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Thos figure are only for artists who have signed away most of their streaming royalties to their record label. Based on my streaming figures, for independent artists who are getting 90-100% of their streaming income, a sale of a single physical copy of a 10-track album on CD at £10 is the same as about 350 people streaming all the tracks.

It wouldn't hurt to learn the Greek names of the modes and shapes at some point. If you're playing for example in C Major but the bandleader wants you to play the intro as two bars of F Lydian and then two more in D Dorian before vamping on B Locrian and shouts that out to you,your fingers will automatically know where to go and what notes are available within those modes.

Thomann have a few options at different prices, we bought one of the cheaper ones for our drummer as a gift, mostly as a joke but i'd expect it to make an appearance live at some point. Washboards at Thomann Matt

It's actually closer to 6 years since the previous post, and having read through what I posted back then, things IMO have changed very little. 1. Unless you already have a large and fanatical following or a video that has gone viral on YouTube, you or your band needs to be actively gigging in order to sell any physical product containing your music. My previous bands that were doing really well with sales of CDs and vinyl sell almost nothing now that we are no longer performing live. Each song gets a few hundred streams a year and occasionally I'll get some PRS songwriter royalties from radio play but that's it. As an example, I don't think I've sold any physical copies of anything by The Terrortones since 2022 and before that it was only a few sales each year before that since the band stopped gigging. 2. What you can sell at gigs will depend very much on the genre of your music and the age of your audience. You need to look at what the bands you are playing with are selling in order to make an informed choice as to what format(s) will be best for you. In my band's genre - post-punk/goth, CDs still sell decent quantities, vinyl doesn't appear to do as well. 3. On the other hand IME you do need to have some physical product available to sell at gigs even if it's just a CD single. From experience as punter, if I enjoy a band's gig I'm likely to buy at least one of their CDs (which is my preferred format) at the end of the evening. If they don't have any music for sale in a physical format then at best they might get a couple of Apple Music or Spotify streams when I add their tracks to one of my playlists, and that's assuming I still like what I am hearing sometime in the next few days when I get around to it. Also as a band you need to stick around until the end of evening and be prepared to sign copies in order to maximise your sales. From experience a lot of sales don't happen until all the bands have played when the audience will decide what they are going to spend their money on. Some more hard facts: Since it was released 6 months ago, my band have sold almost 50 copies of our CD single, all at gigs. That's compared with 10 Bandcamp download purchases and almost 7000 Spotify streams. However we need to sell 75 CD singles to break even on the manufacturing cost. For on-line the single has just made back it's aggregator fees, and overall for all our releases we are just about in profit, but that's only because the less popular on-line only releases are being propped up by CD sales and streaming income for the tracks that are getting 40+ streams a day. Even then, that's only because the recording and packaging artwork are all done by ourselves. If we were having to include studio time, mastering and sleeve design in the costs we might never reach break even. We are currently working on an album for release later in the year when we have enough completed tracks to justify it. Whilst IMO it is possible to get away with small runs on CDR for single, an album needs to be properly manufactured in order get the longevity required (CDRs get less reliable as time goes on and you'll be lucky if they are still playable 10 years after you bought them). As a baseline the manufacturing costs for an album on CD in a Digipack with no booklet will be in the region of £700 for 300 copies which is generally the minimum run for replication with glass mastering. You can save about £100 for the same quantity in a Jewel case with a 4-page booklet. That's a unit cost of £2.00 to £2.50 which means each copy should make at least 100% profit. Things are less viable for small bands when you look at vinyl. 300 copies of your album on vinyl is going to be at the very best at least twice the price of the same number of CDs, and if you want either a gatefold sleeve or printed inner sleeve then you are looking at closer to three times the cost, which bumps up the sale price for a similar profit margin. Even if the profit margin is acceptable, and you think your audience will pay more for vinyl, £2k to stump up in advance may well be beyond what a lot of bands can afford. And again that's assuming that there are no recording/mastering/graphic design costs or that the you are simply going to write them off. On top of that vinyl takes 3-4 times as long to produce as CDs and there are various compromises that need to be made in terms of audio production, album running time and track order, to get the optimum audio quality for the medium.

Not sure I understood ... Im am referring to the Trace Elliot V8? Best Scott

My wife's percussion instrument of choice is her washboard. Started playing it when we were in a skiffle band but we've since discovered that it fits in with most songs we cover now we have diversified. Seriously...! For the slower stuff she has a variety of things in her bag that she can hit, shake or rattle. But after 12 years or so the washboard is beginning to show its age and is getting a bit thin in the middle. Unlike me.. ! So we've been looking for a replacement but can't find anything authentic. There are lots of examples on eBay and the like but all are just cheap toys. A washboard similar to that used by Steve Ferrone on the Clapton Unplugged album is available, but she'd really like a traditional wooden framed one. Does anyone have suggestions as where we can find one...? Or maybe you actually have one stored away somewhere...!

I did it the other way around ie had a MM Sterling into which I had @Andyjr1515 graft a P pickup. Had to have the P bits reversed a la Yamaha to fit into the sweet spot as I recall. Very nice it was too.

Which proves the point. A common assumption is that midrange drivers are paired with woofers to extend the high frequency response. That's true to some extent, but the main reason for using midrange drivers is they deliver wider dispersion than woofers. That's because they're smaller. Tweeters are smaller than midranges for the same reason. Time was when you had to use a fifteen to get enough cone displacement for the lows along with a midrange for dispersion in the mids. That hasn't been the case since the turn of the century.

It's not compatible with me neither. I had high hopes for a Vintage Ultra but was so disappointed. I will check out the videos of this but Darkglass are on my 'nope, won't be for me' list. I don't really do digital without a fight either 🙂

The Delano Sonar 2 is an excellent aftermarket version of the Stingray preamp. If you can find a second hand Sterling by Music Man Stingray preamp, it's almost as good as an original, but remember that the pickup is very important in the Stingray sound. And you already have one. 😉

If you can use a soldering iron, this: https://www.musikding.de/Classic-Bass-Preamp-Preamp-kit Don't worry, they are available by batches, so worth take a look from time to time.

I'm not sure the East will fit - it's a bitsa build with a P bass body. I'm not familiar with Retrovibe - I shall investigate.

....and it's gone for £750. 👍 Anyone on here bought it?

You have an extra finger on your right hand as well!

John East or Retrovibe stinger?

W ≠ dB Not every rating equals loudness. Frequency response should also be approximately the same. Otherwise comparison is about apples and Samsungs.

Our House - Madness