urb

I added my noodle-some vids the other day - hope you like 'em! Cheers Mike

[quote name='dr.funk' post='490700' date='May 17 2009, 05:40 PM']Very nice, is that some scat singing I can here at 2:45?[/quote] Thanks and yes, I do tend to sing along with my playing (not all the time) it really helps to re-focus you on the beat and the melody too - works good for basslines as well I find Cheers Mike

[quote name='Simon' post='490164' date='May 16 2009, 09:34 PM']Nice work Mike! BFD really is quite awesome! Sometimes better than an actual real drummer! LOL[/quote] Thanks Si - and yes BFD really does kick ass - I had to upgrade my Mac's RAM to 4GB to really handle all the samples (as they are such high quality) but now it runs like a dream... and until I can pay Vinnie or Weckl it'll do for now! Cheers Mike

Hey Steve Been meaning to add a reply to this to say I completely understand and wish you all the very best, you'll be missed, but there's nothing like broadening your horizons and if that means relocating, as opposed to finding what you need closer to home... then so be it. You still own some of the nicest looking and sounding basses I've ever seen and shall alway be a true arbiter of taste, if you're planning a leaving drinks session, or just fancy a pint before you go drop me a line, I've always enjoyed our conversations... take care and keep it on the down low... Cheers matey Mike

[quote name='Simon' post='490083' date='May 16 2009, 07:56 PM']Randy is an awesome bass player for sure. One of my favourites. No idea what fretless he used though. Julian Crampton is an awesome player as well though, and did Incognito justice in filling Randy's shoes. thisnameistaken, listen to albums "100 and Rising", "who needs love", Life, Stranger than Fiction" to get you started. I have them all personally - but those are a few of my favourites.[/quote] I'm into my jazzy/funky house music too though I've never been a huge Incognito fan but this all sounds good, I'm a Masters At Work fan too as Gene Perez is one of THE all time great studio funkateers of the last ten years, I don't know much about him but he ca make the busiest line groove like crazy and he flies all over the place. My other recommendation for great, inspiring grooves, to jam along to is Bah Samba, a really cool Brazilian funk band from Brighton. I think they've gone a bit quiet at the moment but their singer is Alice Russell who has a truly sensational voice, she's a great solo artist too, one of my fave female singers ever in fact! The two Bah Samba albums to look out for are their first one simply called 'Bah Samba' and their fourth album 'Four', see what they did there! Thankully the music is much better than the album titles, 'Four' is a double album packed with a great version of Tania Maria's 'Portuguese Love' and even features the Fat Back Band, it's a killing record. Cheers Mike PS sorry got a bit carried away with the recommendations, I have no idea what fretless RHT uses, next time I'm at the Gallery I'll ask the guys there and see if they know as he;s a regular customer.

Yeah they might have been around for years but their new album 'New World' is their best in ten years or more, loads of great tunes, jazzy solos and killler funk lines from Andy and drummer Adam Betts is a monster too... I highly recommend the new album; it's like old school Jamiroquai, minus the annoying vocals and with balls! Mike

Hey... sorry for the repost (I acidentally set the vid to 'Private', durrrr) Anyway, a coulple of new vids using my looper running it into Logic with BFD providing some decent quality drums... I used my EBS BassIQ for the lead solo type bit and a couple of plugins for reverb and compression, hope you dig them: And I just added this one from the same session, trying out some more 'out' sounding harmonic ideas on this one: thanks for watching Mike

[quote name='dlloyd' post='489112' date='May 15 2009, 05:33 PM']I don't know if hype is the right word. I've certainly read good reviews of them and I like the look of them. Is there a reason I should avoid them?[/quote] I have Nordy Fatstacks on my Single cut Sei and wasn't dissapointed, and I've read good anecdotal reviews of the NSJ4 J pups by Nordy as well, those are going on my new Sei J bass... so I'll let you know if they sound any good, I know Mr Freak isn't really a fan but so far they've worked out just fine for me, and no "hype" was involved in my decision Mike

