jonsmith

[quote name='throwoff' timestamp='1363259341' post='2010515'] It is not counterfeit. Noone is selling this as a Ric. Eventually someone will take it to court with J Hall and win, same as when Gibson started their insane war on PRS singlecuts a few years ago. [/quote] One of the main reasons Gibson lost that case was because - unlike Rickenbacker - they could not demonstrate that they had taken reasonable steps to protect their design in the past, on account of the huge amount of unchallenged LP copies. That's actually the reason that Rickenbacker pursue this so ruthlessly. It's not the photo or the wording in the adverts that infringes on a protected design, but the actual item for sale. I'm surprised that a company trying to protect its own designs provokes such a negative response, but there you go.

I haven't tried myself, but I'm told delivery of these is restricted to North America.

Sorted!

[quote name='Dr.Dave' timestamp='1362312878' post='1998167'] The Owl - Rodley (outskirts of Leeds) £3.10 a pint - thieving ***** - so it was sh*t for that reason and I'll never go back. [/quote] That would be the cheapest pint in town around here! Played two slots at a fund raising event yesterday. The first was with the ex-singer of one of my bands. She hadn't given much indication of what we might be playing & managed to include no fewer than 4 songs that I had no idea might be coming up & had never played before. I know some people can cope with that sort of thing, but I like to at least have had a run through first! Second slot was with an originals band that I auditioned for on Tuesday. So 10 songs (9 originals & one cover I'd never heard of before Tuesday) to get through. Six of them were at least on the internet in some form or other, so I was OK with the latter half of the set and had a thoroughly good time by the end of it. All in all, it was a really enjoyable day, with some great musicians playing throughout the event. Exhausted today though!

Hmm, I can understand a certain nervousness on the part of the auditionee, but to the point where you actually pull out of the audition? Then why bother contacting bands or advertising your services in the first place? If you can't make that leap, then you're probably not ready to gig anyway. Where possible, we've met prospective candidates in the pub, but once you've got a few people on the go, it can turn into endless pub meetings, which isn't really practical (although I'd have a good go at it!). We've certainly spoken to all serious candidates on the phone & they will be aware that we're pleasant & straightforward people. Trying someone tonight - fingers crossed!

[color=#000000][font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]Rock Candy are seeking a new drummer. We're a female fronted band based in and around Thanet. We play rock covers and rocked up versions of some pop songs, so our repertoire takes in the likes of Led Zeppelin, The Cult, Radiohead, Pink, Neil Young, Supergrass, Radiohead, Wolfmother, Rolling Stones, Hole, Free, etc. A bit of a mixture, but all with our own style... [/size][/font][/color] [color=#000000][font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]We're sort of past the stage of expecting to have a full time career in music, but we enjoy playing and are committed to providing quality performances. We're looking for someone with similar expectations, who wants to have fun and get out and play a few gigs. We rehearse regularly and once we have the right person on board we are looking to get back to playing live 1-2 times per month. We're in our 30s - 50s, although age and gender are immaterial - we just need someone who can learn the material & keep good time. [/size][/font][/color] [color=#000000][font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]If this sounds like your thing, or you know someone who might fit the bill, please get in touch.[/size][/font][/color]

Trying to find a drummer at the moment & getting thoroughly fed up with it... So far we have had the following: 1) Liked the songs on our website & the philosophy of the band, but didn't think we were right from him when we asked him to learn 5 of these songs for an audition. 2) Really good drummer who was also a really nice bloke - auditioned but decided to rejoin his old band. 3) Guy who actually didn't seem to know where he lived, as when we answered his ad looking for a band, he announced that he lived in a town quite some distance from where his ad said he was based. 4) A 13 year old girl (we are in our 40s & 50s). 5) Someone who didn't realise how busy they were and should never have advertised that they were looking for a band. 6) Someone who didn't realise how far away we were despite our location being in our ad. 7) Someone who got in touch because they loved the idea of drumming for us and liked what we did, but cancelled the audition because they had personal circumstances that prevented them from joining a band. There were more, but you get the idea I'm sure. How hard can it be?

Hmm, my RH450 is well out of warranty, but I'm of the opinion that this is a known issue and so should be remedied without cost to me anyway. Anyone managed to get this fixed out of warranty, without charge?

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1361532395' post='1986999'] [/size] I suspect Bert was having a little joke with us. [/quote] That did cross my mind.

