bluesparky

[quote name='BottomE' timestamp='1344601318' post='1766927'] Nice - who is the girl with the big shiny ones? [/quote] Some cyclist called Victoria, or something like that - lovely girl. I reckon if she applied herself she could really do well, but she was talking about jacking it all in and not doing it anymore, shame.

Here's me on the left. Pity about the overexposure, but it was only an i-phone. One of these days I'll have one of me playing!

Yup, I second the Alfred course. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alfreds-Basic-Adult-Course-Lesson/dp/0882848321 There are three books in this series and they're great for an adult beginner - I started learning on this course about 18 months ago and I'm now just finishing the 3rd book with a view to take Grade 3 or 4 in December. Once you've finished the 3rd book it leaves you in good idea of what direction you want to take your playing and also be at the standard where you are able to play "proper" pop / rock songs that you may know & like rather than the stuff that educational books will give you.. (i.e. Life on Mars, Virtual insanity, Nightswimming etc - rather than the American National Anthem or traditional shepherd's folk songs etc!) Good luck, I'm loving it.

I just bought this on the strength of this thread, and I'm glad I did. - it good to be able to support anyone on here who's got something to show for their hard work. I always thought that the Chapman was a bit of a voodoo dark art which I'm utterly intimidated by, so it's great to hear one being used to play some incredible music and so well played to boot too. Great album, nice one - two thumbs up!

[quote name='oggiesnr' timestamp='1342475904' post='1735965'] If there's a curfew then there is one, end of argument. If you ignore it then at one point do you decide to turn it off? Five minutes, ten minutes, an hour? Everyone knew the rules and not to be able to work within them is just unprofessional both on the part of the artist and the organiser. Steve [/quote] Perfect point, well presented.

I'M the man, and so's my wife! (please don't tell her I said that...)

I'm involved with and working on all of the Hyde Park concerts this year and I've written, re-written and deleted my input to this thread several times with a whole bunch of information, valid points and details concerning this issue and how the point of view of certain people in the public eye have wound me up, but all i can be bothered to say is: He went on stage on time, he played until the curfew was reached and the sound was stopped, just as was indicated and reiterated. The curfew time was very visible to all involved and it was labeled as being STRICT, i.e. no messing around, we mean it. Simple as that, they're the rules. I believe Henry Rollins sums the whole thing up in the most famous of his quotes - which is in actual fact written nice and big and clearly on someone's toolbox which Bruce & Macca would've had to have walked past to get on stage. At least they didn't embarrass themselves like Axl Rose did at Reading a couple of years ago.

I bought their first album and loved it and as a result bought a ticket to see them at Alexandra Palace. Personally I thought they were dreadful when I saw them, whether it was to do with the fact that Ali Pali is notorious for being difficult to get a good sounding gig or whether it was that they were just having an off night, who knows. I've since seen them them come through some festivals I've worked on and they were fantastic, a great show with some top notch songs which will really get a crowd going and they can stir up a great buzz of an atmosphere. Club foot is a cracking song to play. On reflection I'll happily put the Ali Pali gig as just "one of those gigs", top band, great songs & great live. Also Serge's goal at Soccer Aid 2012 was phenomenal!!!! (on a slight detraction from the main topic, one of my best mates was working on a Kasabian gig at Earl's Court a few years ago and tells this cracking story. After the Kasabian gig had finished he popped into the aftershow party for a pint before home-time with his flatmate who was a little bit worse for wear. At the party, my mate's flatmate spotted Noel Gallagher and dragged him over with her saying "we must say hi". Once they both arrived at Noel Gallagher - said flatmate then promptly buggered off after 2 seconds, leaving my mate starting at Noel with a sheepish and apologetic grin on his face. Trying to rescue the situation and his dignity, my mate (Tom) then started a new line of conversation, to which Noel responded well, noticing that Tom had been stitched up and put in an awkward situation by a drunken friend: Tom: hmmm... So..., what do you do then? Noel: Ah, I'm in a band with my brother. Tom: Are you any good? Noel: We're ok, I think we may actually get somewhere and possibly make it. Tom: That sounds great, the pub at the end of my road is looking for new bands, you should give 'em a call. Noel: Yeah, thanks mate, blinding idea, sounds great...etc etc etc)

Musicman stingray 5 - bought new for £1,000 Warwick Streamer LX 5, bought 2nd hand for £1,300 I'd happily use either, as they're insured and I take care of them - if they're out of my sight / reach, then they're in their hard cases.

[quote name='Kiwi' timestamp='1341797123' post='1724331'] Got a link? [/quote] @King42Mark At least I assume it's him. I'm quite naive when it comes to Twitter and it's not a verified account but the tweets seems specific and genuine enough.

He's on Twitter, and very funny to boot too!

