SumOne

The Blue Bells (AKA The Black Arks) are new to me but what I've heard is great. Quite a few of their tunes are on a compilation 'Reggae Fever Oldies, vol 1' (which is a lot better than it sounds!)

Ours has the region's most handsome and talented bass player.

I had similar problems with the Boss Waza Air, I can't remember exactly what now but it wasn't just automatic if the phone had connected to other devices in the meantime. My Sony headphones almost do the opposite, they automatically turn themselves on - I start a Teams call using my Laptop speakers and it somehow turns on the headphones that are on standby (and not on my head), my JBL bluetooth speakers have their own idiosyncrasies when connecting two of them, my car bluetooth does some very annoying auto play things and seems random about which phone it decids to connect to. So as long as the Bluetooth actually works I give these things a bit of a free pass as it just seems the way it is with Blutooth to have slightly odd ways of connecting to different devices. These Positive Grid headphones are now on my shopping list, seem to be sold out everywhere though.

Need one of these: We're always asking our lead guitarist to turn down (and drummer to slow down.....and I do like a drink!). It just seems to come with the territory that lead guitarists generally want to be the loudest thing, they need reining in - so giving them control of the mix is probably best avoided.

Snowflake Patrol

Full glass of ice, 1 part rum (got to be the good stuff though) 2 parts ginger, all parts reggae. Sunshine is quite important. Thanks to this thread this one is new to me for the essentials reggae part:

Bit unfair to quote that though when a subsequent post was. "Positive Grid responded to me with some suggestions, the last of which was a factory reset. Did a factory reset and was able to pair with the phone. Then had another go at pairing with one tablet, making sure that the phone bluetooth was off, and it succeeded"

Hopefully the connectivity issues aren't a deal breaker as I had the Waza Air and miss them (although they also has some connection issues) but the Waza were always pricey and only seem to be going up in price. £399 seems the going rate now vs £55 for my Nux mighty plug - £345 extra basically so I can not have a headphone cable is a cost I can't justify to myself. But these positive grid ones at £189 I could just about justify.

I sold a pedal to Matt, and all was good.

Pete Bruntnell and the Cousins feat. Robbie Macintosh. They played a small pub, it wasn't a well advertised or particularly well attended, they are great musicians though and I think were playing it due to a local connection and general love of playing.

Funnily enough, I'm just half way through writing a 'join my band' advert to form a Reggae backing band. I figured other than Pama International, Upper Cut Band, Friendly Fire Band I'm not aware of other active UK ones - and none on the South coast. I suppose it is because there isn't the market for it but I like the idea of a Roots Radics style band that supports different vocalists. It probably is ambitious for the limited Portsmouth/Chichester/Brighton reggae scene though!

Sone good stuff on this new Dubmatix page, including this Joe Gibbs mix: https://bassculture.substack.com/p/the-mighty-joe-gibbs-hits-legends

Cheers all to a long weekend. Sun is shining, rum and ginger is icy cold, reggae is playing (Handsworth Revolution as this thread reminded me I should. Disk 2 with the dub versions ♨️). The cat knows the score:

Excellent retirement gift! I had an MPC One, and then an MPC Key 67, both were great and I kinda regret selling them. A bit of a learning curve as they have different ways of doing things to DAWs, but is mostly quite straightforward. I never did get any good at finger drumming though!

Thanks @Quatschmacher all of this this tech support is much appreciated (and hopefully could be useful to someone else reading this thread one day). Via midimonitor it confirms PC messages are being sent from FI to Laptop when clicking the FI switch: And changing sliders on the FI editor changes the FI number to the hoizontal lines - so that confirms that signals are going from Laptop into the FI. - Both in and out Midi ports are selected (via editor and when using the updater). - Cables have been swopped around and re-checked. - I've tried the two usb ports (well, now tried four: via two Midi devices - one uses usb C tried 2x different ports, the other is type A tried in 2x different ports, not via a hub - all direct to Laptop) - All FI v3 Editor etc has been deleted (and I've uninstalled/re-installed v4 Editor). - Same results with the Volt unplugged and virtually disconnected, and just using the new Digiflex interface. (I can tell when it is doing the single Midi conncection thing as if using midimonitor the device doesn't show up on the FI editor, go out of that and it re-appears). - Everything on the Laptop is updated. It doesn't seem an issue with the FI as such, or the Midi interface - as the FI it sends and receives Midi from the Laptop. It's the data for the firmware update or via the editor that for some reason are not going back and forth - I assume somewhere buried in my Laptop is something selected that isn't allowing that type of Midi data transfer? ....but with this new Midi interface there isn't even any app to make any changes and Windows has no control pannel settings for Midi (aparently it was removed a few years ago). Some seem to have a problem with things like 'Intel Smart sound for USB audio' driver needing to be disabled, but that isn't something on my Laptop, I assume something similar buried somewhere.

Sorry to say, but my patience with the FI v4 has just about ran out and I think it will be for sale tomorrow. I got a new Midi interface (Digiflex), and on the FI updater it recognises it, select it, go into update mode, click update..... 'FI not present of communication error'. Go onto the FI editor and go out of update mode on the FI, select Midi in/out (it recognises the device), go to editor and move some sliders and the FI display changes from number to two horizontal lines (so the Midi device must be working - it is connecting to the FI and making a change in display). But go to 'manager' tab and 'download from FI' and ......'the FI not present of communication error' message pops up. There are no other virtual or physical devices connected to the laptop, no other usb ports used, not using a usb hub, no other programmes running, the new Midi device seems to have no sortware - no option of thru functionality, and as far as anything I can access - no other virtual Midi is being used. It probably is something to do with my Laptop settings, but this is such a ballache to figure out that I'm gonna give up.

I think there is a difference between the worst offenders of planned obsolescence (e.g. companies deliberately designing things to not be fixable, or to not last as long as they could for the same production cost) and companies not continuing to spend on software updates to keep up with modern operating systems years after the pedal production finished. A digital pedal from 20 years ago not working with a modern operating system is akin to not being able to get replacement parts for an analogue pedal from 20 years ago, I don't think either are long-game consumerism plots by the pedal companies.