[quote name='BassTractor' timestamp='1361488179' post='1986636'] Dunno how to advise. My head is always emitting band names. Other than that, that same head gets [s]inspiration[/s] copy craving from ... er ... everything. Like: See a funny roadsign? --> band name! . . "The North / Hatfield" just waits to be used for a band name one day. Watch and see! best, bert [/quote] Like these guys: [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatfield_and_the_North"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatfield_and_the_North[/url]

[quote name='leftyhook' timestamp='1361399397' post='1985537'] yeah but it's a replica.... [/quote] Yes, but Chris Squire himself plays a replica made by the same people.

I'm struggling to resist one of these at the moment. Really struggling...

If it was previously fine with an E string there, this may not help, but might be worth trying the bridge pickup capacitor bypass trick. I did this on all my older Ricks & it resulted in a significant amount of extra low end. [url="http://www.joeysbassnotes.com/Rick_maint.htm#cmod"]http://www.joeysbass..._maint.htm#cmod[/url] (Link to the rather useful Joey's Bass Notes) You can quickly test this by just looping a wire round the same connections as the capacitor and see if it gives you what you're missing, before getting the soldering iron out. EDIT: Just seen that the wiring diagrams have been removed from that site. Give me a shout if you can't figure out which cap it is and I'll post a photo of what I did. Good guide for adjusting Rick truss rods on the site too, including tips to avoid the fingerboard lift that bertbass experienced. Older Rick necks need a lot of care when adjusting.

Have a great one tonight!

Arrived at the venue to find that one of our guitarists/vocalists had broken his finger and couldn't play, so didn't brave the snow to lend just his vocal talents. Then the drummer realised that he had left the mixing desk at home, meaning he had to rush off to get it and stress levels were pretty high all round by the time he returned. A quick rejig of vocal responsibilities while we were plugging cables in and we were ready to go. Blizzard conditions meant that there were less people out and about than usual, but by the time we got going we had a reasonable crowd, all things considered. Four bars into the first song and the power to my amp shuts off due to a noise limiter. By now I'm feeling pretty frazzled, but despite everything the audience seemed to really like it and we finished up feeling quite pleased to have got through it all with happy punters.

There was a discussion on RRF about whether the bass in the first part of the clip is 'the bass' prior to its cream refinish. There is also some sign that this might be after the first headstock injury (of which there are accounts that say the very first break was in 1970 by the way, with a further break around 1974), as it looks like CS is using a capo to maintain an angle behind the nut. You can see this at the 5 minute point. Squire said that the bass was still usable after the first break as there was no headstock movement once the bass was strung.

Always liked Andy Rourke's basslines to listen to & enjoyed playing along to the Meat is Murder album when it came out. Just been asked to do This Charming Man with one of my bands and I appreciate the bass part even more now I'm actually playing it.

[quote name='KevB' timestamp='1358780641' post='1944838'] I've been listening to Yes 'Time & A Word' album in the car. That's a bass cutting through the mix that is... [/quote] Apparently some of that album was mixed on crappy headphones, where the engineer kept saying "turn the bass up, it needs more bass", thus contributing to what Chris Squire called his 'personal success'. Mind you, I think CS was always going to cut through the mix (and it's the right sound for Yes too).

Yes, despite having appeared on TV at the height of The Police's success explaining how reggae drumming is structured differently to rock drumming and how he incorporated those elements into Police songs. "[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif][size=3]U2 were not musicians"[/size][/font][/color] I think Bono was talking nonsense (for a change!) when he said that. Larry Mullen had been playing drums in marching bands before U2, so he definitely had some musical experience and I don't think the others had been living at the bottom of a peat bog isolated from the real world before U2 existed. I'd agree AC's bass parts aren't always the most exciting, but what he does is absolutely perfect for U2. As a bass player in a rock band, choosing to play an appropriate part is just as valid a skill as any fancy technique in my book (and one that I wish I could employ a bit better myself sometimes). I gather he wasn't very confident about his playing for the first 3 or 4 albums, but he's done alright for himself really. Not my favourite band, but I wouldn't mind his job (or his money).

[quote name='Hobbayne' timestamp='1358722864' post='1944206'] The Beatles - When I,m 64 is speeded up on the mono version by a semitone for some reason. but in the original key for the stereo [/quote] Pedant alert... She's Leaving Home is the one that's sped up on the mono mix I think (as a result it's almost 10 seconds shorter). Stereo version of 64 seems very slightly sharper than the mono (and clocks in at 2 seconds less).

