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I'm assuming not, but is the FM synth voice stackable with the virtual analogue one, if not is this something that is technically feasible in future?

Dizzee Pascal Brunt Mars Sleaford Sods Drape Teddy Swigs Rake

I am no fan of much modern music and was surprised to see the angst in the thread on the insolvency of Native Instruments. I must also add that the practice in the “covers” circuit of pubs and social clubs calling professional Karaoke singers “Solo Artists”. I am also thinking back to my realisation that some of the best singers are now “Solo”. This has, in my opinion, really badly affected the quality of singers in bands. From the financial point of view, it makes sense, A “Solo” singer can make £150 in a night whereas a band charging £250 means each member gets £50. Of course we have to avoid the filter of nostalgia, a quick listen to any retro radio of TV station will prove that a high percentage of 60/70s music was awful, despite being probably the most innovative period in my lifetime. Changes in music seem to come in strange ways, witness the way that white people from here, (re)introduced the Blues to America. It is probably one reason why we should all consider the History of Music to give ourselves a real understanding of why we do what we do. As a creator of electronic music, you need the basics that training coming from a long apprenticeship. The alternative is some soulless, brain crunching morass that sounds akin to my own early experiments on electric guitar, bloody awful. So as someone from a guitar based band, struggling to get gigs in a world where the “empty orchestra” is Emperor and the only real live music is the clinking of glasses at closing time, I don’t understand the chagrin over the feared demise of Native Instruments but I can empathise with it. On reflection may be I should be more accepting of Valve Amp purists. They worship the failings on the technology for what it adds to the music and as music is our religion, perhaps I/we should all be more tolerant of the different denominations. Of course the devil AI music must be rooted out at all costs. The old ways are the best of course so initially I suggest ducking the servers in water. If they fail and die, they are innocent, should they still work, they are evil and must be burnt at the stake. In the words of the great Ozzy Ai, AI,AI,AI all aboard the Crazy Train.

Carter the unstoppable Sox machine

Doobie Experience (Doobie Bros tribute) rehearsal yesterday (just the core members - no brass/percussion). Sounded great, but man that stuff needs concentration. Intricate arrangements at times and so many different styles (rock, rnb, blue eyed soul, country,soul etc). Raised on Journey (Journey tribute) rehearsal this afternoon. More straight ahead but still needs to sound tight and lush. Debut gigs for both bands coming within the next month....!

Teen Town - Weather Report

Heh, Les is so lovely and mild mannered in person. I'd never heard of Carter USM but after I met the guy I looked them up and what a wild ride! Tackling schofield on Smash Hits 😂

Mark is a great, helpful, friendly Basschatter. I bought a couple of cheap pedals from him, unfortunately the parcel was delivered while I was out and some bar steward made off with it (my money is on another delivery driver - never usually happens round my way). He was kind enough to send me a refund! Top bloke, deal with confidence.

My comment was less about the musicians who use the stuff and more about the perceived value of the outcome. The software is great, of course. The fact that it’s either freely available or it provides you with a level of convenience that even my mum could knock out a 175bpm d&b roller (or whatever), and the fact that AI can essentially just do it all for you - that pretty much means that nobody listening values the music any more.

Looks amazing and very heavy !

Every time i hear Pimlico i automatically go back to the Ealing movie Passport to Pimlico. Dave

Security! He used the P-word!

Not at rehearsal stage yet but new Celtic Rock/Folk band now has Bass, Drums, Guitar and Vocals all brought together in last week so its starting to shape up. Still few others to find to get a truly authentic Celtic sound of course. No idea who the guys are or their ability but we'll soon find out once we get a few songs learned and get to rehearsal stage. Drummer is the one putting it all together. Fingers crossed. They are aware i'm in the Glam band but seem ok with it. Dave

I remember Les (Fruitbat) breaking his arm at our party in our insalubrious Georgian housing co-op house on extremely salubrious Vincent Square, Pimlico. I don't think the other residents liked having a row of what looked like punk squatters overlooking their cricket pitch-centred square - they called the police!

Hi Steve so for current production/more recent stuff I've tried the same bass (805MS) in the original transparent gray flat colour,the 705LM and the 605LM. All fanned fret and all using the T1 pickups. Long story short I've been very impressed with ALL of them. Those T1 pickups to me sound REALLY good. I think like you the far eastern licenced Barts do very little for me if anything. The T1s I would describe as a game changer. All 3 basses were ultra playable and the fanned frets took me all of 10 seconds to get used to. The 805 had the longest B string at 37" if that's important.

