uk_lefty

14 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

 

Following house and house influenced records were all number 1 in the UK charts in the 80s. 

 

Jack Your Body by Steve "Silk" Hurley

Pump Up The Volume by MARRS

Theme From S'Express by S'Express

Doctorin' The Tardis by The Timelords

The Only Way Is Up by Yazz

Back To Life by Soul II Soul

 

And there were plenty more that made the top 20. Hardly niche.

Fair point 

14 hours ago, ProjeKtWEREWOLF said:

Does anyone have experience of the 5 string version? 

 

I have a v5 4 string, and love it, but I need another 5! 

Yes! I had the V7 and the old V9. Excellent, excellent basses. I preferred the V7 with the maple board over the V9 with ebony. The V7 was really good for having a 'controlled' sound when your dynamics change... I mean, if you pop the string you got a good sound that didn't give a massive volume spike. Such good basses, I'd take another one any time. 

3 hours ago, BigRedX said:

 

"The 80s" is a very broad church ranging from "New Romantic" and synth-pop via jangly guitar bands all the way through to acid house. Of course most people tend to forget about anything post 1985 unless the band had already had hits before then.

 

The problem I have with bands like the one in the clip above is that for me music in the 80s was as much about the image of the artists as it was about the songs. If the music is going to be performed by a bunch of beardy old blokes in crap shirts then it doesn't matter how well they have nailed the sound, the audience would be better off someone playing the records.

 

I hope the OP is taking note...

Certainly!!! We will have a broad set list but it's not going to go crazy, so no obscure b-sides for the beard-strokers, it's all got to be big hits that people will sing along to, no off-kilter genres like acid house... No disrespect to acid house of course, but it's quite niche compared to Whitney Houston and Bruce Springsteen.

As for the image, the first question I got back from the guitarist when I messaged him about the band was "can we dress like Miami Vice?" The answer was a massive YES! I asked the sax/ keys guy if he would be up for dressing the part too and his response was "I can go to 80s theme nights wearing my ordinary clothes, I just roll the sleeves of my blazer up" said in a knowing tone that inferred he is very much 80s style in his ordinary clothes. 

***£225*** apologies, these are cheaper now than they used to be, so price is corrected.

A bit of a feeler, looking for a quick sale if possible. I'll probably regret this, but I have two multi FX pedals and the other covers guitar too so this is up for grabs. 

Great pedal, really well looked after. I have all the original box and paperwork, and I have the Bluetooth adapter which costs about another £40 that I will include in the sale. UK PSU included too. 

All yours for £250 either collect near St Albans or I can post in the UK, call it £5 postage to a BC member but I'll send it parcelforce 48hrs so it's insured and trackable.

So I thought it would be interesting (decide for yourself how interesting!) to document the setup of a new band... Read on if you want to, or don't if you don't. 

I've always wanted to have an 80s covers band. Ideally I would be the lead singer and bassist, alas my vocal chops just aren't there. I tried once in the past to set up a band using people found on joinmyband and other sources and it wasn't a great experience but a valuable one. 

Earlier this year my main band, a 2000s covers band, had a hiatus and the drummer and I cooked up a scheme to do something as a side project. This is one of the big lessons I learned a few years back: work with at least one person you already know! Well, that makes bass and drums... I contacted a guitarist I was in a band with four or five years back, I love his style and attitude and we have remained friends loosely keeping in touch, he was excited to join in. 

In the middle of August we met up with a handful of songs to bash through. I found it a real struggle to sing and play, my voice was knackered at the end of it, but we agreed we had something that worked and if we had a singer and ideally a keys or sax player we could really have something worth progressing. 

I got too excited and advertised for a singer much earlier than I had wanted to. I got a handful of responses: a guy aged 28 who sings modern metal, a classic rock vocalist in a covers band id heard of, a female singer who recently left an indie band, and a lady who only wants to do backing vox as she doesn't want to fully commit. I have not yet met the singers, we want to get the songs tight first. But we have rejected two of them already! Now, the lost of songs we are working on is a handful of "male" songs and two "female" songs. The classic rock singer contacted me to say words to the effect: "you do realise that Holding Out for a Hero is written for a girl??? You know it's about a Man???" That told me all I needed to know about this person. Didn't say "hey I might tweak the words" which I'm happy with, just basically came across a bit old fashioned and hinted he could be difficult to work with. Luckily, the recordings of heard of his vocals weren't great so I was comfortable saying we had better fit singers already. Also, he didn't notice, or at least raise, that "I wanna dance with somebody" is also a female perspective song. I have no issue if a man or woman wants to change the gender perspective of a song, or keep it. But we had not at this point said we want a male singer, or we want a female singer. We just wanted a good singer and to do good songs, so we have a mix.