Cool, glad you enjoyed it. I wish I was able to go, but sadly I'm working at some radio festival for the "yoof" at 'ackney marshes. As I'm a massive fan I've seen them literally dozens of times and thought they were brilliant at the O2 last year. I was a bit gutted when they announced the Knebworth gig as I'm unable to NOT go if I'm able to see them. I hate going to massive gigs as a punter (anything bigger than an arena and it's almost not worth it) and I wasn't relishing the thought of going to see them there. I'm almost glad work came along and took the choice of having to go or not away from me!

Another thing that I can't see how to do anymore is how to post a URL and instead of it's address appearing e.g. www.thiswebsite.com you can make it appear as e.g. "[u]this website"[/u]. Any ideas? Thanks.

Does anyone want to see a video of a crazy drummer? I swear he's at the wrong gig

That is so easy! I've not posted a youtube video since the format of bass chat changed. Lovely!

Test: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nY1jTVyBE0

Most of my mates are pretty cool about it - they know that as far as I'm concerned it's not a proper hobby / pastime if there's not a forum for it!

Done, good luck!

Thanks for the advice guys. All points have been noted and taken on board. FYI I use 45's - 125's and my action isn't overly low - I've played instruments before with strings so thin it's like using cheese wire and an action which is so low you could sound a note just by blowing onto the fretboard which isn't really my cup of tea. I'm not necessarily out to play the fastest or do 3 hour gigs of nothing but hemi-demi-semi quavers, I'm just looking to regain the prowess used to have (and ideally be able to play Violent & Funky by Infectious Grooves again without having to stress about the thought of it). Thanks once again.

I've been working quite hard on my music theory and how it applies to my bass playing over the past few months but I noticed today that when I went to jam along with a few old tunes my fingers were aching halfway through the first song I started. It wasn't too technical really, but was a pretty relentless string of 16th notes, and I realised that my stamina must've dropped off and I need to concentrate on that again. Does anyone have any suggestions for some GOOD songs to play along too which have quite a ruthless bassline (along the lines of Stockholm Syndrome, or The Trooper etc..) in order to get myself match fit once more?

I'm the one kneeling down. [attachment=110218:836.jpg]

I spent all week working at Download and finally arrived home last night - utterly exhausted and wiped out. As far as the delayed opening on Friday goes, we were on site from last Monday and the grounds were wet but passable and weren't too bad. The weather was terrible all week and the torrential downpour on Thursday night and early Friday morning was incredible. The ground on the slope in front of the main stage changed from being wet and a bit muddy to being up to knee deep mud and unwalkable, with the arena being on a slope the conditions obviously got worse as you got closer to the stage. It was obvious that something had to be done to sort this out and it was a shame that the delayed opening meant that bands had to be cut. This decision had nothing to do with me, but it did me that myself and my crew had a tiny bit of borrowed time to ensure that we were more than ready for the start of the festival as the weather had us on the backfoot since we started on the Tuesday. I spend most of my summers either working on festivals or touring open air venues and it'd been a long time since I've had to work in conditions that were that bad. We were in fact evacuated from the main stage on the Wednesday thanks to the weather being so bad and we had some very clever structural engineers with lots of pens in their top pockets keeping an eye on things to make sure everything and everyone was safe. I have no idea about how life is on the other side of the stage - i.e. i didn't venture past the barrier once all week and spent all of my time on stage or at FOH so I can't comment on decisions, logistics, parking, vendors, pricing, camping or facilities etc and I'm in no way responsible for any of the above. We were all genuinely surprised to see how many people still came. I know that tickets are expensive but we had such a tough and miserable time working long days exposed to such extremes of weather we seriously thought that people would say "sod that, I can't be bothered to go stay / camp / stay outside in weather like this" and simply not go. Having Prodigy was an interesting choice for a headliner on the Friday and Chase and Status confused me more - I do like Prodigy, I'd not really heard of C&S but I wasn't sure if they were quite right for download. Having said that, Pendulum headlined Stage 2 last year and seemed to go down well. Seeing Tenacious D on the saturday was just the moral booster I needed. I did have tickets to see them on Tuesday at Brixton (about 2 miles from my house) and they certainly got the crowd going too. I don't care if they're deemed to be a novelty or comedy act - they went down a storm and the arena was packed when they were on, Biffy seemed to be an odd choice too. I know that Metallica themselves invited them to play so it'd be tough to turn that down. They played a tight set and were very good but the crowd's atmosphere certainly changed from raucous and energy filled to simply head nodding and the occasional bounce when they played some of their heavier stuff. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that most people who were watching them were simply getting themselves into a decent place ready for Metallica. The sun eventually coming out was another moral booster - but it did mean we could then crack on with fixing and replacing broken gear which resulted in me spending most of the changeovers in the air, hence me now being bloody knackered! Also, I've met a LOT of famous people through my work over the years but having my photo taken with 836 was an honour. He had to be given a second hi-viz vest so he could make it out each night without being mobbed for photos and autographs, he's already looking forward to next year and is slightly bemused by it all.