dmccombe7

There's people dancing, couldn't have been that bad plus i like that song. Dave

No gigs till start of May for me. Its actually been a welcome break in April having just the drummers birthday gig last weekend which took up 3 days Set up Fri, gig Sat and collect the gear Sun. Enjoying the quiet weekends. Dave

Gotta ask Pete. What's the Danelectro bass like to play ? Dave

At home I just leave my cable attached to the amp and the other end left on the floor next to the amp. If i'm using a passive bass at home to practice i'll just leave the lead plugged in so its not really any bother. I usually sit down at home to practice or learn new songs so i'm not tripping over any leads and not an issue for me. I can understand when you have kids or pets in same room tho. As for ease of use a cable left attached is no different from plugging in the wireless every time you want to use it plus i don't need to charge it. Dave

I had a cable made up for my Smoothound with a locking female jack one end and standard jack the other and bought a slim holder to attach to my strap. Dave

Fair point. My gear is in a specific room with door closed at all times, no cats and no wife allowed in without permission ............... unless she tells me she's going in of course Dave

If you don't gig i'm not sure why you would bother with a wireless system to be honest. I use a lead at home when practicing and i don't find it a problem but i much prefer a wireless system when gigging especially with the Glam band. It saves tripping over any leads when wearing platform boots which was my main reason for one. I had the Smooth Hound one but it was picking up occasional interference altho it was only rare occasions but it annoyed me when it did so i opted for the Shure GLXD pedal but that's only because i gig a lot. Too much money if i wasn't gigging. Our guitarist has tried a few cheaper versions and is currently on a BOSS wireless and he had trouble with it at our last gig and went back to his lead. Dave

Not a fan of single cutaway basses. Dave

Cheers for that Tim, thoroughly enjoyed it. Looks bitterly cold as i could see the singers breath when he was singing. Great voice too, deep and powerful when it needs to be and soft and gentle at other points. The various acoustic instruments work exceptionally well with the songs. Great idea using the old church too. Brilliant stuff Dave

Anywhere we can hear something from the album and where to buy it. Its not my usual style of music but i'm very curious with the various instruments you use, could make it very interesting. Dave

4 min drive to a gig that must have been the perfect gig Love the wigs along the stage there. Dave

Ouch !! that's what you call horrendous traffic. Sympathy for you guys there. Looks like you pulled it all together and had a great gig tho. Well done. Dave

Too late now Dave

Drummers 65th party last night playing with both the Glam band and the Punk band. Great night and just good fun night. Glam band went on first mainly because the singer Mikey and guitarist Colin wanted to get it done so they could have a few beers etc after playing. Have to say the Handbox WB-100 with the Godin Shifter bass is a perfect match. The depth of tone was simply incredible and worked so well in both bands. Guitarist and singer from the Glam band told me after the punk band played that the bass tone was the best they had ever heard and reminded the guitarist of Roger Glover's Deep Purple tone. He had never heard me playing like that with so much energy and aggression. I don't particularly play that way with the Glam band because its not needed when you are copying the Glam era from studio recordings rather than a live sound. Its more controlled and a bit more mellow. So many compliments from our guitarist about my punk band style and tone and the fact he had no idea i even played like that. He reckoned it was the best punk band he had ever seen. I have to add that by the time we finished at 1am they were a wee bit oiled and i think the comments were fuelled with alcohol a bit but a compliment is still a compliment is still a compliment. The punk band is all about energy and that amp and bass gave it in buckets full. It had so much depth and from what they told me carried right thru the guitarists Marshall stack with so much power and clarity. Singer said the high notes at the dusty end were so clear and sharp where he was standing at the back of the hall. For the more Ric style tones i engaged the "bright" button just to give it that little kick edge. Loved it. Particular punk favs for me last night from a tone point of view were Do Anything you Wanna do and In To the Valley with its de-D tuning for one song but the depth remained but that bright button just meant it carried so much further. Another thing i found using the Godin bass was that the pick ups being so hot meant the amp was nowhere near the same master volume as with my Sandberg basses meaning that amp has a lot more headroom than i thought. I am now keeping that bass and amp. Guitarist said it ws THE best bass tone he had ever heard from any band The Handbox is staying and hoping the Mesa TT800 when it arrives will also give me that Mesa "heft" as so many have commented on the TB site i follow. If anyone gets a chance to play one of those Godin Shifter classic basses then try them they are so well made, not heavy and some of the nicest sounding pick ups i've tried over many many years. Not a hugely expensive bass either on 2nd hand market. If you like a P bass with some extras its a wonderful buy. It has a V & T control and 4 way switch for P, J, Series or Parallel. I had it on Parallel last night and cant fault it. Many thanks to our very own Stevie @theplumber for finally selling me the Godin. If you're reading this Stevie i'll take the other Godin if you decide to move it on. No pics as yet but if any appear i'll post later. Short drive home too at 25mins altho the road to Wanlockhead is very pot-holed at the moment and a bit of care was required in the dark. Just got to head back there today at mid-day to pack up the gear and return home again. Bit long winded post but it just shows how excited i am with that HB and Godin combination. Sometimes things just fall into place by accident and this was that night. Dave