We did 3 in a row with Abdoujaparov at the weekend. They're lovely guys and such a good band. We arranged to share the drum kit and bass rig. The first night was the Golden Lion in Bristol. It's a pretty cool venue room at the back of a pub, but weirdly, the pub punters have to go through the venue to use the loo, which made the doorman's job very difficult. Even more difficult that the job was forced onto our merch guy last minute. A bunch of young guys tried to get into the gig, talking too loudly, over confident, and perhaps a gurn or two... anyway, Tommo our merch man made short shrift of them. Since starting my own venue I keep noticing all the little things I don't like in other venues. Here we had: multi coloured XLR, PA hanging from the ceiling by metal angle and wood screws, spot lights at pretty much 6ft from the stage floor (mild concussion), lighting rig attached to a thin piece of wood attached to some plasterboard... Anyway, it was rammed and we had a great time Bideford Palladium Club on the Saturday, which is a very cool venue, but kind of out of the way. The guy says he's struggling so if you're out that way please go to some gigs! The sound was awesome and the room is fantastic. Green room upstairs with a random selection of objects was good fun. Someone glued a fake Oscar to the ceiling but it was down again by the time I left. More japes - I'd noticed a parking fine on our van before the show. I waited until after to tell the others. It turned out to be a yellow PCN plastic document wallet with a random bit of notepaper inside! We have no idea who it was. I suspect the venue owner did it to prevent us getting a real ticket. The King Arthur in Glastonbury on Sunday. We knew ticket sales were low, but we know a couple of people who live in Glastonbury, and it turns out they had no idea the gig was on. They've not seen it on posters or in local press or anything. There were loads of gig posters on the outside, some from last year, some gigs coming up, and a big brand spanking new gig list with Jan, Feb, Mar on it, and no mention of our gig. We got inside, the sound engineer is the guy "promoting" the show. Our frontman asks why there are no posters around and SE says "We did have some up". Our frontman laughed and asked "Were they nicked?"... SE obviously feels a bit awkward and goes on a rant about how he's not allowed to put posters up around town any more but FFS he might as well have forgotten he booked the gig at all. Apparently his door staff called in sick last minute too, giving Tommo the job again. SE chews my ear off about drums and gear while I'm setting up, and I know I should have seen this coming, but he said he needed 10 minutes to plug everything in, so we went to the shop, and on my return this f&^%$er was sat playing my kit. This might be snobby but I spent more than £3K on my cymbals and I don't let anyone play them. I let him know I wasn't happy, he got awkward and defensive, and we got on with sound check. To be fair it sounded excellent, he really knows his stuff, but by this point I'm losing the will to live. Abdoujaparov played first, and they were great, but obviously playing to 10 people in a cold venue gives a different vibe to the previous two days. I tucked into the beers and did my best. It was a long drive home to Stoke!

Really? IMO the only people who should be worried about the rise of AI electronic music is those who up until now have been content to produce pieces that simply mimic and reference their influences without adding anything new of their own. And stop being nostalgic for the old days. I certainly don't miss them. My studio now fits entirely on my desk and with everything contained within my DAW there are no incompatibilities. I've no desire to go back to the ways of working in the 80s when in order to connect everything together I had to contend with two different CV standards, 2 different gate standards, 3 different types of clock as well as MIDI in order to get everything to talk to each other. I don't miss peering at the letterbox sized display of the Roland Micro-composer which could only show me one note on one channel at a time. The early MIDI sequencers weren't much better, and often it was quicker to have another go at playing what you wanted rather than trying to edit even a couple of wrong notes. Using a DAW hasn't stemmed my creativity. It's opened it up because I can see everything at the same time. All the sounds I program on the various plug-in instruments and effects are saved as part of the composition. I certainly get from initial idea to finished composition far quicker than when my studio was lots individual instruments and effects.

Dean Town - Vulfpek

Just bought a lovely vintage Trace amp from @King Tut, aka Colin, who - apart from being a really easy and great person to deal with - happens to own two fantastic Rickenbacker 4003 basses! 👌👌 I was on my way to a rehearsal unfortunately, so there wasn't enough time to stay longer for the obligatory 'bass chat', but I hope we can get to do that at some point in the future, because I know it'll be a lot of fun. 😁 Suffice to say that you can deal with Colin in complete confidence, Folks. 👍 Thanks a lot for the Trace head Colin, and here's to the next one... 😊 Cheers, Nik

Oh Deanna. Nick Cave atbs