Bilbo

I was just walking through town with my ipod on shuffle and I met someone I knew so took my earphones out and chatted. When I put them back in, the tune I had been listening to had ended and the ipod was half way through the next tune (i.e. I hadn't heard the head). I thought, this sounds ok, who is it? DIdn't recognise the horn player but thought I recognised the bass player so I listened closely for a few choruses and then the penny dropped. It was me.

In my (shared) experience, most insurance is no less a gamble than taking your bass out to a gig. I don't have mine insured because the cost of it balanced against the actual likelihood of a payout makes is pretty pointless (I have the basic MU insurance but that's free). Insurnace is about minimising risk and, in truth, after 33 years of gigging with only one potential claim, I would consider gigging without insurance to be no grave risk. Sensible precautions such as making sure the instrument isn't too accessible to sticky fingers and, number one, never actually letting it out of your (or a trusted bandmate's) sight pretty much cover it. I have little faith in insurance, anyway (after 11 years of insuring my dog, a recent claim, my first, resulted in a £320 bill being reduced to £200 - whoopee do.). They just wriggle out of it unless you are willing to let it take over your life and sepdn every waking hour chasing them. As for venues where there is a likelihood of trouble, why would I play there anyway

I have one bass. End of discussion

Spent sevrral hours working on a piece but have decided it sucks so am going back to the drawing board. Poo.

After 28 years of trying to get an electric bass to sound convincing in a Jazz setting, I finally gave in. Now I wince slightly at yhe wasted decades I have to say I just think it has a more musical timbre and sounds great as a solo instrument whereas I don't feel the same way about the electric. I love the music I play on it more; end of discussion.

Weather Report did a tune called Punk Jazz...

It was just another way of a generation of disaffected yoof to say saying 'F*** you'! We all did it one way or another.

[quote name='White Cloud' timestamp='1370544080' post='2102524'] I love fusion. This one is an oldie...but a goldy. Randy Jackson on bass....... [media]http://youtu.be/kH8jn7hwbDo[/media] [/quote] Wow - that brings back memories - had it on vinyl!!!

I did a jam session thing last Thursday where a hired band play a set before the floor was opened up for people to have a play. The band were Paul Higgs on trumpet, Ian Thompson on sax, Simon Hurley (guitar), Elmer Van Der Hoek on drums and me on wubble bass. I recorded the first set on my new Zoom H1 and this is one of the resulting tunes. Sounds great to me (not perfect (I am pushing too hard in places and there is a wrangle at the end) but spirited). The value of straight quarter notes! [url="https://soundcloud.com/robert-palmer-1/all-the-things-you-are"]https://soundcloud.c...-things-you-are[/url]

Tidy! The voice is the only thing that doesn't delivrr, mate. The composition is np worse than many we have put on here. Vocals is one thing I won't go near near because I can't sing but that limits me to instrumentals and to the instruments I can play. We are all working to limitations so good on you for delivering.

I think the theme and variation element is the bit that turns you from being a tech head who is learning the dots to a musician. My blues solo was a realy eye opener for me in terms of making something of value vs something that showcases a lot of bullsh*t technique.

I did a Jazz Jam thing in COlcherster last night. The deal is, I get booked to play in a quintet for about an hour and then the rest of the evening is handed over to anyone who wants to have a go. Trouble was, no bass players. So I had to play without a break for nearly three hours. Now the great thing is that the last tune was (as it SOOO often is) Sonny Rollins' 'Tenor Madness' going by like s*** off a stick. Despite my own anxieties about stamina, this last tune was about 10 minutes long and I nailed it without any loss of impetus (it speeded up if anything ) and, more importantly, no hand or arm pains this morning. I have those gig with John Etheridge et al starting next week and it is a relief to know that I can at least keep going! I taped last night as well (Zoom H1) which gave me a frame of reference and some learning points.

Just listening to Aqualung for the first time. Not going to go there again but appreciate the craftsmanship.

Finished the last exercise. Only need to do the peer assessments and I am done. Time well spent but quite intense on top of the day job, gigs etc...

No-one ever mentions this guy. I got a couple of lessons with him in the 90s. I just got hold of his Life Without Trousers album. Great bass player but great music, not grandstanding. UK fusion at it's finest. Look it up.

Starting to twitch

I got marked down this week as I didn't do the peer assessments in time. It is so frustrating to always be stealing time for music instead of being able to focus on it.

Miroslav Philharmonik calls!!!

Did a wedding yesterday. Sax/Bass/Gtr/Vox. Good players but it didn't gel. Played at a Stately Home that was the bride's family home (Drayton House, Northants). Slightly iffy charts, strange mix of tunes (some very old, some cabaret, some newer - eclectic I can take but all over the place is something else )/ Still, good money, nice people and nobody died.

I got 11.6% of the vote. The Tories got in on less

Not really. A b13 would have a 5th in th associated scale whereas a +5 would not .

You will find that most of the information you will need is in one book and there is tendency to convince yourself that the route to bass wisdom is more and more 'stuff'. In truth, the path to knowledge is a long and tedious slab of tarmac that just requires you to sit there going over and over and over the same stuff again until it is internalised. Lessons are great but, fundamentally, we are all a product of the amount of time we spend running scales/chords/arpeggios, transcribing solos,learning lines etc. Oh - and learn to read music

I am, by nature, an auto-didact and find that one lesson every decade seems to keep me going Seriously, though, I think, for some of us, all we need is the occasional lesson to keep us on course and then the rest of the time is spent with self-teaching. I have never really been able to afford regular lessons so have just figured it all out myself. There are gaps but, like 90% of us, I have more technique that I can really use and most of the shortcomings in my playing are about a lack of REHEARSAL rather than a lack of knowledge. Where basis theory is concerned, there is not THAT much to learn but it does take a long time to internalise things and to incorporate the concepts into one's playing. It is a case of whatever works for you.

Hey, Stephen. I willvote for you if you vote for me?