Barking Spiders

Then I guess Viagogo's prices for Villa Park of £312-323 standing are a snip?!

A year or so ago I advertised an Ibanez electric guitar which had 12 photos, several in close-up so that viewers could see if there were any blemishes. It was in virtually new condition at a price half that of a new model. Anyway after it being posted and received the buyer sent an email requesting a further 20% refund on the paying price as there was a blemish I hadn't mentioned in my description. On close inspection of my close-up photos there was a tiny scratch adjacent to the scratchplate, all of 1mm in length max. It would've been invisible to the naked eye and a magnifying glass would've been needed to see it. After several email exchanges it transpired he had indeed inspected the bodywork using one and that the scratch wasn't visible to the naked eye. I did not give him a further 20% off. An@l or what?

Recently got Leftfield's live album Tourism. I'd held off before being such a big fan of the studio albums but I shouldn't have. It's a stonker right alongside Underworld's brilliant Everything Everything

If you're a lightweight then I'm flyweight with now having just 3 basses (all bought new for <£550), 2 electric guitars, 1 x well worn but trusty electro-acoustic, 1 x Yamaha keyboard, cajon, djembe and caixa. Last week I sold a Martin acoustic and one bass for £1,100. All my GAS urges are gone with disposable income now just for travel and adventure sports.

Even more important is working on your bassface. The GOAT bassfacemeister to whom we all aspire is ...

Of all the online bass tutors I've tried by far the best is Mike Smith of https://www.talkingbass.net/ Quite a lot of free material https://www.talkingbass.net/lessonmap/ and his courses won't break the bank either. He covers all styles but I mostly use his excellent funk/slap bass material. There are classic lines you can learn like Pow by Graham Central Station and Marcus Miller's line on Run for Cover. If you like Flea there are quite a few RHCP lines

Me neither. A lot on BC seem to be more into that side of things than me. I couldn't tell you what models came out in the 2000s. For my money it's been all down hill since the StingRay came on the market.

Over the last coupla days I'v been playing the newest release by Plaid. Here's a great and my fave though untypical track

Nowt wrong with those. What gets my goat are self-pitying lyrics of the 'i hate myself', 'my life sucks', 'you fcked up my life' sort. And also the sticking to the man /social critiquing variety unless the writers do actually put into practice what they preach.

Yep that's a good snappier way to put it.

There are quite a few albums and individual songs I like for the vocal melodies, the singers' voices and the instrumentation but avoid actively listening to and taking in the lyrics because either they're nonsense, cringe-making or just depressing. Yesterday I was listening to The Hurting by Tears for Fears. Most of the songs are great except the theme of the album is primal scream therapy which to me is a load of pretentious, introspective psychobabble. No doubt a middle aged Roland Orzabal would agree. Such is teenage-20 something angst. Similarly I like a fair bit of Grunge but don't care for lyrics about self-hate and all that. It might ring true with angsty teens but now I'm a middle age grumpy cynic I prefer to blot them out. Anyone else feel similarly about some of your tastes?

It boggles my mind that many bands still keep their name even though the original main men have passed away/on. Then these are merely tribute acts. The one that always comes to mind is Dr Feelgood. Once Lee Brilleaux passed away that should've been it, particularly as Wilko and Gypie Mayo were no longer with the band.

Been playing a fair bit of the hugely underrated Psychedelic Furs, well for the first four albums anyway. Here's a cracking bit of post punk from the debut and something completely different from Mirror Moves, which I used to play endlessly when it came out.

Yep, likewise. They've probably had a more universal long lasting impact across the generations and a broader appeal across all age groups.

But I did say 'which most people would agree are bona fide 10/10 classics'. So there's you, which is +1. Any more takers?

On this morning's journey to work in the car I played Future Sound of London's excellent debut Accelerator. Here's the stonking breakbeat opener...

The production and engineering on Sgt Pepper was brilliant for its time and IMO hides the fact that most of the actual songs are mediocre at best bar Lucy ITSWD and She's Leaving Home. Like The Who and The Stones (in the 60s anyway) I'd say The Beatles were a great singles band but none of their albums are packed with quality tunes throughout. Then again, there have been relatively few albums made which most people would agree are bona fide 10/10 classics.

It took me some time to get used to Phillip Bailey's falsetto before I eventually did, well at least on the uptempo tunes like Serpentine Fire. I still skip those ballads where he's the principal vocalist. I'm not a fan of ballads in any genre and for me these tend to spoil those albums where they account for around half the number of tracks. Funk-wise EW&F, War and the Ohio Players praps did more slower unfunky tunes than most other funk mobs.

Nice! Takes me back to the Half Moon in Putney where I saw them twice back in the mists of time. Used to have Badness, Life on the Wire and It's About Time on vinyl. Must try and get hold of any CDs

The degree of metal-tude is down to perception. For the non-metal fan I'd say the black album is 100% metal. To the average fan of Norwegian black metal it probably is pop with slightly louder guitars

And yet........they're still better than Megadeth, Slayer, Avenged Sevenfold, Slipknot, Alter Bridge, Shinedown and any other metal/hard rock band I've heard who were formed this century. At my stepdaughter's last weekend she insisted on playing a Shinedown track to her mum. I had to go to the end of garden to get out of earshot. Short haired Metallica at their worst are preferable to the best Shinedown has to offer.

Bo Derek👇 Axl Rose 👇

Back in the 80s-90s there were quite a lot of metal singles hitting the UK and or Billboard top 20; Living After Midnight, Breaking the Law, Run to the Hills, 2 Minutes to Midnight, Number of the Beast, Ace of Spades , Dr Feelgood, Welcome to the Jungle, Paradise City, Enter Sandman.... And they all had pretty memorable catchy sing-along choruses!

I'm no Metallica fan but TBH I don't get all the noise about them 'selling out' when the black album came out. In fact I'd say they got better, moving way from the tune-free first 5 albums etc to writing actual songs, you know the stuff that people can actually hum/sing along to. Load and Reload both have some good tunes and if they'd been combined on one album, this would by some way have been their best effort.

Been on an Orb trip of late. Here's a particular fave track, a massive stomping slice of dubtronica