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I made the rookie error of trusting one of my students. A long time ago I took my class of hairy rockers into a theatre pit to play West Side Story with the Performing Arts dept on stage. I downloaded the whole thing on Midi Files and then loaded them into Logic. I printed them out as TAB and handed them to my hairys. To make sure we had a safety net I had piano tracks on a CD. This was back in the day. We radically were running a silent pit with everyone on cans. There were some tidy players in the pit with 3 drummers sharing duties and everyone getting a good crack at it given numerous shows. The fight scene (if you know the show) was absolutely rocking. We ripped off a Steve Vai/Chick Corea version of it. Lots and lots of fun while they were really being stretched. Of course, not everyone was a player and there were students who needed to be accommodated with various roles. I shall call him Dave. He was clueless in virtually all aspects of the course. He was put on monitors (which were set and forget) and playback. How much of a mess could he make? We got to the quiet number before the finale of the first act. This was programmed on the CD to wind down with some gentle piano arpeggios and segue on the same track into the finale. Dave, who was chemically enhanced by then, hit stop at the end of the arpeggios. The intro the "The Jets are going to have their way tonight" etc just did not happen. That song was meant to start at 2:36 in the track. There is no way he could queue it up again even if he was operating at 100%. And he was not. So I turned to, let's call her Sue, on the keys and hissed, "Give me a G". "Huh?" she responded. "Give me a G", I hissed louder. This, while all the cast were frozen on stage. I started singing "The Jets are going to have their way tonight" acapella. The cast joined in and hammered through it. Acapella. With all the moves to the music which only existed in their minds. How we all laughed. A few weeks later. The energy levels on stage were insane, though!

Yep - I had a feeling it might either be tumbleweed or crikey!

and jif is for lemons.

How do you write G-flat?

Play the game - Queen

GIF has to be gif not jif, because the g is for graphics.

GIF has to be gif not jif, because the g is for graphics.

Will the bassist be required to stand too close to the back of the singer whilst blinking aggressively? 🤭

Happy update. Got a can of Kobra "Venom Red" from the local DIY store and this is the colour I was hoping for (going for an Audi Quattro sort of a colour scheme).

how funky is this groove? Man why wasn’t I a teen in the 80’s🙄. 2000 Neo soul shaped my ear

I wonder what would it sound like if read out loud by a Spanish person

Beautiful bass - looks so right with the big Hagstrom-type single pickup . The recent ones with P pickups may be very worthy, but just don't look right IMHO. One of the few semi's I've never owned - maybe one day.....

A bit more Latin joy, this is the complete Michael Viñas performance of the tune 'Adan Garcia' from the 1992, Rubén Blades record 'Amor Y Control'. Simple once you have the thing down (root five octave mostly but pushing every bar so great for learning to master that feel). https://bilbosbassbites.co.uk/adan-garcia-ruben-blades/

I guess one guy's hell is another guys heaven; I remember when in Liverpool Uni around 1980, seeing one of the NWOBHM bands (Saxon maybe?) playing the student union; predictably loud but not crazy loud. I saw one guy in the audience spend most of the gig with his head inserted fully into the sub cab of the speaker stack - I doubt that he had a functioning brain by the end of it, let alone his hearing. As posted here; modern gear is so much more adaptable for playing at a range of volumes; both guitarists in my band play through smallish all valve combos and get a great sound at comfortable volume level. We recently auditioned for a drummer - an eye-opener for me, as it's been a while. One guy turned up with a kit that would have put Cozy Powell's to shame for sheer size, plus his own PA. He mic-ed himself up to it, and before playing put on a pair of big industrial type ear defenders. Sure enough he was shockingly loud; nothing could be heard except drums, and though the guy clearly had technical ability, he totally overplayed absolutely everything. Spot eventually went to a guy from the Charlie Watts school of drumming; tight, precise as a Swiss watch, and able to play reasonably quietly when needed......

@prowla and I are checking about an additional room at the same location. To be honest I think were both overwhelmed at the uptake. My main concern is that there's enough power/sockets. There's no agenda/running order or anything as of yet, so we would be grateful if anyone has invited speakers/demo guys that we're let known ahead of the curve. More later.

Played my first big stage and ran across it - I was not wireless. Fortunately, I plugged back in in time to hit the signature riff. It was recorded and you can just hear the crackle as I reconnect.

Multiple rooms are really useful @Sean- hence why the previous venue we used in Addlestone, courtesy of @Hamster, was so good over the years. But I'm sure we can find a way to make this venue work, and it's great that you've found somewhere that we can get together in this year. Besides, not everyone who says they can make, gets there on the day, and people don't all arrive at the same time either. So, I'm sure it'll be fine. FWIW, I was heavily involved in running the SE Bash for years, so if you want to have a chat about anything, just send me a PM - I'm more than happy to help. Cheers Nik

Once kicked off the second set with a great sound on stage, until the end of the first number when someone out front told us the PA wasn’t on.