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I've been slacking again due to the venue we've just opened. I'll do a thread on that when I get time. On Saturday night we played the Lexington in Islington. Coming from Stoke we had to pickup a guitar that was left behind a few weeks before in Chessington. A total of 6 hours crammed into Vantanamo (named because I don't fit into the van, and so have to spend hours in twisted positions) had me pretty grumpy. Load in up a huge fire escape almost finished me off. The headliner was old friends Abdoujaparov, and I managed to relax while they sound-checked. The venue is very cool, classic old London venue. The set went very well, we won over some new fans, and I left the stage soaked in sweat. Ace gig! Then I had the pleasure of sampling the bourbon bar downstairs. Four Roses and Buffalo Trace were delicious. Here's a photo The next morning we were up bright and early to travel up to Katie Fitzgerald's in Stourbridge where we played a matinee show. Load-in time was 1pm. We arrived at 1:10pm. The owner who actually lives there let us in at 1:30pm 🤷‍♂️ The place was full of our fans singing at the top of their lungs and we loved every second of it.

Baffle cut and cab screwed together,( will glue and screw when happy everything fits ) Back panel cut , just need to wait for when the neighbours are out to check for any buzzing or rattles .

I'm looking forward to this Saturday. I'll get a chance to hang out with a bunch of our local musicians. I'm glad we're going on first. It's a beautiful room on the marina in Port Washington. Daryl

My blue sparkle Sterling Ray34. Imported from Swee Lee in 2016. Much as I love this I might be selling soon as I have a black Sterling Ray34 with matching headstock, Ibanez jetking and just bought a Sire U5. Somethings got to go and this is just too pristine to limit it to pub gigs so will be someones pride & joy on a stage.

shitesnake

I fired the cab up in the rehearsal studio tonight and have some observations: 1 - It's very loud; when compared to my usual cab (Eden 2x15, no tweeter) using the same amp settings it gives noticeably more volume. 2 - Frequency response (or perceived frequency response) is very good; it maintains sweetness in the high end and it doesn't get overly clacky, even with the bass's tone control fully up. 3 - It's chuffing heavy; I've not weighed it, but it's somewhere between monolithic and made of the hearts of collapsed stars. 4 - It's very responsive; even with my Cali76 Bass compressor in use the dynamics are pretty open, and when digging in it moves air around without hesitation, but when playing normally it stays pretty sweet. 5 - The bottom end is big and full but not woolly. 6 - It pairs well with my amp. All in all I'm very happy with how the project has turned out. Cheers, JRK

I know I have a very rare version!

Utterly pointless to try and grade art and artists. Just sit back and enjoy.

I absolutely hate AI. It's theft.

A day using the spray booth and I think I’m getting better lol. Walnut, Paulownia and Sapele.

That's the truth of it. AI is simply another tech tool that will provide some people with new opportunities, allow others to continue as they are, and no doubt piss off a few people. I wasn't around when Dylan and The Band caused uproar with electric instruments in folk, but I was around when synths appeared and people described it as the end of music, when digital recording appeared and people described it as the end of music, when sampling appeared an people described it as the end of music, and when pitch correction appeared and, well, you get the idea. I've no doubt there were similar emotions when recording technology, amplification, electric instruments etc were introduced To me the problem with this thread is the idea that something in the artistic/performance space 'overtaking' something else is in any way meaningful. It's simply change.

Think I've made the same mistake as the O/P...........

Hi Peeps, Unfortunately, I'll not be able to attend on Sunday, but have a good one and it's always a great day. Cheers once again to all involved in the organisation and enjoy yourselves, Cos (Kebabkid)

Long scale? Epiphone Jack Casady. *mic drop*

Just heard back from my GK contact. There have been some manufacturing delays and they are now hoping to ship out in January.

The brilliant Wilton Felder played on one big hit, the Jacksons IWYB and a stonking groove it is to, but he was primarily a highly sought after saxophonist. For my money there's a whole tranch of little known post Jamerson players from that period worthy of consideration including Scott Edwards, Philly souls Ronnie Baker and Henry Davis who played on Love Hangover.. etc. All top flight studio guys who very few people have even heard of.

Don't worry, The Inevitable Teaspoons are currently recording our second album, all by ourselves, in our RF hellhole of a rehearsal room, with whatever mics we can find and a Zoom R24, mixed by me who knows hee haw about mixing. What could possibly go wrong? But it will sound about as far from AI generated "perfection" as it's possible to be, and even though no effer will listen to it, it might poison the AI well a touch...

