Bilbo

So don't do funk. That is not the only way to inter pret the image (I am not)

Great point, grahamD. I use his r/h muting techniques a lot nowadays so his has influence me but I just don't seem to want to listen to his records. Although I do love his song 'It's Only Music' off 'Bent'

The 'too tall' argument was used for me 20 years ago when I applied for a gig with a name band. In short (see what I did there?), if the lead singer is a short-arse with a small ego, you are going to make him look tiny, a particular problem in genres like HM where the macho image is sometimes part of the deal. Interestingly, on the occasions when I meet celbrity musicians, I am regularly surprised at how short they are in real life. I guess this is more common than we think. For the record, I know of another musician (a drummer) who 'auditioned' for a Kylie video. The 'audition' was him being filmed from lots of different angles (he didn't actually have to play the drums). I guess it is easy to forget that the priorities have changed.

Got half and hour on it tonight and this is where I got to. Not finished and very clunky but I wanted to show willing as much as anything. This is as far as I got and have abandoned it as time was up and, frankly, I know how much work is needed to get it up to par and I don't want to spend the time on it but thought I would post this anyway. I was thinking waltz of the dead kind of thing. https://soundcloud.com/robert-palmer-1/waltz-at-the-hanging-tree

I loved the first two LPs, Spears and Dr Hee but, after that, I lost interest (I have owned several more lps/cds but let them go). I find Willis's playing a bit bland and predictable, despite his obvious virtuosity. I think he is one of those guys that needs to be produced by great writers etc. Like Jeff Berlin, all that technique but not much emotional content. There is a cd with Willis and Allan Holdsworth playing standards that says it all. It just doesn't work. He is a monster player, though.

Tis what it is. But, once you have nailed it, you have nailed it for life. Time massively well spent.

https://soundcloud.com/robert-palmer-1/estate When the sax player counted the rhythm section in for this bossa, he was delighted with what he had to play over and you can here him exclaim in delight. Just beautiful.

It does take time. The skill is hard won but hugely valuable.

Voted. Struggling to get ot composing at the moment. Very time consuming when you haven't got time. I started something and got it off the ground but just haven't got back to it in time. Bugg**y b*ll***cks [size=4] [/size]

Sax bass drums trio with Dave O'Higgins on tenor. I was in heaven. I played one of my best double bass gigs ever, really creative and interesting stuff (and more than a little wrong on occasion!!). Still, you can't make an omlette.....

Those stadium gigs are a real turn off, aren't they?

Being blunt, it is pretty much all there in the Levine book. It is one of those things where a simple concept that takes 10 minutes to learn can take a lifetime to explore and to master. If you nailed everything in that book, you would be more knowledgeable than 99% of the musicians you meet. The art of it is not necessarily in the knowledge but in the[i] application[/i] of that knowledge. [i]That[/i] is what takes the time. Just keep listening and learning. I knew a great teacher once who said 'we all seem to think that the answer will be in another book and just keep buying theory books and filling our homes with ideas we don't fully udnerstand. But the answers are in the thorough exploration of the first book you ever bought'!!

I just passed the 10,000 mark on my SOundcloud page!! And some of them weren't even me!!

That Dave O'Higgins trio gig is this coming Sunday. Scary stuff as I fear it will show up my 'inconsistent' intonation. Can anyone lend me a double bass with frets??

Played with singer Georgia Mancio yesterday. Beautiful gig; heart-warming. Great ballads and bossas as well as the usual swing and standards.

The answer is probably but, with double basses, it is much more of the case that you need to try it to see if it works for you. You can get a great sounding bass that turns upo for £50 (Steve Berry's did!!) or you can pay £6K for a dog. Double basses are not like electrics and can be less consistent. What seems apparent is that this one has not been mistreated so that may be an indicator of something. Best have a look at it and, if you can, take someone who plays well with you so that they can give you an opinion of its playability and sound.

[quote name='ubassman' timestamp='1394717646' post='2394351'] ...dont forget to enjoy making music! [/quote] Careful, sunshine!! This is Jazz we are talking about!!