We had a great audience! Yes, some of them were rather 'merry', but we actually had less stage invasions than the last time we played that venue. I'd rather play in a venue full of people singing & dancing than one with scattered punters staring moodily into their beers (and yet I played prog for years ). Had a fantastic night and we all came away feeling rather chuffed with everything - not to mention we got paid a reasonable sum too.

Have to confess that we broke a rule and did play Mustang Sally as it was NYE and people wanted to hear it. Bit of a busk really, but the crowd loved it and sang along at the top of their voices, which actually made it quite enjoyable.

Playing at The Churchill Tavern in Ramsgate tonight with Rock Candy. It's our last gig with our incredible vocalist, who leaves us to go back to country stuff, so we're planning to give her a big send off. Fortunately we have an excellent replacement already lined up. Playing with a dep drummer tonight as our normal drummer wanted to be with his family, so it will be a bit more 'top of brain' than our usual performances, although I've done dozens of gigs with the dep before and he's been good in rehearsal for this gig, so I'm looking forward to it.

To answer the OP, the easiest one of mine to play for any length of time was the Steinberger Spirit. It's the lightest one I've played (believe it or not Budgetneil) & it's probably the easiest one to find. I've had a noodle on a Shergold doubleneck and it was also easy to play, but I preferred the bass neck on my Rickenbackers (I'd probably be in a minority here). I think the Shergold configuration (guitar at the top) is probably preferable to the official Rickenbacker configuration (as opposed to Mike Rutherford's Rickenbacker cut'n'shut). It's not a big difference but having the guitar on the bottom on the 4080 makes some chords a little more difficult (especially some of the early Genesis stuff). The Rickenbacker 12 string neck is rather narrow too, which makes things trickier when you have fat sausage fingers like mine, but I'm sure a person with normal fingers wouldn't notice this. Despite all this, I still think the 4080s are great and I spent a long time hunting mine down (especially the 4080/12 as these are extremely rare). They were perfect for the Rush stuff and had a pretty authentic sound for the early Genesis stuff too. To answer the other question I saw, 'do people need them?'. Well both in the Rush tribute and the prog tribute band I was in, there were parts of songs where a second guitar part was present and other parts of the same song where bass was required, so there was no time to change instruments. The bass pedals covered bass duties during my guitar moments, meaning I had to get pretty adept at tap dancing too. Have to say that after 90 minutes of solidly rehearsing Xanadu, I began to understand why Geddy Lee said he had no desire to ever use a doubleneck again. The weight really starts to get noticeable. I've no idea how Mike Rutherford managed to use his Shergold for whole concerts. [quote name='JohnFitzgerald' timestamp='1356724260' post='1913008'] One and the same Comedy Of Errors. Now having a resurgence with a second album due out in the spring. Have now done Summer's End with the band and have a couple of festivals booked for next spring too. [/quote] I saw Comedy of Errors a couple of times in the 80s, once with IQ at The Heathery in Wishaw and then a very short set at an event in a park somewhere in Glasgow (can't remember where, but Love & Money also played that day). A few years ago, someone sent me a recording of the IQ gig in Wishaw & I asked if they had taped the CofE set as well, but they hadn't. I remembered enjoying it (and my girlfriend at the time very definitely preferring it to IQ's set). This old IQ recording made me look to see if any Comedy of Errors material had been released on CD (I'm sure there was something on vinyl in the mid 80s), but I couldn't even see a mention of the band on the internet at the time. This was obviously before Disobey came out. Does any of the material date back to the old days? Nice to see the band back in existence and I will try to catch a show if you're ever down south.

A couple from history... Hasn't learnt or even acknowledged existence of new songs for tonight's rehearsal: "I have to read emails at work, I'm not going to read any when I'm not there!" Followed by an admission that he's booked a holiday that clashes with a gig we've had booked for months: "I have to use a diary at work, I'm not going to use one when I'm not there!" ...and then this, from a different drummer: "Where is everybody?" "We're in Sutton, the PA is all set up and the drum mics are on the floor awaiting your kit" "Aren't we playing in Hayes?" "Yes, we are, tomorrow night!" "Oh, I'm there now, thought it seemed a bit quiet."