Davy

Great gig at the Moorcock in Peterlee last night. We played a good first set but the backline volume levels went a bit crazy in the second half (typical twin guitarists)! Nice to be back in a busy venue again after a few poorly attended gigs recently.

I've never really used pedals before apart from a Zoom B4, which I used to replace my backline with an in-ear setup and it sounded great but it had way more effects and settings than I ever needed so I ended up selling it on. I've been using my backline(TC BH500 head and TC RS212 cab) ever since but now I'm thinking about buying a very simple preamp pedal to use direct into the mixing desk with my in-ears for monitoring for certain venues. I'm thinking about buying an Ampeg classic analog bass preamp pedal as I've tried an Ampeg SCR-DI pedal before and really liked it(headphone use only). My main question is, has anyone tried one of these before direct into the desk and if so, how did it sound through the PA? I appreciate that it only has a jack output rather than an XLR but the Zoom B4 was jack only and I never found that a problem.

So after the terrible gig on Friday night, we played a mini festival gig at the Rose Inn in Wallsend on Saturday night. Not a huge crowd but they were friendly and appreciative and I only needed to turn up with my bass, as the PA and backline were provided. Left my house for the gig at 8pm, on stage at 9pm, finished by 10pm and home by 11pm after watching some of the last band's set. What a difference a day makes...

You should buy a sports car while you have the chance!🤣

Sadly not. The highlight of the evening was the McDonald's on the journey back and the Dairy Milk waiting for me in the freezer when I got home! 🤣 Onwards and upwards though, we've got a small festival gig tomorrow night with actual paying punters so that's something to look forward to.

The Victoria in Sunderland. Give it a wide berth.

Worst gig of the year so far tonight! 3 people in, terrible acoustics and just when I thought it couldn't get any worse they told us it was too loud! Oh yes and I'm writing this in the break so I've got to go back on in 5 mins! Short second set I think...

First gig in 3 weeks last night with my classic rock covers band "Fossil". A new venue for us(The Benton Ale House in North Tyneside) and a new start time of 8pm rather than the usual 9-9.30pm start. I was pleasantly surprised by the turn out and everyone stuck around even after we started playing! 😁 Got a lot of positive feedback and were asked to come back again. It was also nice to get back in the house an hour earlier than normal! 😊 We're off again next weekend but then back into the usual 2 gigs a weekend after that.

Totally with you on that front, it's great flying by the seat of your pants sometimes. I hate it when songs take weeks and weeks to get right in rehearsals. On another note, I've been off the road for three weeks now due to band member holidays and these posts are keeping me going. Keep it up everyone!

I recently bought a Cort B5 which I'm loving but I don't like the look of the control knobs. I quite like the domed knobs that are fitted to the Ibanez SR basses but not sure if they'd fit the Cort. Has anyone ever exchanged knobs before and are they all standard opening sizes?

We played in Sunderland city centre last night. Parking was actually OK(right out the back). Not really the venue for us, DJ was playing 80s music while where were setting up. It was actually much louder than we were, so much so that I had to wear my earplugs while we were setting up. Wasn't too bad in the end after the DJ had gone and we went on but I sometimes wonder why these places put bands on when the 80s stuff seemed to have more punters in than we did playing classic rock. Looking forward to a couple of weeks off now after three weeks of back to back weekend gigs.

I'm guessing you played at Trillians Bar. I've never played there but have been in the audience there a few times(without a car). The last thing you want is a traffic fine after a long drive from Yorkshire, petrol money and probably not a great fee. Hope the gig was good at least...

We play in Newcastle occasionally and it's always a nightmare getting parked with the lack of parking spaces, bus lanes and one-way streets. If you can't find a space near the pub then you have to literally drive out of the city centre and come right around the ring road and back in again to another car car park. Such a shame because the city centre gigs can be really good. The other thing that amazes me is that the car parking spaces in the city are always full on an evening and are still full when we leave after 12am. And these drivers aren't drinking alcohol?...

Up in the North-East, Sunday afternoon gigs are becoming the new Friday night for some reason. Doesn't work for me unfortunately as I have kids so I have to knock them back. I think generally the audience numbers have been dropping up here since the early 90s when I first starting gigging. Back then pubs were normally pretty full every weekend and there were a lot more Thursday night gigs too. Tribute bands, 80s bands and function bands still seem to do quite well though. Maybe it's just that people are a bit fed up with the classic rock that my band is doing. Funnily enough, I suggested to the band at the gig last night that we do a side project next year, playing stuff a bit less heavy. Didn't go down too well with the guitarists...🤣 Anyway, my gig last night. A lovely purpose built performance venue in Northumberland called Platform 1. Great in-house PA and lights and a proper stage! We had to mix our own sound but we use a Soundcraft ui16 with ipad mixers normally so just connected into their speakers(4 bass bins/4 tops and 3 monitors) and it was fine. The room was very live sounding but a great audience and no heavy lifting for a change.