dlloyd

Before watching this, I wasn't a fan of Metallica. After watching it.... eh.

I waited a year for mine.... and they didn't test me for nickel...

There's a story about Jimi Hendrix appearing on Top of the Pops in 1967 to perform/mime Purple Haze, only for the technician to put on Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear... I would have liked to have seen that, if it's true.

It was the early 90s... bands had to prerecord their instruments and had live vocals. At the time it was claimed that it was the BBC trying to get rid of dance music with sampled lyrics... not sure if that was true.

Yep, 1997. MIJ.

I have read somewhere that Hendrix recorded an awful lot more bass than is commonly believed. Essentially the whole of Axis Bold as Love with the exception of Spanish Castle Magic and She's So Fine. I have nothing to back this up, but listening to the tracks, they do appear to have more in common with the bass on Watchtower than they do with Are You Experienced tracks.

Derek and the Dominoes - Layla Some amazing playing by Carl Radle.

The beer conversion rate works to an extent... but beer prices have risen slightly quicker than inflation, so while prices in general are around 50% higher than they were twenty years ago, beer is 60% more expensive.

Care to elaborate? Are we talking about modern day dixieland bands? Gypsy jazz?

I developed a severe nickel allergy, sensitised through playing. Stainless steel strings help, but not 100%, and obviously there is nickel in most frets. It took a while to pin my allergy to nickel as it's not as simple as contact dermatitis. It's a systemic allergy, so playing on nickel strings brings out rashes on my face, arms, back etc.... The other thing to consider is that nickel is present in food. A low nickel diet is worth considering http://www.pennstatehershey.org/c/document_library/get_file?uuid=0888ec6e-3d2f-4766-833e-b38bd920ffcd&groupId=102184

The highlighted chords below will get you most of the way...

For the OP: The key thing in "jazz chords" is that they extend the harmony beyond root + third + fifth... at the most basic adding the seventh. In major keys this will give you maj7 on the I and IV, dominant 7 on the V, m7 on the ii, iii and vi and m7b5 on the vii. So in C major, you have Cmaj7, Fmaj7, G7, Dm7, Em7, Am7 and Bm7b5. Voicings I use depend on the situation, but with no other context it'll usually be root on the 6th or 5th string: Cmaj7: 8 x 9 9 8 x or x 3 5 4 5 x G7: 3 x 3 4 3 x or x 10 9 10 8 x Am7: 5 x 5 5 5 x or x 12 10 12 13 x or x 12 14 12 13 x Bm7b5: 7 x 7 7 6 x or x 2 3 2 3 x I frequently swap the maj7 with a 6 or a 6/9 and the m7 with a m6 Fun comes with the dominant 7 chord... you can do all sorts to it... add 9ths, 11ths and 13ths, swap it with a tritone substitution, using C#7 instead of G7, add b5s,#5s (drop the natural 5), #9s, b9s... This all helps to make a "jazz sound" but it won't sound like jazz unless you're using them in the right context (which involves learning songs).

The Hohner B2A and Steinberger Spirit are/were made in the same factory apparently.

The bassline is fairly clear here:

It's a very common scale to use over a static minor progression. Think "So What" by Miles Davis. It's difficult to describe what effect it has, but it's bluesy and adds some warmth I suppose... It's like a step towards melodic minor without hammering out the v as a dominant chord. It sounds good. No doubt someone will be along to explain why...

I quite liked the bass he had in the Smooth Criminal video...

It was listed in the Fender catalogue a few years ago... I'm guessing around 2003/4?

You deal with a minor key differently to how you would deal with its relative major. The notes would indeed be the same if you stuck to Eb Aeolian (natural minor) and Gb Ionian (major)... and if you were noodling about playing scales or random notes, it probably wouldn't make much difference. It would sound as crap in both instances. It's a tune we used to do in my old band and I would tend to play in Eb Dorian and Eb harmonic minor with a smattering of Eb pentatonic minor when soloing on the minor part... I wouldn't do that on Gb major, but then you don't generally solo on that part of the progression...

I quite like some rap although I don't know a huge amount about it beyone Eminem, Dr Dre, Snoop Dog, Ice T, etc. I used to listen to The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy...

Not quite. Fender approached him about making a signature instrument, took the neck profile from his guitar, made a few necks with slightly different neck profiles and stuck them on 1983 Elite Strats. These prototypes were refined into what we have now as the basic Eric Clapton strat. (Edit: For those not familiar with the 1983 model Elite strat, it was a strat with lots of hi-tech refinements, including noise suppression through a dummy coil, active mid boost, a fancy trem system and push buttons instead of the switch. Clapton basically wanted a guitar like "Blackie" the 1956 bitsa that he put together from parts of several original 50s strats, but with a fatter sound... so they used the elite to demonstrate the mid boost... which in a slightly altered form was the only thing from the elite strat that ended up in the finished product) His trem is blocked, but it still has the springs.

Okay... you've got a foot in the door... explore from that point. I did exactly the same but at a younger age and found myself hating a lot of music I was forcing myself to listen to because it was never really intended to be listened to by someone coming in cold to the genre. It was only when I found music I liked and explored from there that I got it. You like Satie's Gymnopedies... try his Gnossienes Satie didn't exist in isolation... there were other people writing music that was influenced by him and that influenced him. Debussy and Ravel for example... try some of their stuff.

The only watt I have I got for making a knob joke... quite proud of that.

When I'm in charge, this guy is the only person who gets to post youtube reviews of basses...