WalMan

Can't agree with you there...I luv' em 😁 That said in pre d-tuner days I did manage to detune on the fly at the end of this song

We always aim for at least three at the start of each set to run together with minimal breaks and links where possible. Great but when everything is running tight like that in the set getting to water or swap a bass (not something I do much to maintain the set momentum) can be a trial. with luck there’ll be something where the bass doesn’t come in for the first verse 🫣🤣

Fun morning with my buddies half remembering songs, having a chat and a laugh, and making noise. To be fair we haven’t had a get together since last November, this being a bit of fun blasting through our old new wave songs from 40+ years ago. Drummer was using a newer kit that he normally uses as a cut down set so had a chance to use the whole thing. Guitarist had a new big birthday guitar and refined pedalboard. I stuck with the FrankenJazz, usual pedalboard, and the studio’s Hartke rig. All sounded pretty good where I was stood and generally pretty tight - until it didn’t 🙄 Some songs fell apart when one or other of us forgot where we were in it, but much fun and hilarity all round which is what we’re after. Not really looking to gig, just make some different noise to what we all usually do in other bands. We were the only band in this morning and the youngster that let us in and hung around to lock up after made some nice comments (probably just humouring the old farts! 🤣)

Dammit. I’d been planning to come down, then we had a couple of nights in London at the last minute. Glad it went well

…and that apparently makes me 1033 - I certainly feel that sometimes

17/7/2007 😁

It was originally a single pickup, passive Pro1 that I picked up secondhand, but virtually new when someone p/x’d it at the music shop my then drummer ran (saw it on the wall in the shop, took it to our gig that night and it never went back 🤣) That was around 1982. A few years later I had a pickup built by Kent Armstrong into a Wal pickup housing and fitted in front of the bridge turning the Vol & Tone into two Vol with no tone, but still passive. In 1996 I took it up to Wal for a general service and Pete showed me another Pro1 that they had in that was being converted. He told me that the Pro’s were built with the intention that active electrics could be retrofitted if the owner desired in the future, and quoted a good price to do so for mine, so the die was cast and I went for that along with the service and a few weeks later I went back to collect my now active Wal with the Kent Armstrong pup swapped out. So it started life in 82 as a one pickup passive Pro and was converted by Wal to full active in 96.

Last one before Friday’s prog extravaganza. I made a load of silly mistakes so hopefully they’re out of my system. As it’s prog I took the kitchen sink: - two basses (Wal and FrankenJazz) - pedalboard - acoustic guitar and stand up player stand - BB2 and power amp that was going to be for the bass pedals but in the end was an expensive, but rather nice sounding monitor for the acoustic through a TwoNotes Opus - Alesis Strikepad loaded with two kits for the drummer, one with rototoms and a pad for the clocks at the beginning of time, and a second with two pairs of timpani, one tuned for Fanfare for the Common Man and the other for Life on Mars - I had the McMillen 12Step and bits to connect to soft synths on my iPad for bass pedals, but that was the straw that broke the camel’s back and I shan’t use those. I can get by with the Source Audio C4 on the pedalboard. Friday we have a non proggy support who I don’t know (our guitarist does and I found a couple of videos) but have been asked to share kit and amps. I was going to take both BB2’s to run separate rigs for bass and basspedals/acoustic and I always carry a spare amp so I’ll probably just run up both rigs and he can tweak the spare then I’ll swap it out for the power amp. Had a bizarre “cheese dream” about it last night where we soundchecked in a wooden shack scout hut then I went out to sort out sharing my gear only to come back and find the drums and bass gear stripped from the stage, taken outside and unceremoniously dumped in a deep crater. I woke up as my WTAF rant started 😳 I’m sure it’ll be fine 🤣 Used the FrankenJazz that’s my current main squeeze most of the night, but swapped to the Wal at the end of the first set and first couple of the second. Both sounded great and I’d have used the Wal more but didn’t have my Duo strap and my shoulder started complaining. I love the Wal dearly, it was my only bass for a good 20 years but damn she’s a heavy old girl.

Barock Project with support from Peter Jones at Trading Boundaries on Thursday night. Love the venue and both artists. Peter Jones on fine, nutty form and got up to do one number he had co-written with BP just him and Luca. The BP bass player couldn’t make it this time so they had his parts recorded - I’d have offered but it gets a bit technical at times 🤣 Had a great night at our favourite venue with #2 son and his g/f. I’d have gone for the second night on Friday if I hadn’t been gigging myself

Not a bad night in Portsmouth but quiet at the venue which was a shame. We were pretty tight having thrown in a few we’ve not played in a while but they went ok despite having played them on the 5 previously and have been using the FrankenJazz with a Hipshot so I was still experimenting with different positions and flipping between E and D to fit which led to a few errors in position when dropped. Worst for me was the end of Rollin’ In The Deep when I got songs muddled and was playing (in our tuning) D-E-F#-E-D instead of F#-E-D-E-F#. Guitarist said after “I thought you were going for different inversions but actually it ended up as the “jazz” version. Sound was good from where I was and at one point vox came over to me, nodded at my rig and said “oooo that sounds awesome” … he was right, it did 😁 Annoyingly I’m still waiting both for my new IEM’s with a new mold for a hopefully better fit, and the old ones repaired after one side stopped working ☹️ Meant I had to use the KZ’s I picked up as spares. I haven’t managed to get a good fit so the sound from them is never as good as the molded set, but it was better than nowt. I ended up one in / one out which was ok. On stage the sound seemed well balanced. Hopefully out front was the same!

Sunday night was the prog covers. Drummer works late so only managed the last half hour but sounded good. Gave us a chance to work through stuff in readiness for his arrival which helped with the following. Keyboard player has had ancient keys that have been disintegrating for years and showed up with two much newer instruments so there was some tweaking of sounds and arrangements that has not happened before. Gave me the chance to say "can you not play the bass bit as well as the main part in Turn It On that opened things up and stopped trampling over me 😀 Last night was my main band. Ran through some songs that haven't been in the set for a while and tidy up the new ones. Considering some of the old ones haven't been played for a while - a couple could date back to lockdown recordings and videos - they were all still pretty tight and can be brought out for soundchecks in future.

I’ve been looking to rearrange my pedalboard for a while and wanted one that did not require Velcro on the bottom of pedals. I had looked at the Rockboard but ended up with this from Aclam. Arrived pretty quickly from Spain and generally seems solid construction and ok. Pedals are held on with the blocks that screw down to a track on the top. They are a bit fiddly to start with but I got used to them. The pedal side of the locks has a slight rubberised feel and holds the pedals down with pressure on either side. It remains to be seen whether/how quickly they might work loose, but a quick check every so often will hopefully keep that sorted. Palmer 8 outlet power supply underneath. I should have ordered the tray instead of the legs to clamp that down as I realised that they are too long and required the front legs on the board to be extended as far as possible so that the power supply clamps were not touching the floor. The MicroThumpinator is currently held underneath with cable ties whilst I sort out final bits for the power supply. Picked up a set of EBS solderless cables to make up the links and will put in a final one from last in the chain to the Thumpinator once I have everything else settled. The cables from the power supply to pedals are more than long enough so wound underneath and currently held with Velcro cable ties. All in all fairly pleased with the outcome.

Definitely this. Much discussion around song links, endings and any bits that might have gone awry at the previous gig If we make a mistake we look and laugh at each, safe other in the knowledge that it will have gone unnoticed by 99% of punters 🤣

I meant in recent years leading up to the end not now

Only that they were not taking everything out, which is of course their right in a private company, as might happen in other circumstances. That said there were no profits to take anyway, but there was a couple of mil in reserves IIRC