dave moffat

Ibanez fretless SR something, natural finish,burr poplar/walnut, black metalwork, flatwound strings, best electrics they do, I'll know it when they build it and get upset cos it'll be out of my price range

Good luck, hope they can keep you playing. My knees and lower back give me hell some days, have had to give up on gardening and golf, I console myself that when they finally go I'll still be able to play an instrument of some sort, probably still badly but........

Thanks, very interesting points you make. I have an acoustic fretted bass guitar as well as the unfretted Uke. With the uke, acoustic is fine for practice/noodling but it does have to be put through an amp to really come to life. The guitar is definitely louder but I had put that down to the difference in strings and size and had pondered putting a pup in the guitar but I really like playing the unfretted uke so thought I'd be as well adding an unfretted guitar to the collection might have to skip the idea and just get a fretless electric for about the same price as I'm looking at for an electro. Have already experienced earsplitting feedback putting things through the cube moving things about a bit solves the problem but will give the soundhole plug a go as well. Oddly I haven't had such a feedback issue with the older amps.

Following my experience with my fretless Uke bass ,I know my next bass will be fretless, for practicality I'm thinking along the lines of a shortscale, fretless electro, played through a cube street when not playing acoustically. I think Ibanez do one. Does anyone have experience of such unicorns, suggestions as to what to look at, any to avoid and any pitfalls/ things to consider?

5'8. After 10 months learning bass and other stuff, length of scale (from uke to Ibanez SR800 (34") basses) doesn't bother me but the spread of my fretting hand is now an inch and a half wider than my picking hand😜 is that a common thing? The only instruments I have problems with are top end of a tenor uke and smaller. So I've kind of focused in on Bass with baritone uke as a secondary instrument.

Inspiration for lyrics - try people watching, go to restaurant or pub with a small notepad, grab drink then sit at a table upstairs overlooking a square/train station/bus stop and just watch the world go by, bound to be something/one grabs your attention, so maybe make up a backstory. Shopping malls work too and give you something to do while the Gf/missus (may they never meet) takes hours spending all the royalties your not gonna get.

Listen to some stuff you wouldn't normally go near, maybe some Spanish style stuff and Phrygian mode.

Probably got a big enough mansion to banish brat to the far wing of the mansion or build him a sound proof studio. You'd think a parent would be more wary of young Tarquin's propensity to crank the amps up as loud as he can 🤣. Ah the joys of grandparent's revenge. I love visiting my kids and hearing my granddaughter playing Moonlight Sonata at warp speed on the keyboard (just cos she can) or grandson giving Highland Cathedral an airing on yet another instrument.

Only awkward until you get used to it, I regularly switch between a Uke, mini acoustic and Ibanez electric basses I find doing a warm up on the fretboard before I start helps me get my fingers/brain adapted but then I'm still pretty crap anyway.

I agree with what lefty seems to be hinting at. Could always go for an electro-acoustic, got everything covered then or stick a pick-up in an acoustic if needed down the line. Still need an amp though Only 3 or 4 notes in a chord

My thinking when I bought for my grand-kids and myself was that the instruments I was buying at the time were fine to get started and that with time they would either chuck it in without much dosh wasted or in time upgrade to what suits best. I now have developed Bass Aquisition Syndrome which is currently kept at bay by regular acquisitions of amps, pedals &etc. Its more a case of enabling them to learn, after that it's their journey even if we disagree.

I do agree with taking them to a good music shop and letting them loose, to me music is one of the greatest gifts you can give children. I have a granddaughter (12) who started out on bass this time last year, is now playing bass, 6 string and keys while getting her younger brother (11) started on keys and another grandson (10) who started out on accordion (FFS, oh the shame) and is now messing around with his oldest sister's 6 string while learning Tenor Uke. All the grandkids play instruments but those 2 are pretty damn good whatever they pick up.

Well if it's violent Violet's muff it could be anyone's, how do they know? Have they done tests (other than STD)?

Hmm, big muff dripping with DNA, reminds me of a drunken one nighter

probably a bit outfield but how about a baritone uke; Nice size for a kid, same tuning as strings 1,2,3,&4 on guitar and 4 strings ready for when he gete a bit older and realises his old man was right and bass is best.

Couple of lovely covers of this song my fave is Harvest Moon (Neil Young cover) posted by Reina del Cid, there's another nice version by Foxes and Fossils. Lovely song

Try Luke Macintosh at @becomeabassist.com he's got 3 chord lessons up on youtwat and you can download the chord sheets and stuff. The best online teacher I've come across so far.

Can't put it down to any particular bassist I tend to hone in on riffs, even from classical music but from memory Led Zep, Fleetwood Mac, Deep Purple, Free, Grand Funk Railroad....... I was a chorister as a kid so find the main melody part a bit boring and find harmony and counter melody more interesting, think Scarborough Fair/Canticle and Seven Bridges Road (Eagles). Anyone remember the Flying Pickets and the Bass they had underpinning it all, Went to a Uke concert (Touch of Purple) recently and for me it was Jane Buckley on the Bass Uke that really made it for me.

Yeah, I'm finding while tabs mostly give the notes it takes me a while to get the feel of the song until I actually listen to it. Rhythm and tempo are as important as hitting the right notes, after all isn't the main purpose of a bass to be the link between the beat and the melody? When I was trying to find a version of Senor (I'd never heard of it and tended to avoid Dylan) I found a Bluegrass version by Tim O'Brien which is nice but a bit quick for the song there's another version by the Bob Porter Project which to me is spot on, closer to the feel of the original AND the bass is played on a bass uke, which is reassuring as it's probably what I'll be using for this.

Ho hum, list is morphing and evolving, very mixed though😜 Some I already knew, three I'd never heard of before currently working on Ride On - Christie Moore If - Bread PEF - Eagles Senor - Dylan Secret Agent Man - Johnny Rivers To learn sometime after the above Caledonia - Dougie MacLean Harvest Moon - Neil Young Still learning to learn if that makes sense. Currently downloading onto a memory stick which goes everywhere with me to get the music/lyrics embedded in my head. Listening and singing along in the car, playing along in the house, playing along pausing to work on bits and pieces. Is there anything else I could be doing to speed up the learning process?

Being a noob I've not really thought about this, working on some stuff towards doing an open mic, have discovered there's a weekly jam at a pub not far away so will start going to them to cut my teeth with an open mind. If noone wants to kill me after hearing me play I'll see what happens. Do have a van though😊

Must admit I prefer natural wood and all my instruments are understated. Exception is a gold Aria guitar which was bought because I was after something cheap with a whammy bar to experiment with (meh), will get traded in against a fretless bass next year.

Seeing that makes my knees ache, arthritis is a b@strd.

Was gonna say, that's a singer? Really? Please tell me it was a guest that crashed the stage, surely easier just to pull the plug on the mic.

My flipping music teacher put me off anything with strings when I was about 9 or 10, I was tiny for my age and got nagged at for not being able to bow an adult sized cello 'correctly', bow was too flipping heavy, beach. Otherwise I'd wouldn't have waited til I was 61 to think feckit I'm going to do this. Always has a tendency towards bass, though I've always been good with recorder and tin whistle. So I've kind of settled for Bass (3 and counting) as my main instruments with an 8 string baritone uke when required. Pachelbel must have really hated cellists.