Barking Spiders

You're making it too easy for me😁

Once they get their first liver spots / first double chin and definitely when any new material is an inferior rehash of stuff made at the start of their careers.

Conway Twitt

Likewise. I don't give a flying f*** about shred-like ability on guitar or bass. My OP was more about this dull obsession many people have with 'top 10, 20, bazillion xx ' polls/lists, like any of that matters. Outside of electronica my fave bands are mostly from the post punk/alt-rock genres e.g. Pixies, JAMC, Echo ATB, Siouxsie ATB where the guitarists had distinctive styles and imagination rather than perfect by-the-book technique while the bands are definitely examples of the whole> sum of the parts.

music fora aren't about selling anything though

Indeed music is not a competition so why do all these fkin music/guitar mags (online and print) as well as millions of forum threads continue to bore on with their dull and predictable lists/polls. Things get worse when irate fanboys get all worked up because their faves aren't as high up the list as they think they should be. Then again I suppose it's all click bait, esp when Mojo etc have these top 10s on YT.

The word does seem to be widely applied to certain players as a euphemism for 'limited technique'.

But when people vote in 'who's the greatest polls' they're most probably choosing players from their fave bands they think have the chops. The thing with these polls / lists is they almost solely focus on rock and metal whereas actually the best players, in terms of mastery of their instruments, are from other genres such as flamenco, jazz, country, classical, bluegrass etc.

playing covers of Eruption, Tom Sawyer bassline etc make a nonsense of all these 'who is the greatest ...blah blah' threads and polls across the webverse?

Not sure there really are that many truly widely known, iconic bass lines. From the perspective of non-bass aficionados among the public, IMO they've pretty much been already covered here. No disrespect intended re some noms but I bet most casual music listeners wouldn't recognise any bass lines beyond Another one bites the dust Good times Under pressure The chain Peaches (at a push) Billy Jean Blue Monday (at a push) Come as you are Walking on the moon (maybe among those raised in the 70s) Walk on the wild side (among the over 50s anyway) I.e. songs that still get a lot of airplay on mainstream daytime radio

Seems to me a lot of sellers have raised their prices beyond a tipping point where buyers are probably saying to themselves 'forget it'. The way prices have risen on all instruments I sure won't be buying any more, new or used.

He is??🤔

The very ace The Heart is Strange by xPropaganda, a worthy successor to Propaganda's eternally brilliant A Secret Wish released 36 years ago!

Most of the players i like have been in bands with some guesting on other people's albums. Does that count as a session player? In which case I'd say Derek Forbes, Michael Dempsey. For players that have done a lot of guesting/session/sidemen work, it's easy for me. Marcus Miller, Louis Johnson and Tony Levin

that's 2 minutes per track not per album!

After my re-try of LZ albums I've since had other listens to the supposed best and worst albums of classic rock bands I've generally had little time for; Queen, Black Sabbath and Pink Floyd. OK I more or less flipped through each one giving each track around 2 mins which is ample time to make a call. Viz PF, IMO the best supposedly DTOSM and Wish You Were Here - still bore the s**t out of me. The 'worst -which mainly seem to be Ummagumma, Division Bell, Momentary Lapse of Reason - turn up no pleasant surprises either. Black Sabbath - Ozzy Osbourne has one of the worst voices in music. I just don't get how he's a multi platinum album artist in the US. As for RJ Dio, I can't stand that style of cod-operatic s**t (same with Rob Halford, Bruce Dickinson, Myles Kennedy) I forced myself to listen to 'best' ones like Paranoid, Master of Reality and the 'worst' - Technical Ecstasy, Born Again and Forbidden. Because Born Again has Ian Gillan - a way better singer than the other BS vocalists - it is by default their best, even though it's no great shakes. Queen - so, Shear Heart Attack, Night at The Opera and The Game appear to be their highest rated. I've not heard SHA since I was a kid and actually it's pretty good, way better than the overrated NATO. Also way better to my ears is Hot Space as I like its dance/pop vibe and is on a par with the well rated The Game , which I admit is mostly pretty good. Next up, if I can summon up the strength I'll work my way through a selection of 'best' and 'worst' of two of my least fave big names of classic rock, The Who and the Stones. I'm not expecting any pleasant surprises, particularly with the Stones as Jagger's voice is as bad as Ozzy's and I'm too familiar with their best known tunes, few of which I even can tolerate

IMO they still had (most of) it up to Red with green the best of the post Pinkerton albums. While none of these are quite up to blue at least half the tunes are good on each one and don't deserve the bashing , mostly from fans it seems. Check out allmusic and all their albums are at least 3 1/2 star ratings.

Viz JA i fully agree. I used to have all their albums and got rid of all apart from Strays which is light years better

Going against my own nature over the last few days I've listened to Led Zep, all their albums and all the way through. In conclusion, for me In Through The Out Door is by some margin their best album and I'm not trolling for the hell of it. The reasons? 1. it features lots of tasty keyboards which flesh out their sound by some margin 2. Plant actually mostly sings with his banshee yowling/screeching that marred their other albums out of sight...kinda. 3. The production is cleaner, tighter and lighter with the plodding heavy sound of the early albums reined in 4. I dislike Blues heavily influenced rock intensely but there's little sign of that here I understand that John Paul Jones -the best musician in the band - had more input here than on the other albums so that explains the heavier keys orientation So, what allegedly weak albums by well-known bands would you say are among their better, if not the best albums

But the map doesn't show the underworld/Hades where I'm domiciled! Think I might have a couple of neighbours from BC

Let's take a step back here. You do ironing!!!? 😱

Ah, forgot my two fave Clutch albums. Earth Rocker and Psychic Warfare. Crackers all the way through Also forgot to say Music has the right to children and Tomorrow's harvest - Boards of Canada Adventures beyond the Ultraworld, UF Orb, Abolition of the royal familia - The Orb Music for the jilted generation - Prodigy Tri repetae, LP5 and Amber - Autechre Looping state of mind - The Field Supermodified, Permutation and Out from out where -Amon Tobin Lifeforms and the Archived series 1-6 though these aren't 'proper' albums - Future Sound of London Suzuki and No hassle -Tosca Hydroponic garden, Interloper and World of sleepers - Carbon Based Lifeforms Dream of 100 nations and Rejoice rejoice - Transglobal Underground

There are a few in my collection, off the top of my head those with 8+ tracks being Lexicon of Love - ABC A secret wish - Propaganda Stella - Yello House of Love's epon debut Dubnobasswithmyheadman - Underworld brown album - Orbital Vertigo -Groove Armada Life is Yours - Foals Chairs missing - Wire Giant -The Woodentops Rattus Norvegicus - Stranglers Title of Record - Filter Doolittle - Pixies Risotto -Fluke Fear of Music - Talking Heads Leftism -Leftfield Endtroducing - DJ Shadow Fat of the land - Prodigy Probably a few more

Not sacrilege in my books, in which Prince isn't all that hype /myth have cracked him up to be. The original sounds so much of its time and has dated badly IMO and so was due for a bit of freshing up. I'm not a fan of this genre of music in the vid but it's definitely better than the original.

I've read many anecdotes suggesting he really is a grade A a-hole, as are his former Metallica bandmates, what with their constant hazing of original bassist Ron McGovney