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My blues rock trio Toredown played at our 'regular' pub in Ipswich, The Shamrock, last night. I arrived a bit later than usual, found a rare parking spot virtually outside. We didn't get to fully set up until after the footie as our space was occupied by viewers but as the place wasn't busy we could get kit assembled by the side - in the event we kicked off at around 9.15ish, so not too bad. We have played better, all of us made mistakes but nobody noticed or, if they did, cared. By the time we were a short way into the first set all our regulars had turned up and the place was packed. Security had to turn people away at some point. Really good atmosphere, we went down really well, got paid more than we asked, no road closures on the A12 homeward bound so 60 mins to my door. Wonderful. Nice to see @Dazm66 who plays with our drummer Joe in another band. Next gig is supporting Dr Feelgood on 15th Dec

Well that was bloody great. First gig in a few months due to folk on holiday etc. I'm always a little nervous after that much downtime - will I remember the songs? Turns out the human memory is a little more resilient than I gave it credit for. Had an amazing gig at the Butchers Arms in Inverurie last night. Slow start but crowd streadily built up during the first half and thankfully didn't bog off during the break. This may have had something to do with after the last song of the first half. After we finished the last song of the first half, the singer was telling everyone we were going to have a break and I absent mindedly started noodling the riff to "Groove is in the Heart"/"Bring Down the Birds". The crowd cottoned on to what I was doing, the drummer joined in and then we had someone rapping to it - they were really good! I have no idea what she was saying, but she was in time and had good rhythm! Second half went fantastic, lots of dancers, and only one minus when a pished wifie came in, tried to steal the mic from the singer a few times, got into a fight with a bloke who came across to stop her and finally she got kicked out by the door staff. Some annoying other pished wifie was indignant that we didn't know any Fleetwood Mac. Here's 40-odd other songs you seemed to enjoy, but no, the whole thing's effed because we don't know Fleetwood Mac. OK then, off you pop Cobwebs well and truly blasted out. What a great night!

Played in a massive converted warehouse venue last night on Gloucester docks. Basically a giant bathroom acoustically speaking. It was fine, with the only thing of note being me watching with my usual amusement as a drunken ‘expert’ regaled our sound engineer with lots of pointing and hand gestures. When I spoke to him afterwards, it turns out the guy was brilliant and actually really helped with some advice that transformed the sound and resolved a bass bloom issue. I suppose mathematically speaking it had to happen eventually 😂😂😂

Had the privilege of collecting my dream bass today and even better the Mrs thought it was more than it actually cost 👀

Our seven piece swing band played inside a store as part of the city's downtown Christmas walk last night. It's a small shop but we had hundreds of people coming in for the three hours we played and got lots of good feedback as we worked our way through a mix of swing charts and some Christmas songs arranged for a band like ours. We played well and were done at 9 and got paid too . I used my Yamaha SLB 200 instead of my DB due to limited space. A shot from inside and one through the window from the street. 👍🎅

Out came the scrollsaw and off came the excess pickguard: Unfortunately, @atsampson , I don't think the offcuts are quite long enough to completely fill the narrow, but long gaps. After doing this sort of thing a few times, one is relatively relaxed hitting a 56 year old icon with a Forstner bit...well, definitely relatively And, again using chisels and mallet, the chamber is cut: And it fits! (Big phew!)

I’ve never had an issue with the stock 3point bridge , but I’ve loved the look of the hipshot. This has been my favourite player for quite a while now, it’s a beautiful little thing to play. With a single pickup in the classic sweet spot this actually behaves much like a Pbass. Lightweight , and fun. I love this bass.

Unless you are looking for a specific sound, look or 5, 6, 7, 8, 10 or 12 strings etc, no one really needs any particular brand. What you need is something that sounds the way you want to sound, plays well, feels good and possibly looks good as well. I've never really bonded with any Fenders that I've owned over the years. My current basses are a Warmoth Dinky body with Status Graphite neck and EMGs so Fender in type but no where near any Fender I've played before. The other is a Musicman Sterling HH which has a loose connection with Leo Fender

Just a couple of days ago I had an email from a Vineyard church quite local to me. It was an invitation to a Worship jam they are doing. It is an initiative to build a new worship band as they feel they need more bodies to cover extra services they are putting on including an evening service which will be all worship without any teaching or sermons. I sent a yes to attend and got back lead sheets for the 3 songs they want to try out to start with within hours. I've been trying to get the gospel church where I play to use lead sheets for 18 months with no results. This looks like I might be on the move to serve much closer to home than the 44 mile round trip I have been making for the last 18 months or so. Please pray for me that all is well and according to Gods will.