[quote name='urb' post='487877' date='May 14 2009, 01:39 PM']Breath in, and breath out, now relax.... M[/quote] Um I posted this because it's VW playing a gorgeous improvisation of The Beatles' 'Yesterday' - without a slapped note in sight the guy is an amazing musician first and a great bassist second - whether you like ALL of his musical output or not there's no denying the fact that he is one of the most accomplished and complete bassists on the planet. [b]Virtually every single debate about his playing I have ever seen on the web - and I must have seen DOZENS (if not HUNDREDS) of these kind of threads - always end up in two camps those that like/love what he does and those that don't. Quite frankly I am tired of them too - I've been a fan of Vic's since 1989 - I've met him and [url="http://www.munkio.com/music/victor_wooten.html"]interviewed[/url] him and hung out with him and for a man of such huge ability he remains the most unaffected and down to earth guy around... he could teach us all a thing or two about being humble-assed human beings and not getting above our station on this little planet..[/b]. Anyway I can't be arsed to say any more - I love this guy's playing - not everything he does moves me or excites me - but the biggest lesson you take from him is that he's not afraid to fail - and make mistakes - and that's something we should all get better at, regardless of our ability on the bass or any other instrument for that matter. Mike

Breath in, and breath out, now relax.... M

Lush bass!!! (as they say in the West Country) Nice one... one of my fave J bass designs ever - so playable too. M

He's also doing a double bill with Linley Marthe for 2 nights at [b]Charlie Wright's in Old Street/Hoxton on June 5th and 6th -[/b] they will both be with their own bands plus will have a big 'bass-off' jam at the end - should be great... see you there. M

I think a common misconception with slapping is that it needs to be done aggressively or with force, but if you check out Marchs Miller or Alain Caron they slap gently, really controlling each stroke, you might want to lower your action so there's more give in the strings. Also try and keep your hand in a rigid fist shape, thumb extended, and use your wrist and forearm for movement. Hope that helps M

[quote name='XB26354' post='485886' date='May 12 2009, 01:22 PM']Stick with is 51m0n, I have to say that playing a walking line through changes and making it swing is one of the most satisfying experiences I've ever had with bass... believe it or not I was exposed to jazz and actually liked (some of) it before I even played any instruments (Dad played, amongst other things, classical violin, keyboards and jazz guitar), so liking it made learning it easier! BBC4 reran some episodes from Jazz 625 and in one of them Stan Getz was playing with his quartet at the LSE in London in (I think) 1959. My girlfriend and I just stopped what we were doing and listened - the music was simply stated, very melodic and just beautiful to listen to. I wasn't even thinking "is this jazz?" or "what is he playing?", so like any other style of music jazz does have the power to touch the listener, even if it isn't in the mainstream or played on commercial radio.[/quote] +1 There's loads and loads of great advice here - I'll simply add that I found both Band In A Box and the Jamey Abersold playalongs really useful as one of the hardest things with getting into jazz is the constantly cycling changes - a tune like Solar, or Scrapple The Apple, played at a fast tempo is very hard to maintain a constant, driving bass line for over ten minutes. The good thing with BIAB is once you have programmed in the song/chord changes you can vary the tempo - so you can start slow and then get steadily faster - it's a great way to shed certain difficult sets of changes - you can stretch out and practice either basslines, solos or the melody. The Abersold ones are good too for giving you an authentic sounding backing track - but the tempos are fixed, so getting into stuff like Donna Lee etc (if you are just starting out) might seem a bit daunting. The other small nugget I'll add is try and think ahead the whole time - always anticipate the next chord and keep your lines simple - let the soloists do all the fancy stuff! [b]Hope that helps - the [url="http://www.jazzwise.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=753"]Charlie Parker playalong[/url] is really good [/b] Cheers Mike

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='482870' date='May 8 2009, 12:46 PM']There must be an update by now... surely...??[/quote] Soon come may brother, soon come...! As soon as the body is back from the polishers it'll be a matter of days for completion - but hey if it's finished in the next month or so that'll still be well within the 12 months of normal build time - I ordered it in September last year so any time in June or July will be great - and it's going to look sick! M

[quote name='dlloyd' post='484718' date='May 11 2009, 12:13 AM']That's great news Mike (and Big Red X) I'm thinking of getting a fairly basic jazz 4 with a few inexpensive tweaks, so it shouldn't be more than a £400 deposit (in theory!)[/quote] Definitely cool - the Sei Jazz's have recently been very much in demand and I have to say that Martin's take on the classic J is really lovely - Pino Palladino's new 33" scale 5 string modern 'P' bass is wicked - it has the same top wood as mine but an alder body and is strung E - C - I tried it very briefly last week and it's killing! Even if you opt for a basic Jazz I'm sure Mart could add some nice extra touches without it affecting the price too much. There's another J body drying in the shop at the moment (which they do when the customer wants a matte finish) and that's got an Ebony top on an ash body - will be luuurvly... Anyway feel free to drool over my J build page here - not long to go now - just waiting for the body tomcome back from the finishers and then it'll be a matter of days... [url="http://www.munkio.com/visions/seijazzbass.html"]http://www.munkio.com/visions/seijazzbass.html[/url] Cheers Mike