Not so much a gig tonight but more a set the gear up and sound check for tomorrow nights gig for the drummers 65th party in his mates house. Its a large 8 bedroom sleeps 22 house with function room, swimming pool, sauna and games room. He lets the drummer use it for "special parties" and the owner has a large outdoor BBQ and Pizza oven. Tonight after setting up we had home made pizza's which were amazing. Both the Glam and Punk bands playing tomorrow night so the stage area was a bit busy. Got the punk sound check done and dusted and as soon as the singer arrived from Glam band we did the sound check and ran thru 3-4 songs. Its funny how quickly a band that gigs regularly together can adjust their own sounds and volumes to suit an unusual gig very quickly. After the first verse the balance and tones were sorted but we did 4 songs anyways. Only doing an hour set each band tomorrow night so that will be good fun. Tonight had a small audience as people are staying from Fri to Sun so maybe around 20 folks in including the house owner and his wife. Used the Godin Crafter classic bass tonight for both bands into my Handbox WB-100 and Mesa 210/115 cabs. I had forgotten how good that HB amp sounded. Warm, deep and clear sounding too. The Godin boosting the depth with its amazing solid deep pick ups. Was considering selling the HB and tonight was going to be its last gig before i advertised it but now i'm not so sure. The tone was spectacular. The Godin having very hot passive pick ups too meant i could push the HB amp easily into valve distortion giving it a really nice edge when hitting the strings hard during the punk songs. Think i might just keep the HB as it sounds wonderful matched with the Godin bass. Will update you all Sun on the actual gig tomorrow night. Dave

To be honest i did ask what the band thought of the tone with the flats but the guitarist was the one who spoke his mind. I'd rather have an honest opinion in a band than to remain silent. The guitarist is no longer in the band. (his choice i have to add) Dave

I put Low Tension Flays (i think they were LaBella) and quite liked the tone but guitarist wasn't so keen so i went back to my usual D'addario nickels. It obviously doesn't have that top end zing but it made the Glam songs sound very studio like and it reduced any string noise to almost zero. I'm now using Elixir nickels. Dave

On one occasion we had 2x1hr slots so that meant cutting a fair few songs out of our 2:45 min set. We left out Slade mainly because the singer struggles with them a bit. At the end when we got to the encore we did the usual extended encore medley and the shouts continued with we want Slade so we did a Slade song as the last song and we've kept a Slade song as a final encore ever since providing the singers voice is ok. On the longer sets where its up to us to decide when to finish each set we'll just play the full list of songs. That all depends on the audience and if they are up for a full party night. I think the longest we've done is almost 3hrs at a Xmas party night. I was absolutely knackered after it wearing all the Glam gear incl the wig and wearing platform boots. Sweating like .......... well you know and legs and feet aching with those bloomin boots but i loved every minute of it. Dave

Its an odd one cause its the same drummer and female singer in both bands so why the punk band doesn't have a song up its cuff for an encore has always surprised me but if suggested we do a song for an encore in both bands then that song ends up in the set list and we just do it leaving us with considerably longer sets than we need or venues expect with no encores to do. With the Glam band we always keep the last song as the encore and the singer will announce this is our last song knowing we have one more to do. We always seem to get asked for an encore but in the rare occasion we dont he'll ad-lib his chat and announce something daft that by special request or because you've been such a great audience we'll do one more song. Wearing all the glam gear etc with those platform boots and wigs does make it difficult when finished as we sometimes need to walk thru the venue to get to our changing rooms so we will linger a bit at the end like you say put the bass on the stand and put the amp on standby to see what happens. I totally leave it up to the main singer to make the call. Dave

In the Glam band we'll do up to 2 encores depending how long we've been on stage and if venue time allows. Think the most we've ever done is 3 but that's our fav venue and we need to ask the owner if its ok to do another. He's usually up for it so that helps but he runs a Rock night club upstairs directly after the band so it cuts into the DJ's time but he's ok with that too. In the punk band we generally don't do an encore and if we do its usually a song from the start of the first set. Dave

After a gig i open a bag of peanut M&M's for the drive home but i like the Red Bull and Yorkie idea from @Gasman When i get home its coffee and 2 tea biscuit dookers and like @TimR if local kebab shop open its a cheeky wee donner kebab to be eaten when i get home another 8 miles up the road. (country living means takeaway food is usually a bit cool when i get home so i have to pop it in the old microwave for 20-30secs. Happy Days. Dave