Anyways, onwards and upwards. In the meantime we wanted to get the songs tight but also I kept hearing sax in a lot of the great songs of the decade so I advertised for a sax player. I got a great response from a guy local to where we rehearse who plays sax and keys. I sent him the long-list of possible songs and five mins later got a reply of "f me that's my childhood!" And I just knew he would do for us.

This week we met up again and invited our sax and keys player. We also had a friend come along to sing so I could concentrate on bass and arrangements. Magic happened. We did two or three runs through of each song, had a ten minute break for a chat. We instantly bonded with our new multi-instrumentalist: a decent person, a proper musician, and he LOVES the genre. There are still  details to work out such as better transition to solos, proper endings of all these fade out songs, but we were really solid and the keys and or sax just really added something. It felt special.

We will meet again in a few weeks' time, now with a handful more songs that really prominently feature the sax. Our best candidate for singer isn't available until mid October so hopefully we can be really tight by then and ready for him. 

I'm getting quite excited about this side project! Playing with a drummer and guitarist I know really helps, and striking gold with a chap who plays sax and keys is just sheer good fortune. 

More to come soon....

My local rehearsal spot has some kind of TC amp in there. I hate it. It's underpowered and it either goes "booooom" with indistinct bass or it disappears. I wouldn't buy one, but I am aware there is brand heritage that is sadly not being lived up to.

Now on eBay, £10 starting bid, no reserve.

It's a nice looking bass, far nicer than that weird Ric-a-like thing they brought out. I just couldn't read all that dross though, just give us a table of the specs like body woods etc. and leave us to it.

Venue:

Played at the George III in Hoddesdon for their annual music festival on Saturday night. Heard some really good bands over on their second stage, then took to the main stage ourselves before the headline act. 

Gear:

Played my Stingray through my Boss ME-80B and there was a Fender Rumble 500 provided. I put the Rumble on the "bright" setting with the EQ all centred hoping that would give me the most transparent sound, then used the amp Sims on my Boss unit. I occasionally used some fuzz or distortion but the rig absolutely sang. I was really pleased with the sound considering it was plug n play and I haven't used a Rumble before, also amp SIMs on pedals can often clash with Amps... 

Set:

We jumped straight in with "I bet you look good on the dancefloor" and kept the feel of each song being a 'finisher' throughout. It's a great place to play because you've got a clientele who love their live music and will sing and dance along to everything. No gig photos available yet but I did manage this snap...

BC end of school summer holidays offer: £800 plus postage. You know you want to. I found the receipt for the repair works carried out professionally for the previous owner. Seems someone over tightened the truss rod, the receipt details the repair. 

If you've got something interesting to offer in trade I could be persuaded.

Returned to stock except the bell plate and wiring. £120

Original bridge, knobs and pickup cover back on.  

I need to be able to get on with people I'm in a band with. We need to be able to have sensible discussions and some give and take on all sorts of things like song arrangements, gig bookings, and which hotels to stay in, etc. I can get on with people who have different mainstream political views, that's what democracy is all about I think, but prejudices just switch me off. 

Incidentally for a new project I'm starting up with my drummer and an old band mate we had an email this morning from a singer we wanted to audition. He seemed to be against singing a great song because it was originally for a female vocal and about a man, lots of unnecessary punctuation. Just made him seem very insecure, I haven't bothered responding because I don't think it's worth telling a grown man he need not worry himself, or he can change the words. The tone of the message just screamed that he's not someone I want to spend my time with, let alone have to have discussions with that may involve persuasion and compromise on each side. 

On 31/08/2025 at 10:58, Mickeyboro said:

My band has been around for three and a half years.

 

We could like to play blues clubs and/or festivals as well as the local venues we’ve found suit us - pubs and social clubs seem not to work so well.

 

So my question is - what do these more specialist venues/events require? Original material rather than classic blues? A following to boost their attendees? A commercial recording?
 

How can we take the next step? I’m sure many here have made the journey, and I’d value your thoughts. 
 