[quote name='BigRedX' post='484173' date='May 10 2009, 09:27 AM']Mine was £400 down at the start of the build and the rest on completion. The prices have gone up since then so the initial payment might be more now.[/quote] Same here but having ordered my Sei Jazz bass last september, after the price rise, and I still paid just £400 deposit. At one stage I offered to pay off the rest as I have the money but Martin said he'd rather wait till the bass is finished, which should be in about a month. If you want my advice... GO FOR IT! They are amazing basses and the build time and price are all worth it. Hope that helps Mike

While I apprciate some of you out there find jazz hard to get into or still find it inaccessible because it's generally percieved as being about 'clever' harmony and fast noodly soloing - as someone who writes about the UK jazz scene for a living - and I do so with the sole wish of sharing the music with any one who is interested and not excluding anyone just because they aren't a musician themselves. Well I'm pleased to report there are loads of fantastic new bands - yes not combos or pick up trios/quartets etc - that play very catchy melodic music, full of great grooves and hooks and shed loads of energy - all you have to do is seek this stuff out. It's not boring or self indulgent - IMO - and mixes a whole load of other types of music with improvisation - this is the one major factor that makes jazz 'jazz'. Anyway I highly recommend you all listen to the following: EST (esbjorn svensson trio) [url="http://www.myspace.com/esbjornsvenssontrio"]http://www.myspace.com/esbjornsvenssontrio[/url] Neil Cowley Trio [url="http://www.myspace.com/neilcowleytrio"]http://www.myspace.com/neilcowleytrio[/url] TrioVD [url="http://www.myspace.com/triovd"]http://www.myspace.com/triovd[/url] Minghe Morte [url="http://www.myspace.com/minghemorte"]http://www.myspace.com/minghemorte[/url] Led Bib [url="http://www.myspace.com/ledbib"]http://www.myspace.com/ledbib[/url] Troyka [url="http://www.myspace.com/troykaband"]http://www.myspace.com/troykaband[/url] Outhouse [url="http://www.myspace.com/outhouseloop"]http://www.myspace.com/outhouseloop[/url] The Mighty Jeddo [url="http://www.myspace.com/themightyjeddo"]http://www.myspace.com/themightyjeddo[/url] The South Trio [url="http://www.myspace.com/thesouthtrio"]http://www.myspace.com/thesouthtrio[/url] Zed-U [url="http://www.myspace.com/zumusik"]http://www.myspace.com/zumusik[/url] Acoustic Ladyland [url="http://www.myspace.com/acousticladylandmusic"]http://www.myspace.com/acousticladylandmusic[/url] The Final Terror [url="http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/introducing/artists/finalterror/"]http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/introducing/artists/finalterror/[/url] Polar Bear [url="http://www.myspace.com/sebastianrochford"]http://www.myspace.com/sebastianrochford[/url] Fraud [url="http://www.myspace.com/fraudsound"]http://www.myspace.com/fraudsound[/url] Portico Quartet [url="http://www.myspace.com/porticoquartet"]http://www.myspace.com/porticoquartet[/url] Manu Delago [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17ojj7tgrqw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17ojj7tgrqw[/url] Ben Allison and man Sized Safe [url="http://www.benallison.com/"]http://www.benallison.com/[/url] Kurt Rosenwinkel [url="http://www.myspace.com/rosenwinkel"]http://www.myspace.com/rosenwinkel[/url] Hope you like some of it...! Cheers Mike PS for me jazz is a gateway to a whole universe of musical posibilities beyond simpler forms of music - BUT - it's not the be all end all, it's just another form of music - and as such should be viewed as one piece in the gigantic puzzle that is music as a whole. Forget what you read in the media, use your ears and make up your own mind - but jazz is a tiny word for so many variations in style it'd be silly to dismiss its place in music today as so much of it is amazing - some of it's crap naturally - its possibilities are endless.

