teej

[quote name='Linus27' post='610740' date='Sep 28 2009, 12:25 PM']Very Old Band - Supertramp, The Doors

Modern Band - Simple Minds, U2

New Band - Company of Thieves, Foo Fighters, Natalie Imbruglia, Paramore[/quote]
Supertramp - Very Old?
(now where's me bus pass... I know I left round here somewhere...)

[quote name='beerdragon' post='610717' date='Sep 28 2009, 12:06 PM']Captain Beefheart with Ry Cooder on Guitar.[/quote]
Great music, but the job's only for those who are happy to rehearse locked away in a shack for weeks on end and subjected to various insane restrictions/conditions - if I remember right...

Playing the Cotton Club with Cab Calloway would have been pretty cool.

[quote name='waynepunkdude' post='610581' date='Sep 28 2009, 09:16 AM']Looks horid to me.[/quote]
Me too. Don't have a problem with decorating a bass, but that doesn't look like a very good job to me.

Saw Chris Wood (Medeski Martin and Wood) playing one last year. Sounded fine.

Howling Wolf's band, maybe Muddy Waters' too, but I think he might have been a hard task-master. Little Walter's band - but the drinking would probably have killed me too.

Louis Jordan's band.

Well, I have a Sennheiser e609 super-cardiod that I've used a lot with good results, but having recently recorded some stuff with The Ukes of Hazzard I was really impressed with the violinist's Rode NT1, [url="http://www.dv247.com/microphones/rode-nt1-a-condenser-microphone--10229"]here at digital village[/url] - very natural, warm sound. I'm saving for a matched pair.

I love my main band Red Jackson: not only is the music right up my street, but the whole approach to it as well. It's a mix of all sorts of different traditional blues styles (delta slide, chicago, ragtime, texas boogie, New Orleans street grooves, jump blues, funky/jazzy blue-note label stuff, rockabilly and more besides), with no rehearsals, no setlists, no strict arrangements, allowing for plenty of spontaneous fun. We work hard, laugh lots, make good money. This band pays my mortgage [b]and[/b] keeps me sane.

My main sideline The Ukes of Hazzard is fun too, but can be harder work for lower return. A more traditional approach than Red Jackson, perhaps, with regular rehearsals and strict arrangements, but still plenty of room for improv. They do get some excellent gigs, and a few months ago recorded a song for the soundtrack of a major UK movie. Not something I ever thought I'd do. And I get to wear a tux sometimes and hang out with spangly burlesque girls.

Both of these bands are based in Brighton, and I live in Winchester, but I dep in a couple of local flexible blues lineups, and although they feature some great musicians, they sometimes get the closest to being gigs I hate. They just don't swing like Red Jackson. But it's no problem saying no, because they'll find another bass player nine times out of ten (which always leaves the awkward tenth...).

Would I change anything? Not much. I'd like to get Red Jackson into the retro/burlesque scene, and we have a club that's very interested, the only problem so far is finding a date we can do. That and get some festival work in Europe. I'd like to add some quick-to-learn stomping dance numbers to the Ukes set, some Louis Jordan or Big Joe Turner. And I'd quite like something else, but I'm not sure what. There was talk of doing a Hammond-led dance outfit down in Brighton with the guitarist from RJ; maybe a '40s jazz/blues duo with a guitarist/singer from Bristol (more travelling, but my son lives there too), or an old-timey bluegrass trio with a brilliant fiddle player I know, again in Bristol. But there's precious little time for any of this.

All in all I feel pretty lucky, and looking forward to seeing how things develop in 2010.

Yep, I've got a Gibson EB3, not sure of the vintage, and it's totally neck heavy, in fact just downright heavy. Doesn't get much use, but it is a great bass and I can't bring myself to part with it.

Why wasn't I surprised to see that the original post was all about an EB3?

If I remember right these [b]are[/b] converted baritone ukes. I've got one coming down to a mate's shop in a few weeks for a test-drive. It will need to be very nice for me to shell out £400+; but it would fit in very neatly with The Ukes of Hazzard.

[quote name='BurritoBass' post='597835' date='Sep 13 2009, 11:08 PM']Played Windsor in the park by the Thames. House amp was a Laney that I had to play around with to get a half decent sound. Band played well and we sold a bunch of CDs that we got to sign for the audience (ironically it was only the singer from the band who was on them but they wanted us all!). A lovely hot day for an outdoors show.[/quote]
We were in Windsor too, outside the closed down Woolworths. We've not busked for a few weeks, due to afternoon bookings and it seemed like hard work getting started. Town was quieter too. Eventually it got busier, quite late in the day, and we slipped back into the swing of street work with a load of banter and general showmanship and were rewarded by a decent crowd. Sold a respectable number of CDs and the tips were very good indeed. Good to get back to it.

