, really; I rather thought Metallica at least were acting like weapons-grade numpties throughout theirs...

I thought Metallica's Some Kind Of Monster was by turns ridiculous and hilarious, in an unintentional Spinal Tap kinda way, but the all-time winner for a great band film has got to be The Story of Anvil...

I'll refer to them if I'm pushed for time (for instance, our BL has just disseminated a list of 21 new songs he wants to debut in three week's time; we may or may not get a rehearsal in before then), and tend to approach them on the basis of a quick start guide, rather than anything definitive. Sometimes aggregating the results from a couple can get nearer the desired result. I've also come across some which are bang on. They're not all perfect by any means, but as a resource, they're not bad at all...