Thanks

My band is very different but we spoke to a promoter we know about how we get more specialist music venue gigs. He gave us lots of advice but the main thing was good social media. You need to have a good social media presence with photos, videos from gigs, regular engagement so you keep onto your followers. Our guitarist knows this stuff well and does a good job of it, though I'm sure there are people out there far more proactive. Studio recordings aren't as good as a decent live recording because a live recording shows what the venue actually gets... We paid about £600 to have someone video us live at a big gig, make a pro video for us, and laid over audio from a gig we recorded off the desk. It looks fancy and it shows our singer working a big crowd and the audio is unmistakably not the original.

Then there's the slog of contacting all the venues to get absolutely no reply at all. If anyone knows how to break through that wall I'm all ears too!

10 hours ago, kevham said:

That's not the one I sold you is it?

Looks lovely anyway.

 

No that was the butterscotch one with a tort guard which went to @Bonin-in-the boneyard. This one is olympic white, black guard. Lovely, lovely bass but I already have a US Jazz and I need to cut down.

On 01/09/2025 at 15:45, Dad3353 said:

As to a 'speciality' : may I suggest that we see a lot of folk disappointed that 'such and such' a model is not available in 'lefty' format. Maybe it could be an option to 'clone' a 'righty' bass into a lefty version, if a lefty player said what he/she would be interested in..? Just an idea.

It's a good idea but in the last fifteen to twenty years we have been better looked after, with Fender doing a Mexican P bass and Sire doing everything! 

There have been a few sellers I've noticed that do this kind of thing. There was one on eBay doing nice Fender shaped stuff but they were having around a long time before selling, there's also someone in Japan who bolts together unique basses made from the usable bits of old knackered ones. Thing is it's a gamble buying one of these. So I guess if you're looking for the USP in selling bitsas for me it would be the personal touch in design consultation and instrument handover that would make the sale, rather than seeing a nice picture online. I built a fantastic looking PJ bass bitsa myself with good quality bits but it just didn't ever feel right to me, so you're playing it down by saying it's just screwing some bits together, that all important finishing and set up is the real value! 

Loving the Ibanezes (Ibani, Ibaneziz.. ) and the twelve stringer. 

The original Fender Katana bass was pretty weird.  This is a nice talking point but I don't think I will ever see one anywhere.

48 minutes ago, Obrienp said:

G4M have just knocked a few quid off it and they have sunburst lefties in stock. 

Stop it!

Here's something with potential... 

I suspect this was a kit bass, I acquired it second hand and it was in a bit of a state. Work I have done:

Vinyl wrapping with carbon fibre effect wrap;

Fingerboard treatment - it actually looks pretty nice now;

Copper taping to shield the insides;

Very thorough cleaning of all parts.

This was a project I decided to do but ran out of steam. Note this was probably a kit bass so you're not buying Fender US quality, and the vinyl wrapping has some rough parts, being my first attempt at ever doing this. As well as the body in the photo the buyer gets:

Squier PJ pickups;

Harley Benton jazz bass wiring loom;

The bridge on the bass right now AND individual bridge pieces in black;

Strap pins;

More vinyl wrap;

Control cover for the back of the bass 

Local pickup always best but will happily remove the neck to ship within the UK.

Any questions, go ahead! 

I really like the look of these!

4 hours ago, kwmlondon said:

It'd be interesting. I'm not exactly in a rush.

 

My ideal situation would be giving it to one of my friends kids who is an aspiring bassist and seeing them play it when they do a set at Glastonbury! We can all have fantasies...

You could give them it as a loan with no end date, provided they keep it in good condition, don't swap parts, keep it well set up etc. Then when it's worth ten grand take it back and sell it.

I've only ever picked up Sandbergs to have a quick noodle and it's hard to describe but you can just feel the quality. Great basses, glad you've got a way to work around the back issues too, Loz, hope this keeps you doing what you love.

1 hour ago, Papabull said:

Is this taboo. Asking for friend. Be as opinionated as you want and tell it as you see (hear) it.

Nope. I like flats on a jazz bass. Currently have La Bella flats on my Japanese jazz and it sounds great.

4 hours ago, Bassbooksbikes said:

Why? 

Pardon my ignorance, I'm a newby, so are 62 reissues not that good? 

@BlueMoon beat me to it. They are very good basses, they're just a lot easier to get hold of than some of the other models. 

I forgot to mention I've got La Bella flats on it at the moment which are not at all cheap...