Ignoring switches I count 94 knobs and sliders … presuming 10 distinct positions on each knob that’s 10000 0000000000 0000000000 00000000000000000000 0000000000 00000000000000000000 0000000000 0000000000 options

I think the reason my band has stayed together for over 15 years is because we distance ourselves from each other. We rarely see each other outside of gigs. I also think it's the reason all our gigs are fun. Blue

People maybe 40 something, age around the same. They had been having some educational thing the whole day. They really expected something like a slightly advanced trio, and we were 10. We actually played pretty well today and the audience was dancing. A lot. Good vibes from the start.

I love gigging. I need the money and the attention. A friend asked me why I still gig at 69 years old? My response, " The gardner doesn't applaud " Blue

72 Jazz, 75 P Bass and 77 P Bass

I did the audition on Wednesday. As I expected, I played at about 50% of my ability under pressure. It was bit hot and my hands were sweaty which made my flats a bit sticky too. But, they want me in, so it was a good result. My little Barefaced One10 with the LM3 sounded fabulous with my P bass, I don't think I'd ever need anything bigger with this band. I learned six tunes for the audition including The Chicken, which they were quite pleased that I'd picked one of the more tricky tunes to audition with. I now have another 5 to get down before rehearsal next Wednesday. I have permanent jazz earworms at the moment! A couple of the band members will be at Jazz Jam tonight in Lancaster. I'm going down and hoping to do a few tunes with some new people. I feel like I've come a long way since buying my first bass almost a year ago. Onwards and upwards! Rob

Hm I don’t like them for some reason. Or stacked pots. I think a slider switch will be quite neat and a cool take on the jaguar style, plus I think Andy has one already

All string manufacturers publish on your website the string tensions of the individual string and the set total and use the same units or both American and metric and agree on standard conversion figures from one to the other It would make it sooooo much easier to find comparable strings/string sets Especially important when a set of strings is £50+ Failing to publish the data to me means you are either lazy, don't care about your customers, don't acknowledge customer intelligence or that your strings are just whatever came off the machine that day depending on who was minding the machine or what the supply chain sent you in terms of materials and you don't actually know or care what you are making

We're working on a mash up of Groove is in the Heart and Gary Numan's "Cars"...

I doubt that the band that plays the Academy Awards rehearse every week. I'm guessing that most of the players see the charts either at band call (or maybe a week or 2 beforehand at most), then have a couple of rehersals including a full dress rehearsal, followed by 'see you next year'. They won't be going to a rehearsal room every week to work out songs and arrangements- that's the job of the arranger and MD.

Best Precision I've played is a Tokai. Best Strat I ever played is also a Tokai.

Fender are a bit all over the place with their business model IMO. The Japanese made models are generally really good and not particularly overpriced, particularly second hand. With less than an hour set up the Squier CV are good value at around £400 new. Good value first bass or backup that would lose little money should you want to sell it on. The supposedly cheaper Mexican models now feature gems like the JMJ, Nate Mendel, Flea and Vintera range. Again very little money lost if you want to sell them on as they retain their value fairly well. The USA models are fairly expensive, but most products bought from the USA in Europe are expensive. I guess if the instrument feels right in your hands then the cost is worth it.

Of course if they go up to 11 that’s one better…

Welcome to the 21st Century ...

Decided to treat myself to a short scale bass about a year ago, so got in touch with https://www.wilcocklondon.com/ to ask if he'd make basses for lefties, and turns out that he did... So after a bit of wait and choosing specs (alder body with sherwood green finish, roasted maple neck with rosewood fretboard), it finally arrived. Looks and sounds fantastic so far, surprising versatile range of sounds, considering its simplicity (passive, 3-way pickup toggle, tone and volume controls).

Not particularly bass related…sorry, but any fans here? I love his later stuff with The Hot Licks, when it sounds like he’s singing without his teeth in 😂. Great musicians, clever songs and his duet album is wonderful. This one Featuring Setzer & Costello is a lot of fun. The bass is perfect.

There is a veritable cornucopia of amazing double bass exponents out there - is there any style/genre that particularly interests you?

