SteveXFR

Matt Freeman - Rancid Rex Brown - Pantera Jeff Matz - Mutoid Man & High On Fire Al Cisneros - Sleep, Om & Shrinebuilder Scott Reeder - Kyuss, Fireball Ministry & The Obsessed Lemmy

Peaches - Stranglers

I don't get why people complain about Behringers plastic casings. They're proper tough.

My Ibanez multiscale uses the same strings as Dingwalls. Options are still limited and expensive. My favourite strings on my old 4 string were DR black beauties but they're not available in XL scale

I've had someone tell me I should use old strings and not change them because Jamerson used old strings. I don't remember Jamerson playing much metal though. Maybe he played on Justice For All

My XL scale strings are £55 a set plus the Ibanez individual multi scale bridges are a bastard.

Another metal top tip is get some now strings. Nothing cuts through like new stainless round wound strings. I change my strings every two months which is rather expensive with my extra long scale bass but worth it.

A sensible starting point. It'll get you somewhere useful. Set your tone controls on your bass and amp and the pedal all in the middle as a starting point and work from there

There's a huge range of bass sounds in metal from super clean to fuzzy, clanky nastiness. My bass sound is quite mid heavy with a good amount of grit. I take a little bit of grit from the amp but most of it comes from a Darkglass vintage microtubes with gain up high but blend in the middle and then a Two Notes Le Bass preamp for added valve grit. The most important thing in a band situation is to forget about what your bass sounds like in isolation, that doesn't matter. It's all about the sound when played with the guitars and drums. A lot of bassists who hear Lemmy's bass isolated will say it sounds dreadful but listen to it in the mix and it's perfect

The zoom b2.1 won't power a cab. How about a tiny little compact 200w(ish) head like Trace Elliot Elf and a lightweight cab like a TC 2x10. They make a really light plastic cab which sounds OK.

Heresy - Nine Inch Nails

Jesus built my hotrod - Ministry

Burn the witch - QOTSA

That's what our guitarist bought. It's only a Squier but with dual P90's. It sounds great.

Because we use a ridiculous low tuning (drop A#) I've been telling the guitarist for ages now he should try a baritone guitar to get some decent definition in the lower notes. Last night he turned up with one. It's such a huge improvement to our overall sound compared to his standard strat. He complained a lot about how difficult it is playing with a .60 lowest string. I pointed out mine is more than double the thickness and told him to stop complaining. I'm not sure if it was just because the guitar sounded so much better but we all seemed to be really tight and it was a really productive rehearsal.

I don't ever want to see that again.

I have a wedding ring (she's a lucky lady) on my fretting hand and honestly never notice it when playing.

Domination - Pantera

I don't really enjoy covers to be honest. A band with more members may be less stressful, with just the one guitar and drums and not a lot of vocals, the bass is a huge part of the overall sound so mistakes really stand out. The issue with finding another band is Somerset is a bit of a heavy metal waste land, its all folk and blues bands.

I get really bad anxiety. Dunno why, makes no sense, don't know what I'm anxious and stressed about. I used to spend my weekends doing activities which regularly caused serious injuries and id be excited all week. Now that I'm just standing on stage plucking see strings in a slightly aggressive manner I dread it. The worst that could happen is Tony Iommi could hear us and decide to sue for a riff or two we may have borrowed.

After a busy year with the band, writing, recording and our first few gigs including a support slot with a thrash metal legend, I've come to realise gigging isn't for me. I enjoy the actual gig but get stressed out for a couple weeks before and I've decided it's not worth the stress. We've got two more gigs in January and then I'm out of the band and selling my gear. I'm not much of a home noodler and don't really enjoy playing along to songs so I guess that's it.

They go up to grade 8. I think NIB and Welcome To Paradise are definitely very easy compared to other grade 7 tunes such as Hysteria

Tell her you've decided as a band that it's time to become a Cannibal Corpse tribute band. Ask her whether she knows the lyrics to "I c*m blood" and "Relentless Beating". If that doesn't work, tell her you've reconsidered and decided a Kid Rock tribute is the future and ask how her racism skills are.

A mate of mine worked with the Proclaimers once. According to him, they are seriously toxic brothers who absolutely hate each other and are absolute corn holes to work with. He was also not a fan of working with Chemical brothers but I don't think they are actual brothers.