casapete

‘Proper’ amps these. I used GK stuff for over 20 years (the 1001RB for most of them )with no issues. Loved the sound, build quality and overall vibe of them and only moved mine on when I downsized. Well done with your choice, you certainly won’t regret it.

This. But then again, this! A five string would be beneficial to me in my acoustic duo, where we tackle all sorts of stuff in all sorts of keys. However, 5 string acoustic basses don’t do it for me, as well as my 50 odd years of playing 4 strings getting in the way, so I’ll continue with them. Huge admiration for you folks who can swap between the two though. 😊

I was not going to post about my gig last night, but reading a couple of the above posts has changed my mind 😆 Anyway, ours ( 3 piece blues rock band) was a small bar in a country pub in North Lincolnshire. Bit of a trek from the car park, but we had a reasonable space to set up. Around 20 or 30 people in, most of them staying for the evening. Very friendly landlady, left us to decide when to go on. We did 2 x50 min sets, and had polite applause throughout but no dancers. I was a bit on auto pilot for some reason, despite it being our first gig in nearly a month. Subsequently missed a few turnarounds but nothing to derail us. We did receive 3 offers of gigs though! One back at the venue, another as a fund raiser in the village hall and also a small festival next summer. Just goes to show you never can predict the outcome of gigs, even when they appear to be nothing special. 20 minute drive home in the rain, but 14.5 degrees around midnight - very strange. Heading up to Scarborough later for an acoustic duo gig, so hoping the weather stays okay.

The Coal Porters at The Old Parcels Office in Scarborough last night. A bitterly cold evening in Scarborough, and inside wasn’t much better. However, a capacity crowd filled this lovely venue to welcome the 5 piece band featuring the legendary Sid Griffin. Two sets featuring a mixture of old standards / classic originals and some great covers of more recent stuff all done in an ‘alt-bluegrass’style. The covers included The Style Council’s ‘Walls come tumbling down’, ‘Another girl another planet’ by The Only Ones , Bowie’s ‘Heroes’ ( which was fantastic) and ‘Ooh la la’ by The Faces. All great players, especially Kerenza Peacock on fiddle, and Andrew Stafford on upright. One of those gigs where you just have a smile on your face throughout - highly recommended if you can catch them.

Great singer, guitarist and writer, top bloke too. When he played a local gig a few years ago, he covered the Lou Reed song ‘Perfect Day’, and as there had been a popular charity version of it in the charts he got various members of the audience up on stage to copy singing the celebrity parts, really funny.

Thanks, I’ll bear that in mind if I’m doing any restringing then!

Out of interest, any idea what caused the A string to break? They seem quite robust strings to me , and have never had any problems with them on my Ibanez or Taylor GS.

Although a lot of us take singers for granted sometimes, it is a lousy thing to be when you’re ill. I’ve never had to cancel a gig through illness ( apart from when I broke my arm!) but as a backing vocalist I know how difficult it can be when there are colds / flu and other stuff kicking around. My last band had to cancel gigs in theatres on a few occasions when our lead singer lost his voice, and it’s such a hard decision to make. Deps are so difficult to find too - usually if they are any good then they’ll be out working with their own band or even doing solo gigs. Unless your band are playing generic well known covers then it’s a big call to find someone available and suitable.

Any idea what channel number it is? Can’t find it on Freeview in my area.

You gonna bust some similar moves then Mick? 😆

Absolutely. In my old band we used to do a few medleys, and the various songs were joined together by either the main riffs or a few bars of drums. For example,we did a ten minute Motown medley which made this quite easy, as many have well known riffs / intros which are recognisable and share the same tempo. Our aim was to get people on the dance floor and keep ‘em there! The band played functions of all kinds, and we were usually successful in this. ( Other medleys we did included Disco, 60’s, 70’s, Rock and Xmas ). Even now when I hear one of the songs we ‘Medlied’ I still think of how it went into the next one!

The Coal Porters next Thursday at The Old Parcels Office in Scarborough. Great venue, looking forward to it.

Here you go….

Apologies, I honestly didn’t know. Will amend my post.

I always took my bass in to the hotels after gigs, no exceptions. Actually, after I had a hotel room cleaner come into my room one morning ( uninvited I might add! ), I used to jam my bass case against the door handle to prevent any further incidents. 😆

Post deleted.

A while ago there was a spate of band’s vans being broken into at Travelodges. Easy pickings if they don’t have alarms / security locks etc, as all the thieves have to do is watch the van being loaded up at the venue and then follow it to the hotel. Because the vans arrive so late there, more than likely the only parking spaces left aren’t near the reception area too, making it easier for the theft to go undetected. Be careful out there folks.

Many specialist musical instrument insurance companies ( Musicguard etc) will cover items left in the car, albeit with some conditions being met. Still better off left in the hotel IMO - a good chance some toe rag may just steal the car anyway, not even knowing what’s in the boot space.

Nice Les Paul Special - obviously a man of great taste.

True dat. Some Premier Inns don’t require the key card in the holder thing, although most do. Reception will often give you two key cards as well.😆

Because you’re staying in the same room for a couple of nights, from my experience of Premier Inns it is unlikely any staff will be entering it to tidy / make the bed etc until you check out. Obviously leaving your basses unattended anywhere does involve a certain amount of risk, but I’d still go with the hotel over leaving them in a vehicle. Put them upright in the wardrobe section, behind some clothes if possible and leave the ‘do not disturb’ notice on the door handle. Leave the TV on too, just loud enough for anyone in the corridor to think there’s someone in the room. I think you would then be extremely unlikely to have any problems.

Also if you order from them before November 11th they are offering free international shipping on all orders over $75. Great company, used them many times.

That’s crap but in this game stuff like this happens all too often. Back in the early 80’s when I had a day job, my band was offered a short tour in Scandinavia as a support act for a band who were just beginning to do okay. I booked time off work, even getting my boss to swap his holidays around with me so I could go, as one of us needed to be in the office. The band arranged the carnets / gear / transport etc, and I even went to Liverpool to queue up to renew my passport which was dangerously near its expiry date ( a round trip of 250 miles ). Then about 10 days before we were due to leave, the tour got cancelled. Flimsy excuses were offered but we suspected it was down to poor ticket sales / promotion etc. To cap it all, I had two weeks of lousy weather staying at home on my ‘holidays’ whilst my boss had a fortnight of glorious sunshine on his.

I don’t really have a problem with it per se - if someone pays the price I’m after then what they do once it’s theirs isn’t my concern. If I’ve bought something on here though, then I think it’s only fair to sell it back on here again,for a good price - if it doesn’t sell then try it somewhere else for more of a realistic price. (To be fair I’ve done this a few times when my listings on here have n’t raised any interest.) The one sale that did anger me was a few years ago (and didn’t involve this forum). A guy answered my local ad for a guitar I was selling. When he came round to try it he brought his lad with him, about 9 years old. Told me the guitar was for him, his first instrument etc and used that angle to get me to knock the price down which I did. Later that evening it was advertised on eBay for considerably more than he’d paid me. Was considering arranging some false bidding to mess his sale up but in the end I just let it go. Older and wiser now….

Looks good - how’s the Taylor doing Neil? Seems like exactly the sort of gig it would be suited to.