One of these. Cort a5. Absolutely astonishing bass. So comfortable to play and sounds tremendous. It's quickly became my #1!

Bake That.

Earlier this year, in my quest for U2 basses came these Warwicks Then came a Harry White 4003 Found myself buying a Ric bridge pickup and the bloke played me some stuff he recorded with his Ric thru an Ampeg V4B. So I had to buy one of those too Wow, ussed the HW thru the Ampeg last week at a Total Jam gig. Awesome. Total Jam are a Jam tribute not able to get everything lined up but what a year I've had Ampeg has given me the best sound I've had in 38 years of gigging

It's important enough to say it twice - do NOT use your truss rod as a means to control string height/action. That it has a small effect upon string height when you're adjusting at it is neither here nor there. It's there to control neck relief, to keep the neck straight (or with a very slight concave bow in it) to counteract the forces being placed on it by the strings.

Hi, @W-1Pro - hope all good with you! It's been a long time Remember: - the truss rod is not there to change the action height. It's there to keep the neck straight. My strong advice is to loosen it back to where it was ASAP so it doesn't break something. When I get a moment tomorrow I'll post some simple instructions how to set the truss rod at the right tension - especially seeing that this is a sort of bolt-on-neck, almost certainly the neck needs a shim in the body side of the neck pocket. We are not talking anything of significant thickness...put in the right place, a thin shim can make a HUGE difference to action height

There's going ro be an absolute deluge of these from people hoping that if they churn out enough AI slop they might get a few hits that make money. It's already happening on social media, every 3rd Instagram clip seems to be an AI fake and it's getting really hard to spot them. There's got to be a gap in the market for a streaming service that can guarantee no AI content.

The V4 had a little hiccup a few months back with a horrible cracking through the speakers, lightning inside one of the EHX KT88s and ultimately a fried fuse. The EHX are still currently untested but being safe rather than sorry, I replaced the fuse and installed some old SED 6550C that I'd acquired - these thankfully brought it back to life. They've been fine but I wanted something a bit newer and special for the big Trace so having done a bit of research, I came across these 'Linlai' branded '88s. Initially, I thought they were re-branded premium Shuguang but seemingly, I was wrong and it's a new factory set up by former emplyees of both Shuguang and Psvane specialising in big hifi tubes such as 845 and 811 plus smaller 6SN/L7 and ECC83/2/1 types.. With only about 45 mins on them so far, it's nowhere near enough time to evaluate them but initial impressions are very good. They look fantastic, biased up and remained stable after about 25 mins plus I noticed an exceptionally low noise floor - the V4 isn't noisy anyways but it was near silent with these. We'll see how they go - I got the best part of ten years out of the EHX (and there's a chance they're still ok) which is longer than I've had out of any other set that have ever been in there. Whether these will match the Russian built valves is yet to be seen but having paid £150 including delivery, the V4 feels great and I'm a happy camper.. 🥰

There is this formula which is very simple to calculate the elevation: length x sin(degree), so assuming the length from the nut to the end of the neck is 81.28 centimetres (as the scale length is 32 inches), you'll get an elevation of 1.41 centimetres at its end with a 1 degree shim. So roughly, a 1 millimetre shim will give you the equivalent of a 1 centimeter bridge elevation. Check the elevation you need on the bridge and shim the neck accordingly.

Personally, I wouldn't do that on this bass. I would do exactly what @Hellzero suggests. If you try to lower the bridge as a whole, you will need to chisel/rout both into the neck extension AND the body sides to accommodate the two bridge 'wings'. I would shim it under the bridge, say 1mm, bolt the neck back on, sand/chisel the neck extension back flat with the body, string it and see where the action is. If it's still too high, take the neck off again, add another shim, bolt it back and flatten the bridge wedge again. Externally, the bass will look exactly the same as it did originally - which is not the case if you try to sink the whole bridge into the body.

Perhaps a Sandberg but not a Rick 4030

Its a good way to discover bands you might never have heard of. Today I found an excellent post metal band called Humanfly who were listed as a related artist under a band called Dimscua who I discovered as a related artist under Cult Of Luna. So thats two bands who will sell me gig tickets and a t shirt next time they play Bristol because I found them through streaming. You don't have to use it if you dont want but its there for those who do and its not going to disappear.

