KevB

Well I'm a similar age to Lozz and I'd love to be able to retire at 60 but realistically I think it is unlikely despite having no kids to put through college. I'm not expecting the state pension to be worth anywhere near enough on its own to live on comfortably by the time I'm 60. I've worked for the same employer since I was early 20's too but I'm not expecting a great return on that pension either for various reasons. I'm sadly looking at either working till at least 65 or retiring early and living very frugally. The way my career has gone in recent years I'm starting to consider the latter option though!

To deaden the sound you can also wind up the foam string mutes so they are touching the strings to dampen them, gives a more 'thuddy' Macca sound.

[quote name='Dingus' timestamp='1350054263' post='1834114'] course, I have no idea what the rest of the band are getting paid, but I find it hard to believe that anyone would turn out regulaly for that kind of money for so much work . [/quote] £50 per person is pretty standard for a pub band round my way, 4 or 5 piece bands play for £200-£250 quite commonly. Usually it is only the late opening clubs that pay more, you would get more like £100 per person for playing places where you are doing sets at 1-2am but that's not the regular pub circuit. The band in the ad describe themselves as a 'functions band' but looking at the gig list it seems they are playing as many pubs or 'bars' as they are weddings etc.

As I'm between bands I'd probably do it if it was local. Make me learn material I wouldn't normally bother with, get to do 4 free practice sessions with other real musicians rather than sitting in my bedroom office doing it with a PC. Then I get to do a gig and actually get paid for it. If it's a crap band it's a one off gig which I still get paid for. Going to leave this thread alone now for fear of getting crushed by all the high horses milling about.

Quote from Plant ; "It would be precocious of me to walk to the front of the stage and take on a kind of rock singer pose, at that time in my being – and that's five years ago. I could only send it up, and I don't want to do that." I think he has a perfectly valid point and applaud his attitude when there are so many ageing rockers still grinding out tours to an ever diminishing audience.

[quote name='chardbass' timestamp='1349953133' post='1832581'] Definite Patitucci-facial-tourettes [/quote] Someone should invent some sort of gurnometer that you can hang on the studio wall that shuts all the power down after a certain point like a decibel meter. Get Rowan Atkinson in to calibrate it.

I was expecting some sort of trainwreck looking at the youtube comment before I listened to the actual track. Slightly loose in places but frankly if I'd recorded a cover of that tune and got it to sound like that [i]and[/i] (more importantly) it fitted in with what the rest of the band were playing as well as that original track does then I'd be quite happy. Never a huge fan of Queen but it seems well enough put together to me as a finished product. There are no doubt plenty of other isolated bas stracks with all manner of minor imperfections that no one ever noticed in the final mixed piece of music.

I did sell one on here a few years ago, pre EB stingray that had seen a hard life and I'd spent too much trying to restore. I made a serious loss but it wasn't getting played. Sale went smoothly from what I recall. Rather poorer experience when I tried to sell a bog standard Squier precision at a knock down price a few weeks ago. Lots more tyre-kicking kids and 'can you wait until the end of the month' stuff. I can understand this for top end instruments but for a <£150 bass? Stuck it on ebay in the end, sold immediately to a thoroughly nice bloke who collected it and paid cash. I think the market is quite genuinely slow for standard stuff and the economical climate hardly helps.

There's a barely played jetglo 4003 on eBay at the moment for £1300. Still a lot of money in grand scheme of things but still well below new price in UK. IIRC I got mine in early 2000's using money left to me by an aunt when she passed away, probably one of the reasons I don't want to sell it.

Went through that, a remarkably quick process for me; Looked up going rate for anything remotely decent/collectable from correct year. Quiet smile and shake of the head. Money still safe in bank...

[quote name='Dr.Dave' timestamp='1349702220' post='1829262'] How many of us want this in next weeks set ?? I do !!! I'm going to suggest it. [/quote] You certainly wouldn't be the first to cover it Dave [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJE_puVA29s"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJE_puVA29s[/url]

Also it has to be taken into account that Jeff only came in right at the end of The Move, they'd had their time by the point he joined. Jeff and Roy were pretty much planning what they would go on to do together soon after Jeff was on board. Considering Wood then only lasted 1 ELO album as they both wanted to be band leaders the actual time they spent together in any band couldn't have been much more than a couple of years so in the context of Jeff's full career it isn't that big a chapter. On a trivial note, anyone else think that maybe Jeff's trademark hair might not be his own anymore? I mean, he has barely changed in 40 years, it's not natural is it?