I think Mr Funk has done all the crit work necessary on this - I just wanted to say how much I dug both the groove and the vocals and that was some lovely/tasteful/musical bass playing sir - keep at it I'm sure this lot can only get better - nice overall vibe - but perhaps a little more energy wouldn't hurt - I guess that's easy to remedy. Also depends if you are having a good gig or not...! I know with my own bands sometimes things go bad/or sound bad due to venue, personal things like being tired etc - and it does affect the music. Anyway really good stuff - post more things you are doing - it's good to hear some souly funk grooves around these parts (as well as all the solo-noodle bass stuff!) Mike

hey I've always used a video camera and transfered the resulting film to iMovie - which is very easy to use to edit whatever you;ve filmed - then simply export - or 'share' the clip - to MP4 (Mpeg), or flv4 (flash video) file formats. I was getting mixed results with the sound quality and since my new vid camera is HD Sony handycam with only a built in mic I've since recorded tha adio via Logic theny synced the audio and video afterwards. This is a pain in the ass as it's tricky to get the two perfectly in synch but the end result is worth the extra effort (see the last two clips on my Youtube channel for an example). In your case I would try and record you audio via a soundcard and then dub it onto the video afterward - essentially this would require you to possibly use a click to create a definite edit point which to synch the audio with the visuals - but again the sound quality should be much better than simply using a built in mic on the camera. Hope that helps - it'sa bit of trial and error and essentially requires you to get stuck in an experiment M

I can relate to this as well with one of the bands I play with, see www.ludomix.com, the two guitarists have varying sounds, and one of them uses a POD, which also causes quite a lot of variations in his sound, and it can all get a bit frustrating... I think I'll mention it next time it gets a bit ropey. That said they know what they are doing playing and performance wise so it's just one aspect of what they do. My set up is based on having a good bass with a good amp, and knowing how to play...! It's a simple formula that works, I tend to steer clear of effects as I think on bass they can get lost in the mix in the live setting. However I have recently started using my EBS Wah One pedal and that really kicks ass live, it sounds huge, and I am thinking of getting my EBS Octabass in the mix as well, but on my gig last night I just relied on my Sei and my SWR Baby Baby blue combo and playing to get the job done and it worked. One tip I'll add is... TURN DOWN... it's amazing how music loses so much of its dynamic range when you are play at high volume, obviously if you are into extreme volume levels then fine, but lots of other musical styles will benefit from stripping things down and leaving lots of space, it'll just make those BIG choruses sounds even bigger when everyone joins in.... just a thought. M

[quote name='liamcapleton' post='476058' date='Apr 30 2009, 02:49 PM'][url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAiRfPNQdJY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAiRfPNQdJY[/url][/quote] Interesting use of a Sei Single Cut bass there... I think I know who that chap is as well... ahem, K**in *ind*ey - good work fella! M But then again - he IS f***ing good:

[quote name='Jase' post='475655' date='Apr 30 2009, 12:51 AM']That's a cool version of Giant Steps Mike and Push reminded me every now and then of aka Moon, Michel Hatzigeorgiou's live groove and feel, if you get me. Thanks for sharing [/quote] Thanks Jase - and I just checked out your band - really good stuff man, kind of reminds of Ben Folds Five (with a touch of Supertramp) with Jaco (or his mate ) on bass... actually your playing reminds me of Mike Watt more, which is a very good thing. Thanks for listening to my shizzle again - I'm gagging to do some more fusion stuff soon - the chops are back in, big time! Mike

[quote name='Captain Bass' post='475219' date='Apr 29 2009, 04:25 PM']...so I can learn some Alain Caron - Woo! I can do it now [/quote] Funny you should mention him - after seeing him at the Musik Messe in Frankfurt I've been working on his slap style - it's just awesome and while it's not as fast as some it's incredibly accurate... I love it! M

[quote name='Captain Bass' post='475006' date='Apr 29 2009, 01:04 PM']p.s. does anyone know how to embed the youtube videos so they play of the page? I copied and pasted the embedded code from youtube but it only displays the code?[/quote] Like this : Nice stuff man - I mean it's 'solo bass' rather than "doing what a proper bassist should be doing..." - but your playing is tight and the ideas are well conceived and executed - good sound as well which helps too. Are you tuned E - C by the way? Just noticed it's a 5 string and you're slapping a lot on the bottom string... sounds good. Cheers Mike