[quote name='Dr.Dave' post='595781' date='Sep 11 2009, 04:02 PM']I listen to a song we want to cover enough to get the gist of it. I'm not interested in what the bass players doing , I come up with my own part. In fact , that what our band does as a whole. Where's the fun in copying?[/quote]
oh yes. our stuff is from back in the '40s anyway, but we'll only take the basic lick and a lyric and from there on it's ours' - that's a traditional and respectable approach to blues

With a flute in the band, how about some Gil Scott Heron? The Bottle or The Revolution Will Not be Televised maybe.

For me Boxing Day is family time, especially as the run-up to Christmas is the busiest and highest earning time of the year for street-performers like us, so I wouldn't do it anyway. Having said that, of course it has to be more money than a normal gig - does your guitarist have a hidden agenda? Mother-in-law visiting or similar

I make a living playing a bass I paid around £200 for (B&H Excelsior). OK it's worth more (maybe £800?), but there are bargains to be found out there. I for one would rather have a second-hand bass in the £4-600 region than a new one for £1000. But then I guess I'm a more confident judge of what I'm looking at than you'll be at this stage, and I have an aversion to spotless shiny basses. What kind of stuff are you aiming to play on it?

Hey Tanuki, I think we met briefly 'backstage' at the bandstand, probably 2007. I was booked for Lost Vagueness and Avalon with The Ukes of Hazzard, and was hanging out with Stuart and Fiona from Vladimir Steamboat, I think you'd rushed down from another stage to do that gig with them (?). John gave me an EP, which I came across tidying up today, sure enough, John The Revelator. Congrats

Do you gig much in Bristol? I have a grown-up-left-home son living there as well as some friends and often visit for a spot of R&R...

Of course - but I make sure I never listen to a track [i]before[/i] we start covering it .

Well I swear by my Fishman Pro EQ Platinum: it's compact, with xlr out for PA, jack out for backline (and another for tuner). Phantom, battery or mains. Phase switch, 5 band graphic, volume, input gain, compression & depth controls. Pre/post setting for sending a clean/altered signal to the xlr output. Lift/ground switch.

I took the leap something over 20 years ago, and pretty soon afterwards I was playing upright exclusively. It is more effort than a solid electric bass guitar, and I think you're better off getting stuck in rather than taking an intermediate step. It might help you get used to the scale length, but you'll still have to develop the physical strength in your fingers to hold the strings down and get a strong enough note out of them. Better to do it all at the same time.

[quote name='BurritoBass' post='591396' date='Sep 6 2009, 01:49 PM']Friday was awesome (but I was offline) so couldn't post. Played the double bass. Great.

Saturday was really good. Busking in the day, playing on a truck in the evening. Don't get much better![/quote]
Whereabouts were you busking, and what was your setup?

I reckon snowboard bags are too wide, ski bag might be a good bet like you suggested, what about rifle bags? maybe a bit short? Do they not make a bag for the palatino?

[quote name='0175westwood29' post='587999' date='Sep 2 2009, 09:22 PM']well we play hard rock/ metal, its just the rhythm in the solos does drop, it just missing the cut the our old guitarist gave it.

check out our myspace in my sig

andy[/quote]

How about playing chords like Lemmy?

[quote name='chris_b' post='587914' date='Sep 2 2009, 08:30 PM']Great news. You think something will be missing, but it won't.

You'll find that a trio will be great once you get used to the lack of audio wallpaper and background racket. I play in trio's all the time and you just have to love the space and freedom that you get. Every note you play will become more important to the number, as will every space you leave. You can fill the spaces with all kinds of stuff, pedals, extra notes, whatever you want, but none of it is needed and most of the "stuff" will detract from what you are playing. Try it.[/quote]
Amen. Don't fill the gaps, glory in them.

Our violinist in The Ukes of Hazzard, Ellie ( [url="http://www.myspace.com/elliestrings"]www.myspace.com/elliestrings[/url] ), works with those guys!

How about the Alesis Protrack [url="http://www.alesis.com/protrack"]www.alesis.com/protrack[/url] ? Anyone used this?

I'm just up the road in Winchester. The only one I can think of is Becketts: I doubt if they'll be able to help, judging from the look of this, but it might be worth giving them a call... [url="https://www.beckettsmusic.co.uk/shop/Scripts/hire.asp"]https://www.beckettsmusic.co.uk/shop/Scripts/hire.asp[/url]