NancyJohnson

I haven't owned a Warwick in years, but I'd like nothing more but for every Warwick to roll off the production like with black hardware. This alone makes some very pretty natural finished instruments just pop.

There's a loooong thread elsewhere about this!

We recorded at the guitarist's studio, which is spread over three rooms off his house in Sandhurst, Berkshire. I used a variety of Tech21 stuff - GED2112/BDDI and the dUg DP-3X - but in the main we ran two feeds, effected and clean. The guitarist produced. The bass tones from the clean feed were pushed through the Ampeg SVX VST-plugin; I don't think we used much of the effected stuff at all. As an aside, it was a very strange recording process. We hadn't played anything as a band at that point, I was just called and asked whether I wanted to 'do some bass', so I just turned up like an eager puppy. It was like, 'I need four bars here, sixteen bars there,' and so on. There weren't any complete songs, but about four or five days later, I would get an email with a very rough sketch of the song I'd recorded earlier; this carried on for 8-10 weeks, I'd go in, do stuff, then go in and revisit the old stuff, do new stuff. We had 20 songs at the end. A couple we just reworked parts into other songs...there was one we didn't touch but ended up not using, which was called Box Of Stupid. It had some Trump samples on it. It just didn't fit, so we parked it pre-mastering. We start #2 in about six hours.

You bought it? Thanks mate. Honestly, you didn't need to do that. PM your email address and I'll send you a couple of other things. There's a radio edit of Light 'Em All Up (changed radio chatter, no use of the word b*stard) and a bass and drum mix of 3rd Shock Army Sniper (I did this on my own over a couple of takes and just left it with the guitarist to do whatever he wanted). Thanks!

If you have Spotify/iTunes etc. it's been up on there for about a month. Bandcamp as well (amazingly we've already recouped the outlay of recording it). I'll post a disclaimer here...it's not an easy listen, but as a collection it kind of works well. It's more shouty and aggressive than we planned; it just evolved that way the further we got into it. Just search on 'Lutz' and 'Nowherebound'. Cheers!

...well in a somewhat bizarre turn of events, I interviewed for a position last week and the agency just called and told me I'd got the position and start on the 17th. Amazingly, I'd initially turned the interview down, largely questioning my abilities, but the agency were told the decision was unanimous and I was head and shoulders over the other applicants. Feeling a bit happier.

I'm knocked out that my band (Lutz) have had our album listed on a couple of these top ten releases of 2018 things; I'm assuming this came out of the New Music Saturday podcast and a few people have just picked up on it. At the very least, it affords me a little smile after what has been a fairly traumatic year in which I lost my father-in-law, my mother and my job. [Edit: I also emerged from the wreckage of losing my band, the band I formed eight years ago, to a bunch of fairly unpleasant interlopers.] 2019 has got to be better, eh?

I was looking at this on a very small phone. I'd concur with this not being a Fender neck from that period as well. At that point Fender joints were a standard rectangular four or triangular (to accommodate their micro-tilt system. Too many laminations and the fingerboard wouldn't overhang at the dusty end.

Whaaaat? This doesnt compute.

If it were me, I'd bolt everything together first to see whether it intonates properly, which would obviate the necessity of filling holes in the neck and neck pocket. If they're both genuine Fender parts, the holes should match up. Beyond that, you're simply making good on filling the gaps in the neck pocket, sanding and staining. Borrow some clamps. Any decent woodshop should have a decent stock of veneers; I'd take the bolted together bass along and see what fits. This would save you sanding time.

Aside from the Hamer Cruise Bass, the Ex-Factor was the only other bass that gave me an instant wobble from the first time I saw it. John Taylor at Live Aid. It was a, 'What the feck is he playing?' moment. Never played one, I doubt I've ever even been close to one, but it's always been there in my mind. Had my inheritance money come through, I might have taken a cheeky punt at this one, but right now, noooo.

The awful thing with the 6-stringers is that frankly horrific headstock!

The only one I bought new was a NR Thunderbird reissue; that was five or six years ago. Every other Gibson I've owned was a used purchase. I've seen plenty of people playing Epiphone and (strangely) Tokai Thunderbirds, but it's a pretty decent observation that in the main you don't see a lot of Gibson basses out in the field. Only thing I can think of is that they're possibly seen as more of a vanity purchase and not so much the type of bass you actually want to take out to a lot of the old rat holes a lot of us play regularly.

Shielding or otherwise, there's an inevitability of noise when you're in the vicinity of dimmer switches etc. Played a few venues where thus has been the case. Ultimately, and if there is an upside to nit making changes to the bass, once you're up and running, no one will hear the buzz.

Years ago, I gigged with the Johnsons a couple of days before Christmas and we did it straight, but I donned a Santa hat for the last song (Christmastime Has Come To Town). We were an originals band and it was great to see 100+ punks moshing about to the last song. Interestingly, the band on after us were 'equine surf punkers' Horse Rock. Their gimmick was that they dressed the same and wore Mexican wrestling masks. Keep reading. Their drummer is great; quite a chunky guy, big beard, very energetic, plays a tiny drum kit. He was in his clothes, with a Santa suit, his mask, a Santa beard and a Santa hat. After he finished his set he was literally steaming.

I don't understand the desire for <insert year here> reissues or Signature models.

Because Gibson are asshats and they're only interested in Les Paul models.

I'll pm you here.

Aah, just spotted this. Because it's apparent the GED has developed a bit of a fault - it's at Rocky Road at the moment being looked at.

I'd been a subscriber to the US magazine Alternative Press for a very long time; my sub stopped a few months back. I doubt I'm going to start rereading these, so wondered whether anyone would just like them; they form a comprehensive journalistic collection of alternative/indie/noise but from a US perspective. Decent journalism, album reviews etc. Seems a shame to just put them into the recycling. There's an awful lot, certainly ten years+ of copies, plus some special editions. This isn't a collection that can be mailed, so if you want them, you'll need to drop by and collect (Crowthorne, Berkshire). Don't want anything for them (maybe a nice bottle of red).

While not strictly bass related, I was just reading a short piece about Joe Strummer's Fender Telecaster; 1966, black over grey primer over sunburst. He used it pre-Clash through to the last gig he played prior to his death. My wife remarked (while I was regaling her with the information), that I would never have kept anything for that long and just stuck with it, because betterment of gear is in my nature (viz. GAS) and I see little gain in vintage kit. Aside from Brian May, I really struggled at that point to come up with more than one or two people (see below) who've used the same instrument night in, night out, for pretty much their entire (long) career. I wasn't even certain that the Hofner Macca plays once in a while is from his time with the Beatles. Joan Jett (the white Gibson Melody Maker): Francis Rossi (the Telecaster with the hole in it), Anyone care to add? Not people who just play Jazz basses (ie Geddy Lee)...anyone who is still using the same gear now as they did 40/50 years ago.

In non-musical purchases, I bought a television. Been doing up the lounge for a while and have been tracking the specific model for a few weeks, John Lewis price dropped overnight, so pulled the trigger about 6.30am today. Musically there's nothing I want/need that's actually readily available from any retailer.