Agreed. I wish all my Spectors' bridges were as close to the edge of the body as possible, even if sacrificing high fret reach. Which issue I, as a cellist student turned to bass player never understood, cellos don't have cutaways still you have to reach up high if you have to play notes there. (Full disclosure: I do understand it can be an issue for some, but if I ever play around and over the 20th fret is 99% tapping which overrides the cutaway issue FOR ME)

You Are Awful, But I Like You - Dick Emery

I certainly do gig with one, I find the string to string balance and thickness of the notes high up really useful. The Fallout is a pretty versatile bass....I don't sound that different whatever bass I play, for better or worse, after all these years.

Yeah, spot on. I recently started an electronic music project with someone and after trying what Suno could do sort of scuppered our plans - we figured if we're just doing it to make music and not play live then what's the point? Suno can pretty much do it as well already with the right prompts. I've spent about 20 years learning music production but it now anything technical I know might as well be forgotten, it feels like learning to make photo-realistic drawings and then the camera being invented. I had toyed with the idea of being a sound engineer years ago, glad I didn't go down that road. I suppose telling Suno what to make is like being a music producer in the non-technical sense 'add some quiet guitars here'..'make it more upbeat for the chorus' etc. which does have some artistic merit. And like the video says - this might lead to very personal music being made by non-musicians which could be a good thing. Playing an instrument or playing with a band is a different matter though. AI isn't going to replace that achievement, fun, camaraderie or live event. It's partly why I've mostly moved from electronic music production into playing Bass with a pub band, and when I do produce my own music (spending a lot of time with an MPC Key 37 at the moment) I'm doing it becuase it's fun to do - not because I'm aiming to make any groundbreaking music that I'll make £ from.

I would've been surprised Gary if you didn't have at least a COUPLE 🙂 🙂

And even then how can they tell that the artist hasn't got AI to generate the original musical idea which they have then re-created manually?

I could see AI music being good if it gets to be properly intelligent and did the job of good music by making you feel something and then enhances that experience by making it truely personalised. e.g. music to help you relax/sleep that is in-tune with your sleep patterns and heartrate, music that is just right for motivating you at the righ parts of a marathon, music that helps you concentrate on study/work within the timeframes you give it. In some ways, it takes the 'celebrity/pop icon' aspects out of it and just leaves you with the music and emotion it creates which is possibly a good thing? But yeah, current AI music isn't any of that - it is just a middle of the road regurgitation of stuff humans have made. If it doesn't move on from that I'd expect that once it starts heavily referencing AI made music it will just get get increasingly bland. A quote from Thomas Bangalter from Daft Punk when they split up "As much as I love this character, the last thing I would want to be, in the world we live in, in 2023, is a robot". He went on to completely leave technology out of it and hand-wrote a Ballet score that was only played on traditional instruments. I expect there will be more of this sort of push-back, a young person today might grow up always accepting AI music for their gym workout or background ambient music but I expect (or hope) there will also be more enthusiasm to see humans playing instruments live.

Rather more secure than my old brown factory case! When I took it back to Paul the other week, he expressed amazement that the piano hinge was still intact

Unfortunately IME Bandcamp is a muso/indie ghetto. Fine if all you want to do is reach other musicians and a few hardcore music fans, but nearly useless for reaching ordinary people. The sort of people you need to reach if you want to really grow your fan base.

There is certainly a lot of money still in this country, but the problem is that it is increasingly flowing from the middle class to the extremely rich. They are then using it to buy more and more assets, thereby pricing them out of the reach of ordinary people. Obviously, this is particularly important with housing. Add to this, an increasing problem with poverty. Twenty years ago, food banks were virtually unheard of by most people - now they seem to be ubiquitous, with certain sections of society reliant on them. What you say about house prices is evidently true. They make a lot of people feel rich, but you don't make money on the house you live in. At best, you just provide additional funds for the end-of-life care home you will probably end up in!

Shape can't be patented, only copyrighted and they lost that battle decades ago. Yup. PU type and position define the general characteristics of a P type to me, but sadly many will look and determine that a non-FSO is not a P even if they couldn't pick it blind from something else.

I first heard Wilton Felder in 1973, on the Crusaders album 2nd Crusade. I bought it the next day. . . . ps Click on the 1/9 on the right hand side of the screen to play the rest of the album.

Great work, Jack. Were I not so feeble, old and decrepit, I'd treat myself to another proper bass cab'.

You should aim them as the room demands, which is to cover the most listeners possible. That's listeners, not people. We've all played those rooms where far too many are more interested in their conversations than the music. When I played those rooms I aimed the PA where it would be most appreciated, at the dance floor.

