ian61

The endlessly offended need to do some careful thinking. There are a million books some may deem offensive, do they all need to be burnt? And lets not even get started on painterly art and, hard sculpture dripping with the "exploited nude female". Three pages in and no-one has said these words...."Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery". 10cc wrote a fantastic little tune and figured in all innocense it would make sense to try and make it sound black, makes perfect sense to me. How about UB40? I dont know if Ali's voice is naturally black sounding or he's putting it on.....but it certainly sounds appropriate and the band and entourage was full of black comrades and great friends. Be careful what you wish for cause if we carry on down this path, all art and expression which is wrongly deemed to be be-litteling someone will eventually be crushed. Then what?

Its been endlessly debated. Jagger wanted to tell the story of the horror. Yes the lyrics are crude but clever and written as we know by a pair of total Blues nuts who hung out with the best. I suppose being such a great upbeat tune is the weird part, but its art without the awful gratuitous language we hear so often nowdays. I think its a song that cannot be played anymore except by the guy who wrote it, and he wont do it anymore so its effectively gone forever.

There's TV studio footage of them in Germany with Marshall, Hi-Watt BL which seems live and he sounds exactly the same so I would imagine as with many of us he sounds the same whatever he's playing due to his bass, strings, and technique.

Ha the lure of good money can land one in all sorts of difficulty. I got a call to dep in a 60's/Beatles five part harmony outfit couple yrs back. 60 old tunes Id forgotten all about and Beatles stuff at short notice is very tricky. It was a very good earner but Ive never worked so hard. Dropped a few notes, suffice to say I never heard back and to be fair they were a top draw outfit. Fun tho.

Mine is early and it has the DD legend imprinted on the P PU covers.

Agree. Technique and superb reading chops plus really switched on with the tech. As with the rest of the band, all top flight professionals. Really interesting to see how its done.

It was actually a shop damaged blue VM P/J which I got for cheap. Plugged the bridge cavity kept the P PU and repainted....Its now a standard VM P bass albeit with a minor alteration. Great neck, under 8IIbs and nicely resonant.

Such a ubiquitous tone....You feel like you've heard it for ever, guess in some ways we have. Lovely.

Yep, plenty of SQ love around here. My VM P bass with those 'Duncan Designed' PU's is probably best P bass Ive ever had, and Ive had a few over the yrs.

Yep as already suggested, competence breeds confidence. Know ur material inside out, dont be looking at the others for cues.... My first gig at 18 was in a dingey basement night club, a terrifying experience. And as we emptied the dance floor we knew we were doomed. My anxiety got the better of me and I screwed up big time cause I didnt know the tunes well enough. You'll also be shocked how weird it may sound on stage with the full band in swing. But that's where total familiarity with your material is key. Good luck.

Fair play to you. I used the new lightweight Rumbles for years live where I daisied two 100's together and at home but was never really satisfied. For me they just dont have that last ounce of mid range grind. Then I discovered the Ampeg BA range, problem solved. The Rumbles are a dream for the gigging bassist which I was and who isnt too fussed about delivery, but after Ampeg they do seem rather...well, 'polite'. Anyway good luck.

I had an early original SR which I played all thru the eighties which I was very attached to even tho it wasn't that great. Then one day in the late 90's I picked up a JV? Squire P bass. Sold the Ray a month later without any qualms at all. Which suggested to me that playability (tone feel etc) in an instrument kinda trumped my emotional attachment.

......dont leave out Lieutenant Pigeon.

Which is an important point. Tons of old music now being used in TV ads flogging stuff to 'young people'. Cant think of one non Hip Hop style tune from a current artist being used.

Well Ive had just about all of the Fender style P basses over the years and I'll end my days with my current CV 70 in walnut. Incredible build quality and playability and as with just about all of them, would benefit from a PU upgrade tho it doesn't bother me at all, but thats it.

Early Mex RW P basses. Superb things, wish Id got one now.

If we're talking bout the very first time with a rock instrument, barring the ubiquitous class Recorder etc. It's middle school and the last day of the summer term and the school wanted to quickly put on a little show. "If anyone can do anything, sign this form"! was the carrion cry from Birch the head. So for a laugh myself and my mates cut out some cardboard guitars, got up there and mimed to 'Get It On' only there wasn't enough cardboard so I grabbed a snare drum, sticks and two chairs and proceeded to bash along to perplexing gasps from around the hall....I was actually playing a pretty groovy backbeat to everyones amazement ( I did bash some biscuit tins at home so had an inkling) Not sure I fully realised what an important moment it was but it probably cemented my need to take the electric instrument thing seriously.

Best friend and I, guess we were around 15, both loved music so thght we'd have a go at playing it so got a couple of guitars ...Within a few months it became very clear he had a real talent for guitar.. plus he was tall and lean with long hair. I mean he looked like a rock God from the outset, meanwhile myself? Lets just say I didn't. So, I got an old bass but then equally realised that I could make it sing, or sound funky I suppose. Shortly afterwards we went our separate ways and never did play together in a band as such, and as great as he was he never did really take it much further than playing at home, whereas I've enjoyed a lifetime of playing bass in all sorts of situations.

And they weren't all great either. I bought a 77 Ray in 1980 and it was a bit below par really. Heavy with the black finish coming off in sheets and never seemed to have a lot of output.

A fool and his money. So your basically paying say, 4.0K for the re-machined maple part of the neck and tuners? The rest could all be penny h'penny anything. Incredible.

I think bk to how I played when I first started as an 18 yr old sprog and its makes me cringe. Always the performer with way too much over playing, whacking the strings without any finness. Jumping about like an idiot missing notes etc. About as rookie a collection of errors as it's possible to get. Probably took me a good couple of yrs to cool it and start to play.... 'properly'. Been re-fining it ever since.

Never understood the stress around tuning. I just wait till someone hits any old note or chord and go from there.. My bass is always more less in tune so only ever needs a cent either way.

Things do seem to hv changed somewhat . I played in a pretty good 6 piece prog rock outfit years ago with an old school JBL, ATC, EV pa and you cld talk to each other on stage with raised voices . Sound guy was strict as hell and would just press ur mute button if you started messing with the onstage.

Id only been playing a couple yrs but decided i just had to have a dirty grt Ampeg V4B amp ( or so I thght). Trapesed all over the country, found one, and shipped it back to the south coast at stupid expense. A few weeks later popped into my local store and to my horror plugged into a used but superb Peavey 150 BW combo with DI out the works, for a fraction of what I paid for the V4. Took me ages to move the Ampeg before I could find another Peavey. The exuberance of youth really is wasted on the young.

Nothing, packed it in 8 yrs ago, my ears just couldn't take it anymore....even wearing plugs. And to be honest, there's very little 'modern' music that inspires me to want to play anyway.