Etienne

Hello everyone! A BC'er known as Sparky told me about this place... I'd been lurking around here for a few months before deciding it was a cool place to hang out! I'm 31, and have been playing bass for 15 years now, but I've been hooked on the instrument for much longer! I still remember buying my first bass back in April '94 (a 10th-hand 'Grant' Jazz Bass copy with stupidly high action!) with £90 that I'd scraped together doing chores for the old man- he was nice enough to buy me an amp to go with it though! I always remember the drive home from the music shop afterwards, mainly because I first heard the news of Kurt Cobain's death on our car's radio that afternoon... I'm basically self-taught, but I've had some great mentors along the way- the very first was Sting, courtesy of a Police greatest hits CD I got for my 15th birthday! The following are all dudes as well in my book (In no particular order & by no means exclusive!)... Willie Weeks, Bruce Thomas, Bedders, Mick Quinn, John Paul Jones, James Jamerson, Rick Danko, Timmy C, Dirk Lance, Ben Kenney, John Entwistle, J.J. Burnel, George Porter Jr, Bob Babbitt, Larry Graham, Stuart Zender, Mani, John Deacon, Mark White, Robert DeLeo, etc, etc... As you can tell, my tastes are pretty eclectic! The most recent player to leave a lasting impression on me was Justin Chancellor of Tool, who is just a brilliantly creative player! I mainly play using my self-taught fingers-and-thumb picking technique (with all its quirks), but a few years ago I really got into using a pick as well (thanks in no small part to Mr Chancellor)- now I use whatever works best for the music I'm playing! I've been playing in bands more or less constantly since I joined my first one back in school, and I'm still enjoying it! I've been based up here in Liverpool for 10 years now, and in that time have played with a lot of cool people. My previous band, Xander and the Peace Pirates, were fortunate enough to do some great gigs, which included supporting blues artist Eric Bibb on the first night of his UK tour, and also opening for the legend that is Buddy Guy, both at the nearby Philharmonic Hall. Needless to say, both were amazing evenings! I also regularly dep for a couple of my good bassist mates (playing in their function/bar bands), and do the odd bit of session playing & recording too. Most recently I've played a couple of gigs apiece for two local legends of the 80's scene- Pete Wylie (Mighty Wah!) and Ian McNabb (Icicle Works), which were all pretty fun, though somewhat chaotic at times, shall we say! However, one still has to make a proper living in between, so I work as the delivery driver for an independant coffee shop/catering company in the city centre... Tonewise, I'm always experimenting, but always seem to gravitate back towards the big and round old-school Fender/Ampeg vibe. However, as I live in a 2nd-floor flat, an SVT and 8x10 is just [i]not[/i] happening! My rig is a Gallien-Krueger 1001RB-II head and two Barefaced Compacts. I also regularly use either a Sadowsky preamp or a Tech 21 Bass Driver DI to fatten my sound up, depending on the gig. I've been through a fair few basses over the years (though not as many as some of you lot!)- at some point I'll post a list of them all in here. However, I seem to have pretty much settled on these for what I do: - [b]Fender US/Japan hybrid Stack-Knob Jazz Bass[/b] (80's Japanese Oly White body, USA 62RI R/W neck, Nordstrand NJ4s, CTS pots, Series/Parallel switch, copper-shielded/star-grounded, Ernie Ball rounds) - [b]1983 Squier JV '57 Precision Bass[/b] (Oly White, Maple neck, Nordstrand NP4, CTS pots, copper-shielded/star-grounded, D'addario flats) - [b]Yamaha BB414- Defretted[/b] (Black Pearl, R/W neck, PJ pickups, CTS pots, high-mass bridge) Nice to meet you all! Etienne