Streamed music has already dealt a blow to most bands' hopes of making decent money from their original creations. AI assisted / generated music music is just the next nail in that coffin. Live music is where it's at for most bands and solo artists looking to make a living from their art. Yes there's one hologram providing superb entertainment, at vast cost and albeit with some incredible session musicians actually playing the music, but an average punter going down a busy pub doing live music at the weekend ain't going to be fobbed off with anything but a live band or solo act. What we all should be campaigning against is the ridiculous infringement of copyright laws that our Govt seems to be wanting to wave through for AI companies to train their large-language models on, and which is theft pure and simple.

We organised a 4 band gig at Whiskers in Newquay on Halloween. It was a bit of a shambles, but turned out alright in the end. First up, the sound guy was meant to arrive at 5. He showed up at 7. We were expecting the first band to go on at 7:30... Everyone says that this guy does this all the time and it's to be expected. He runs on "Cornish time" 🙃 This doesn't happen in Bristol! Punters were leaving because it hadn't started. The first band finally started at 8:20. Then, you know, we're alll running late, you'd think the bands would try to keep to time, right? Nope, the first two over-ran by about 10/15 minutes. Changeovers were SO SLOW. I never understand why it takes some people so long to get off stage. Everyone says it's "Cornish time", we call it unprofessional. It was just as well that the venue had a 2am licence. We had planned that we'd be on at 10:10. Didn't end up going on till 11:45, finishing at 12:40. To their credit, a fair number of (very drunk by now) punters did stick it out and seemed to really enjoy our set. We even had our first mosh pit! I did struggle a bit with fret markers while wearing sunglasses for my costume though. I used to find it alright in the hip-hop covers band. There were also a few mistakes, but I'm putting that down to tiredness. I'd had a few late nights trying to finish mixing our new EP and then early mornings because I have a 3 year old! Gear was Dingwall Combustion -> Boss GX-100 -> Laney Digbeth DB-500H -> borrowed Vanderkley 210. Got some shonky phone videos too. WhatsApp Video 2025-11-01 at 11.21.17.mp4

Supported the Bluetones in Brum on Friday and at Hangar 34 in Liverpool yesterday. Great room sound in Liverpool. Absolutely freezing loading into the house at 3am this morning but nice to be still doing gigs like this occasionally, worth savouring

Friday night (Halloween), played Grays Inn in Mastrick, Aberdeen with Nine Lives. Wasn't the best of gigs, file it under "alright". Oddly, the pub didn't seem to be doing anything for Halloween, but that didn't stop a bunch of people being in fancy dress anyway. Including me - who you gonna call? Neepbusters! Anyhoo, we were late starting because one table of folk who had finished their dinner wouldn't vacate the area for ages, leaving us a lot less time to set up than we usually have. Grr! Put me in a bad mood, ngl. But we got going about 10 mins late, and managed to get an OK sound from the get-go. It was busy enough at the start, but I suspect a lot of folk had kids and once they left, the place cleared out pretty bad. There were a few stragglers, but it was mostly dead, leading to a fairly meh gig. Oh well, still get paid, I suppose. Gear was the Sire Z7 followed by the Yamaha BB1200, into the ISO Standard modular bass rig.

Katy Hurt was booked to play a private event last night, run by the same people who run the Buck and Bull pop up saloon club nights we’ve played before. Big marquee at Tweseldown Racecourse near Fleet, 200 guests, line dancing, DJ, bucking bronco… standard UK “country” themed night. Since this was essentially a private version of the Buck and Bull event, no expense was spared. Pro PA and lighting rigs and engineers made for a wonderful experience, plenty of soundcheck time so the onstage sound was crystal clear and devoid of all the issues from the previous week. The only real downer was the marquee had no heating so it needed the bodies in there to make it warm, it was very chilly in the run up to there being a party in full swing. Our normal drumming options were all unavailable so I pinched the drummer (and my brother in law) from my pub rock band, and he stepped in brilliantly. Being a private party, the crowd weren’t quite the same as the Buck and Bull clientele, and never really fully got going (vs them being totally up for it from the second we walk onstage at a real club night), but we had moments of fun watching some of the better line dancers try not to trip over the less good as we ripped through our two sets of covers and originals. So yes, in some respects a mixed bag but I was home and in bed by 00.30 and throughly enjoyed the playing bit. Basses were my trust ACG RetroBs, via Laney Digbeth pre, Trace TE1200 and Barefaced Two10. Shoes were DC hi tops Hat was Cavender’s of Texas 🤠