Frank Blank

As are so many of their songs, Steely Dan eh? fvckin’ superb.

Advanced apologies, this contains thoughts that sometimes drift into musings. All wise words here, thanks. Being a gentleman of leisure I have simply set aside some of my vast acreage of leisure time to playing bass every day. I think most of my negativity was coming from potentially being band-less, which would have been a first since the early nineties. However, my partner in the ‘acoustic’ duo has requested that I send her files of new bass lines I’ve been working on so she can put guitar and vocals to them between the demands of very recent twins and the guitarist I’m looking to start a new noisy project with is keen and has also found a drummer. Given these prospects now in the offing I have to look at my gear and think ‘You lucky sod’. When you have actual music to be getting on with suddenly the equipment in the tool box (fnar) is looking mighty fine. I am getting the short scale Recurve set up and restrung next weekend, that bass is already becoming the workhorse, there’s something very plain and utilitarian about it that very much appeals to me, it’s robust and business-like, if I clumped it or put a ding in it I think I’d just shrug, it’s a tool, granted an art tool, but a tool nonetheless. The Harlot remains the most beautiful bass I’ve ever seen, I’m very lucky to own it. I have been playing it a lot over the last few days and it’s access to the higher strings is a real bonus as I do a lot of writing around the 12th fret, I also love the asymmetric neck, it’s just so comfortable. But the biggie with the Harlot is that early preamp, the tonal range is bonkers. I miss that in the more recent Recurve, which has a narrower (and frankly more user friendly, sensible) range but then I’m hardly an expert yet. The Rob Allen Mouse is... well it’s just bliss with strings on. I'm kind of working this stuff out as I write trying to see why I felt the way I did and why I feel how I feel now, all pointless tosh no doubt but nonetheless I think it’s time to stop looking at basses for sale and actually consider the ones I own. I am not buying any more basses for the foreseeable. Now that’s a bold statement but it’s one I have to make in order to get out of the ‘there’s a better bass just around the corner’ limbo that I wallow in for too long. @skelf builds beautiful, unique basses and I very luckily own two, I should get on and play the bloody things. I have to say there are two caveats to the ‘no more bass buying’ statement, a) I think @Jabba_the_gut is still working on a bass for me, there’s a space in the rack for that if it’s still incoming and b) I am beginning to cobble together a few ideas for an ACG built to my spec, if I ever settle on a design I’m 100% happy with I’ll commission it. In the meantime I should just get on and play these three superb basses sitting not two feet away from me rather than the thrill of search and acquisition. No more bass buying.

Should have flown Ibex Air.

Title of my forthcoming autobiography, there.

In fact I don’t know why all men aren’t rounded up and put on an island where we are simply required to produce a gallon or two of sperm a month in exchange for food, let’s face it, were fück all good for anything else.

Don’t we all son... don’t we all.

So the answer is to play them! Who knew? Well I think my initial post was me in what could be loosely termed as 'a period of the bass doldrums' (just left of the actual Intertropical Convergence Zone). The possibility of the duo I play in ending had simply cast a dumb cloud over my head and I am un type psychologique who tends to throw the baby out with the bathwater, demolish the bathroom along with the rest of the house, set fire to the wreckage and dance around the fire. My usual overreaction to such an event would be to sell up all my gear and take up with a passing circus or something but after some wise words from @Al Krow (thanks dude) and a short period of thought I picked up the short scale Recurve and started writing. Well, the reason I love the Rob Allen Mouse is that every time I pick it up to just noodle I end up writing a new bass line, or at least coming up with the kernel of something new, music just seems to fall out of it. I always have a 'cooling off period' with new basses before they either get moved on or stay, in all honesty the only one that has ever really stuck has been the RA. This is almost certainly a contributing factor in my ambivalence towards new basses, subconsciously I'm thinking "It isn't going to be as good as the mouse", not in a quality way but in a do I want to play this all the time? way. On Monday I had a little series of notes running around my head, I went to pick up the Mouse but picked up the new Recurve instead. Now its Wednesday (no Craig David quips please) and I have almost an entire songs worth of lovely bass line and I can't put the Recurve down. I think I might finally have found the perfect fretted bass to compliment the fretless Mouse. ...although don't quote me or it. Now what do I do with the ACG Harlot..?

Norfolk Music scene. What's it like? ...a bit flat at the moment.

After seeing this post... ...I believe Ibex would be fully capable of competent piano moving.

She should have got a team of Ibex into move it.

The hoof...

Someone needs a crash course on The Internet.

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Absolutely... At no time are we ever in such complete possession of a journey, down to its last nook and cranny, as when we are busy with preparations for it. After that, there remains only the journey itself, which is nothing but the process through which we lose our ownership of it. Yukio Mishima

Blimey, what happened there? Have I missed a post?

See, the thing is, this is far truer than you think. It’s very easy to just keep trying them out and they are such rare beasts (you’ve done extraordinary well already) you could keep going and going. I don’t think you’ll find better than the MB2 or the Shuker and if you are spending that kind of money I’d definitely speak to @Andyjr1515 or @skelf about getting something built to your exact spec.

Carl’s tone is all in Carl’s fingers.

Carl! 🤢 Is the fingerboard made of toast?

When I first joined BC I owned a Godin A4 and both a fretted and fretless Fender Modern Player Jazz basses. Since being a BC member I have tried out many, many beautiful basses, bought a few and sold a few. I have discussed some detailed technical details along with the aesthetic nuances of various basses. I have met many lovely people and have enjoyed being part of a community. Now I own two unique beautiful ACG basses neither of which I play very much at all. I do all of my writing on my Rob Allen and when I write something on the Mouse that I want to transfer on to a fretted bass I find myself wishing I had a bog standard Fender. Again, before BC, BBC if you like, I had a rule, no instruments over 1k, simply because I didn’t want to be precious about them, they are, after all, tools of work. Yet here I am with two basses I don’t play enough to really justify their cost, as beautiful as they both undoubtedly are I increasingly find myself scouring the BC for sale section and the Bass Direct site looking at Fender Precisions and Jazz basses. Does anyone else find themselves with basses the like but don’t play? Does anyone else have the recurring thought that if they spent as much time practicing as they do gassing on BC they’d be Pino Pastorious?

Karl Bartos, ‘nuff said.

Carl don’t surf...