musophilr

[quote name='steve-soar' timestamp='1346841944' post='1793841'] 11 pages of some people saying tribute bands are ok and others disagreeing, is enough to send anyone round the twist. [/quote] So read a different thread then

IMO you should listen for the mix you want then reduce the FOH faders if your meter tells you that you run the risk of hurting peoples' ears (or contravening regulations). For example, I've noticed when mixing tracks at home that measured amplitude tells you very little - an electric guitar solo can still sound too loud and not sit nicely in the mix even when the bar meters for its channel are several dB lower than the other instruments: if I were mixing just by looking at the bar meters I'd get it hopelessly wrong.

I think that for playing live you need one basic good sound that allows your part to be heard without splatting over other peoples' parts. What sound that is might depend on your style of music (you probably need a more toppy sound for funk & slap than you do for dub reggae), and on how the band sounds in the venue you're playing in. The only limit in the studio is how much time you can pay for.

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1346600054' post='1791033'] The point is that sounding [i]good[/i] isn't the point. In rock and roll the performance is the point. [/quote] How so? How can the performance be good if the playing/singing/songwriting are sh*te? There's sh*te music that can be performed with technical accuracy and a lot of that sold in the pop charts, mainly to the undiscerning. Then there's sh*te performances (you see those on Saturday night tv sometimes) of material which may or may not be sh*te, but either way you wouldn't want to listen to it.

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1346575875' post='1790618'] You haven't got the point of rock and roll, have you? [/quote] There's lots of good guitarists who can write songs and sing well, all within the genre you might call "rock'n'roll". I know who I would prefer to listen to. I suspect you may be confusing punk with rock'n'roll.

His arse is as bad as his bass playing is good. His cross-dressing is vaguely amusing but wouldn't it be nice if he found something worthwhile to do with his talent?

Of the "tributes" posted so far: Michael Jackson - cringeworthy Final Countdown - dreadful Neil Young - at least the playing was together and in tune, but may I ask WHY? Neil Young is a competent lyricist and has been known to write some good tunes, but he is a dreadful guitarist and his singing isn't much better. To re-interpret his songs and do them your own way would make much more sense. Bob Dylan is also a dreadful guitarist who can't sing but he's a good songwriter, so look at what Jimi Hendrix made of various Dylan songs - he did them his way and improved them beyond belief.

[quote name='alyctes' timestamp='1346460060' post='1789637'] (a ) if there's any songwriter credit to be had, insist on it. That way, their treachery will be rewarded forever (b ) bunch of losers, you're better off without them. [/quote] ^ This. If that's the best excuse they can give for getting rid of you, then you're best rid of them! As for getting signed - that's just the start of their worries. They'll be owing the record company for a long time, the record company at its whim could fail to promote them and while they're under contract they won't be able to work for anyone else. Think of it as a lucky escape. Musicians who did well despite being overweight: Leslie West (guitarist). IIRC Dill Katz (bass) wasn't a lightweight either. Adele is well overweight but still selling records.

[quote name='Delberthot' timestamp='1346356910' post='1788363'] None other than Eric Clapton in 1988 as a spotty 13 year old. [/quote] I think Eric would have been a spotty 13 year old in 1950-something. Not sure I can remember my first gig but we saw several bands in the town hall during the early 70s. In particular Camel (original line up on the Snow Goose tour) was most memorable, but also Stackridge. When I was in the 4th year at school some lads in the 6th form organised to get Jonathan Kelly (with Gasworks as support) to play in the main hall at the school. I think that must have been the first time I went to anything that wasn't a classical concert.

I know the keys player I'd like in my prog rock band - he's very very good, nice bloke, likes all the right kind of music but he's too busy earning better money than he could get for playing with me. I play guitar in the function band I'm in, and keys on a few numbers. I think keys fills out the sound a lot, and the songs where I use them would sound very empty without. There's a lot of songs we do that would benefit from the addition of keys, but the other guitarist and the rhythm section they seem to tune them out when listening to the originals, they hear the guitar bass & drum parts and are sometimes surprised when I tell them there's keys in there as well.

[quote name='Doddy' timestamp='1346275674' post='1787499'] 6 hour rehearsals and only 1 gig in a year? I'd have left a long time ago. [/quote] ^ This ^

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1345983268' post='1783756'] The drummer is far more entertaining than the guitarist who can't even be bothered to replicate the very distinctive tones of some of the tracks the band are covering. [/quote] You can't expect a strat to sound like Pearly Gates. He could at least have taken an LP to the gig with him. He was slightly dragging the last few bars because he was trying to rake the pick and began the rake on the beat which made the leading edge of his note at the top of the rake late. To get that right in this context you have to rake in front of the beat so that the leading edge of the note at the top of the rake appears on the beat. I prefer to leave rakes to music where it adds to the effect if the note at the top comes in after the beat. In this song, it detracts.