A couple of points from me, I think there is a tipping point where a starter instrument starts to hamper your improvement rather than aid it (I am thinking about general things like noisy pick-ups, poor fret work, machine heads that slip out of tune etc - whatever snags you can think of). Some get lucky and find cheap instrument that doesn't have the 'issues' that others do but, for a lot of us, there can be problems. My first bass (Hondo II Precision copy) had an action you could limbo under whilst the second, an Aria SB700, whilst a lot more playable, was a little noisy and it's knobs fell off. More to the point, there can be a point where you need something more robust as you start gigging more frequently and that bass starts to become a tool rather than a toy, so to speak, and, like any other craftsman, a cheap screwdriver from a B&Q 'pack of ten' is no good if you are hammering away with it all day every day. I remember once playing a Epiphoen Joe Pass (essentially an ES175 copy) which was nice but, when I played a 175 (4 x the price), it was immediately obvious that it was a much better instrument; better tone, better intonation, quieter electronics etc). If you know enough to notice, it is time to up-grade. I guess the day you 'out-grow' a cheap instrument is the day when you realise that the problems you are having with the cheap kit are problems.

This is where a knowledge of theory becomes extremely useful. Examples could be learning a line from a tune you like that is a funk groove in C major. Now, theoretically, everytime you play a funk groove in C, this line could work (never that simple but work with me). In fact, if you understand how the note relationships work and how they fall on the neck of your bass, you can use that lick against any Major chord, not just C Major. More to the point, if you REALLY understand the relationships between notes, you can take that C major lick and transpose it to C Minor, which you can also use on any Minor chord, not just C Minor. So your one lick now has a minimum of 24 applications. YOu could also take the rhythmic elements of the lick and reframe them entirely; a lick that starts in 1 can also start ofn 2, 3, 4 or on the off-beats of 1, 2 3 and 4. Each option creates massively different levels of tension. If you really want to get clever, take a line that is being double by a piano players left hand and, on the fly, play the line a third higher (I do this all of the time, always an octave higher than the original line as it sits better up there and stands out nicely - it is effectively 10ths not thirds). This is where you really need to know what you are doing up the dusty end. You can think of rhythmic variations of your line's main 'theme'. Dave HOlland does this a lot, taking a riff and chaniging it minutely every time he plays it, creating endless variations whilst still effectively playing the same riff (listen to 'The Oracle' on his Extensions album). I could go on but the point is simply that any line can be used in a myriad ways to create new and fresh perspectives on the original idea. THe more you know about the music, the more you can use these ideas in improvisations and in settings where the instruments are interacting rather than playing parts. For me, this is where all the magic lies.

Ian Shaw - Alone Again (Naturally) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8UbNFnYWw8

They may already have been posted but for me it's Greenslade 'Time and Tide' (Animal Farm), Rush 'Hemispeheres', all early Yes (Yes, Time And A Word (when it comes in at 0.46 on Dear Father), The Yes Album). They may have been posted already but I cannot see most of the attachments/links posted above.

I have been gigging my electric through my AI Clarus and Ten2 Ex and it is fine for what I call 'quiet' pop/rock/funk gigs (yes, they do exist) but, when welly is required, I am not 100% happy so am thinking about the Markbass discussed above as the next 'targeted purchase'!! Good to see people are generally happy.

He is a wonderfully clever artist, like Zappa, Kim Mitchell, Jon Anderson, Prince, Gwilym Simcock and so many others. They do their thing and some like it and some don't but that is the nature of these things. Enjoy what you enjoy.

There is a lovely story I heard yers ago and reproduced here at least once before. When Van Halen were a young up and coming band, they toured with Ted Nugent. Ted had heard about this hot shot new guitarist Eddie Van Halen and was watching him soundcheck. On hearing this fabulous sound, Nugent asked EVH if he could try his gear. Eddie took the guitar off and handed it to Nugent without altering the sound in any way. Nugenet picked up the guitar and played a few licks, without touching the eq etc, and sounded just like Ted Nugent. Whenever I play a bass, any bass, after a fewn momnents orientation, I sound like me. I hate the fact but there you are.

You couldn't get the pirate stations where I lived in the Valleys!!