If it was slightly progressively influenced I'd be jumping at a band that only wanted to do '68-'75, some superb stuff recorded between those dates. I've had to become rather less selective as time has gone on and this has probably resulted in me leaving bands prematurely due to me accepting something I wasn't 100% committed to. Unfortunately these days I'm too old for most of the bands I see ads for. If you advertise a 'proper job' and put age stipulations on it the HR people wouldn't let it go out. However I see numerous 'bassist wanted' ads on stuff like partysounds and it's invariably under 40's only.

The Tom Petty doc 'Runnin Down A Dream' deals with the Wilbury thing more extensivey (it is about 4 hours long after all!) for those interested. I watched pretty much all the Jeff stuff as ELO were one of the first bands I got seriously interested in. The very early stuff tends to get glossed over because it wasn't commercial but there's some cracking material on ELO2 and On The Third Day. Listening to the albums chronologically you can really get a feel of how it was developing and how Lynne's songwriting was changing direction. I think he got a bit disillusioned with the whole ELO thing toward the end so it was natural for him to spend more time producing other people and getting their albums as good as they could, he's always been a studio animal.

[quote name='crez5150' timestamp='1349687580' post='1828991'] Don't over do it (as demo'd on the earlier video link) as it will sound dreadful and fake. [/quote] I think this is the key, judicial use in the right way can sound excellent. The last time I saw someone using it was where the bass player was the lead singer and he didn't get any support BV's from any other band member. He didn't use pitch correction though, it was some old early harmoniser unit that he said was long discontinued, triggering it with a stand alone foot switch. He knew how to use it and when, just dropping in occasional lines in a chorus or whatever (like in 'Long Train Runnin') to give an extra harmony vocal. Sounded great.

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1349432244' post='1826171'] Stanley Jordan was doing this sort of thing - all on his own - in 1985 . . . . [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ruEkWMtdM8[/media] [/quote] I remember seeing him do this on a UK show, may have been 'The Tube' and being completely mesmerised by the playing, hadn't seen anything quite like it. I recall going out and picking up a Blue Note compilation CD because it had this track on it.

I used to have a P copy, very playable but very heavy so in the end I passed it on to a family member who was learning bass at the time. It originally had the typical Fender type bridge and I replaced it with a badass II. On a completely passive bass I can't say i heard a deal of difference in tone or sustain. I currently have a US P deluxe that is active and I have no plans to change the bridge on that. I do have a passive US jazz and when i swapped that bridge out for a badass III I think it maybe improved the tone/susteain a little. In short for the money I wouldn't bother unless the bridge on your MIM P bass is really causing concern in terms of adjustability or wear. In the limited amount of upgrading I've done my conclusions are that the biggest difference in overrall tone is by changing th epickups and that shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone. My first ever bass was a cheap Columbus jazz copy. The neck wasn't great so I swapped it for a Mighty Might neck and I ended up with a bass that was very playable but sounded thin and weedy. Swapped the pickups to standard US Fender ones and it was a different bass entirely.

So, Wayne, did they give you an audition for the bass job or not then?

I almost enjoyed PIL, they seemed to be going for that 'Grinderman' type approach from last year. Sadly, Lydon never nowingly leaves a song unruined for me so as soon as he opened his mouth that was pretty much it...

[quote name='The Dark Lord' timestamp='1349267028' post='1823969'] +1 to that. Never seen the point of a 2nd guitarist. [/quote] Thin Lizzy? Wishbone Ash? Quo? classic era Whitesnake? wouldn't have been the same bands without 2 guitars and not better ones IMHO.

The other sad truth is that no matter how different and 'special' the one P bass might be over the other to you (and probably most others on here) 99% of the people listening to you gig in the pub won't have foggiest which one you are using. If cash is tight and you can get a half decent tone from your current set up I'd stick with that for a while if it's a new band.

Back to OP, I think the current state of affairs here and probably to some extent on eBay too is that every seller is trying to wring the last penny out of their sale whilst every potential buyer is looking for an absolute bargain every time. Net result is a very stagnant market.

My understanding of the OP is that the whole bass is detuned a semitone so that would be 4 new detuners. I think I'd rather just take a second bass as a backup that could be detuned in advance. In fact come to think of it I'm sure I've done gigs where I did precisely that.