[quote name='lojo' timestamp='1346050735' post='1784381'] Custom shop & special edition labels are almost as misleading as the name Jazz Bass [/quote] But at least we know what a Jazz Bass is. Those other labels could mean anything (and usually, nothing)

Our drummer hates our version of Hot Stuff - I play the guitar part as if Ritchie Blackmore had written it but I must confess my playing has been a bit scrappy on the first few attempts, so that may partially explain it, but now I've tightened it up a bit the rest of the band quite like it. He also says our version of Breathless (Corrs, not Camel) sounds sh*t, whereas I just think it sounds like us playing a song we're not used to playing very much. Other songs we have agreed are giving us too much hassle to get right but we still like them and think they're worth doing so they're on the back burner while we put a couple of sets together that we can start gigging with.

Payment with booking, no reschedule or cancellation within 48 hours of lesson. That makes 'em take it a bit more seriously. I've had people "waste" my time by not learning, not practicing, but all of them have given up eventually. I've not had to tell anyone to quit, and them that have quit, I have known for some time beforehand that they would do so. To my knowledge nobody has quit and then said it was because I couldn't teach them (or if they did, I've not heard about it).

A mate has a Warwick RockBass, which sounds good through my Selmer T'n'B 50 coupled to an old Marshall 4x15 cab thats had 2 drivers replaced on a new baffle with Celestion 10" BG80s. That's when he played it at my place. His own rig is Ashdown: a 1x15 cab with a 2x12, and a tiny little Class D box that says MIB on it. His rig sounds good too. Class D is said by some to be more valve-ish, I'm not entirely sure that extends to how the circuit behaves under overload/clipping conditions, but what I've heard of this MIB jobby is a good clean & warm bass sound with the right amount of punch in it. I think I'd buy into or at least investigate seriously Class D on the strength of that if I were in the market for a new bass rig.

I believe it is customary to use heavier guage strings with a higher action for slide guitar, although light strings and low action never seemed to bother Ritchie Blackmore when he used a slide.

My #1 bass lives in its hard case, stood up against the wall. My #2 bass lives in a gig bag, stood up against the hard case that the #1 bass lives in. Next to them are various guitars in hard cases & gig bags, but all stood on end. Elsewhere more various guitars all in hard cases sit on the floor with their hinged sides downwards and the handles upwards. I need more room (bigger house) ...

[quote name='Evil Undead' timestamp='1344966861' post='1771788'] I know. I've also found another two errors. FFS - I'm trying to learn this stuff and having a chord chart that's full of sh*t isn't helping [/quote] Why not go with the music theory instead of pictures? You can work out your own fingerings

[quote name='bremen' timestamp='1344931852' post='1771119'] Showing off in a music shop...that's about it. [/quote]

[quote name='Lozz196' timestamp='1344883548' post='1770654'] Having worked with two singers who were, shall we say, difficult people, I`ll never work with their like again. Life is too short, and music is my hobby, so I won`t spend my life/hobby with people who detract from it. [/quote] Yay, an instrumental band Play off the backline, don't bother carrying a PA around

I have never been in a situation where scooping the bass sound has been a good idea, although there may be some such situations outside of my experience ...

[quote name='BassBunny' timestamp='1344853680' post='1769997'] what works for me is "More Mids". I find that mids are your friend in this situation as they help the bass sound carry and cut through. [/quote] ^ This ^ It constantly amazes me that people think the answer to not hearing the bass is "more bass". What defines the note - its pitch and its leading edge - is the mids. Natch the bass content is good to have, but without mids all you have is ... vlumpff - some nasty woolly muddy flubby kind of vlumpff that defines absolutely nothing.

I was playing guitar with another guitarist, at the opening ceremony for his art exhibition. He had a pointy Ibanez thing with a Zoom floormounted FX box into a Marshall Valvestate 8080, and I played my Yamaha SA2200 straight into my Harley-Benton GA5. The contrast of the solid guitar with various FX was nice with the mellow jazzy/bluesy sound of the semi into a low powered amplifier running a single EL84 in Class A. We had a small number of instrumental pieces prepared and we also did a little jamming. The people who came to see the pictures liked the music too We didn't play all night, so when I got back to my village there was still time for a pint or two in my local

[quote name='Dave Vader' timestamp='1344734102' post='1768660'] I vote for playing bass making me a better bassist, but to be fair it's playing music that makes me a better musician. I have played guitar for 40 years, and dabbled here and there on bass and keys mostly up until about 5 years ago, when I started to get more serious about recording my own music. I have always tried to play bass properly and not like a guitarist. Made me figure out that less is more, and not to twiddle about like a tit all over everything (though a good bass fill to go with those high twiddly guitar notes and squealy feedback is never wrong ) Wasn't so much being a guitarist that helped my bass playing, more the fact that I know basic music stuff like what notes go in what chord, scales etc. etc. once you know that it's all just about mechanics. [/quote] ^ wot he said, with edits as per my own experience