Thankfully I’ve discovered that an old bass I no longer use had close enough screws, so that’s handy for now. just added some tea staining and a single coat of danish oil.

I think Niails observation may have something to do with it. My important life moments have been punctuated by some rather bland music - some that stick in my mind are Holidays in the Sun by the Sex Pistols (the first time I saw a band play live - admittedly my brothers punk band in his bedroom), Without You by Harry Nillson (which was playing first time I hooked up with my wife), Last Night a DJ Saved my Life by Indeep (which was playing when I lost my virginity - I'd like to claim it lasted longer than the record but sadly not) and Cocaine by Clapton (the first song I ever played live to an audience).

When I worked for the Beeb I used to go to the incidental music recordings at TVCentre music studio for a couple of progs I worked on - Lovejoy and Hetty Wainthropp. In both cases the composer and MD would get together beforehand, send out music to the "band", there'd be one rehearsal then everything would be recorded live - mostly in 1 take. 30 cues would be recorded perfectly in 3 or 4 hours...

Me and the drummer often do this, noone has joined in yet though, the rest of our band dont. It is such a great bass line to play though!

Best Les Pauls many of my mates have played were also Tokais.

I suppose that this is the real point. The Fender Aerodyne looks fabulous and was almost faultless, remember this was a £1000 bass in 2003 in the UK. Since I have had it, I have replaced the stock machine heads with Gotoh Res-O-Lites. That really helps with the weight, although it's not a heavy bass. I have also changed the pickups to DiMarzios as I hated the buzz from the single coil Jazz bridge pickup. On the Sire Marcus Miller M2, the machine heads were not the best and I put Hipshot Ultralites on thanks to a bargain buy from a fellow BC'er. The controls, both the knobs and the feel of the pots are not perfect, but I cannot fault the preamp itself. With the bass, treble and mids set central, the volume and tome is virtually the same as when switched to passive. I van feel a preamp upgrade coming though, as my friend @Passinwindhas a couple of nice onboard designs. I might try a body and neck from Northwest next to build exactly what I want.

And the gas😁

Abba - Arrival (because Abba are an indelible part of my pre-teen memories) Planet Funk - Illogical Consequences (kept me going during some rough times in London) Toto- 25th Anniversary live (because Toto have been a near constant musical inspiration) Prince - Aftershow Party bootleg 15-9-2007 O2 Dome with Beverley Knight (because I was there) Rolling On The River - Tina Turner (we used to play it in my last band and it killed every time) Sky - Sky II (because it inspired me to take up playing music. More specifically I wanted to drum like Tristian Fry 2:00 in on Tristan's Magic Garden.) Freemasons - Compilation of their more bombastic remixes (because I like listening to the arrangements) John Williams - Star Wars soundtrack (a movie that I heard the music to before I saw the film) Book: The SAS Survival Guide I'd swap the Bible for a translated copy of the I-Ching. Luxury: Rainsong carbon composite 12 string acoustic guitar (upgraded with stainless steel frets), 30 sets of strings, tuner, a supply of 0.5mm Dunlop tortie picks, a small pair of needle nose pliers and chord sheets for a selection of songs by Supertramp and Abba.

I’ve just got around to listening through all of them and I must say, bravo , superb stuff all of them I might start up the Christmas thread later today as the theme will remain as is tradition , so we may as well open it up .

We've got a gig at The Rigger in Newcastle Under Lyme, supporting female-fronted prog metallers Dakesis on 16th December... Poster to follow, as well as dates in Rhyl, Wakefield and in a field near Pwhelli!

We did a gig in France, just one night, but 3 days in total, including travel. The gig was OK, but we had an absolute blast, I don’t think I’ve spent a more pleasant bank holiday weekend. Our rehearsals were mini versions of that trip.

I don't see much value in Fenders except with resale, even then only if you've bought it used in the first place. That said you can still take a hit with 2nd hand, not many folk clamouring to buy Dimension models. I like the look of the AV II 54 but £2050 is a hell of a price, then there's the fact demand for chubby neck single coil P-bass is limited. You could lose £500 if selling on. For that £500 hit I could easily build a 51/54 style P-bass. Truth be told with £500 I could , and have, build 2 of them 🙂

Would it be possible to use the offcuts from the pickguard to fill the "wedges"? I don't know if it's the right type of plastic to do an low-visibility join with solvent...

bow just to setup the core and start some presets