SumOne

It's already the case that recorded music isn't much of a money maker and artists make most money through playing live and merchandise. My guess is AI probably won't make much difference to that other than perhaps making recorded music less valuable and the experience of seeing live bands more valuable. 

Interesting that Thomas Bangalter of Daft Punk having spent nearly 30 years pretending to be a Robot, disbanded and said "the last thing I would want to be, in the world we live in, in 2023, is a robot." and went on to write a score by hand for a 55 piece orchestra and 20 ballet dancers. 

I know this is just GAS that I need to avoid, but the trouble with the CK 61 is I just know there are things like the Yamaha YC 61, and Nord Electro 6D 61 that will be even better (but £1k more), I'm close to convincing myself it's worth the extra for something that'll last for years and hold it's value well.....but of course, once I got that I'd then I'd be eyeing up the Nord Stage 4!

I thought Bass buying was an expensive game! But really, a £700 Fender Player series J or P will not sound or feel all that much different to a £4k vintage or custom shop one. Whereas, arguably (at least my internal monologue) a £4k stage Keyboard probably does actually sound, perform, and feel significantly better than a £700 one.

I asked chat GTP to respond for me:

---

Hey everyone,

I recently received an AI-generated pub gig booking email, and I have to say, I was impressed by how seamlessly it mimicked human communication. It had all the right elements - a friendly tone, relevant information, and a clear call to action. However, I couldn't help but wonder about the implications of using AI for tasks like this. On one hand, it's incredibly efficient and can save a lot of time for both artists and venues. On the other hand, there's something to be said about the personal touch that comes with human interaction. What are your thoughts on using AI for pub gig bookings?

--- 

Yamaha CK 61, arrived today. 

Early impressions are that it's a good 'un. 

I'm sure something like a Nord Electro 6 would be better, but is also more than twice the cost. Or perhaps the Yamaha YC 61. But £750 was about as high as I wanted to go, I play in some quite grotty and boozy pubs, the risk of it getting knocked over or having a pint dropped over it is quite high! 

It seems in my Goldilocks zone for pub gigs: I've got an 88 key home piano that's great for home piano stuff, not great for other sounds though and is big/heavy to move. Also, I've got an M-Audio Pro 49 which is good for using with a Laptop/DAW but I've had hassles using this setup live. I had an MPC Key 61 that was excellent for home use and making full songs, but is complex and doesn't have quite so obvious/simple on-hand keyboard controls as the CK (like organ drawbars) for live purely keyboard playing.

The CK 61 is small (fits in my 49 key flight case), light, decent enough sound for the main things I want - Piano and EP and Organ (not quite so good sounding for some other stuff: Horns sound very digital - like an 80s keyboard, and Bass Guitar players have nothing to worry about being replaced by the Bass Guitar sounds!), seems okay build quality, fast startup, obvious and useful hardware controls that are relatively foolproof - it's really good to have pretty much anything you'll need directly there with a corresponding button/slider/knob (I haven't opened the manual and think I've got it all pretty much figured out within a few hours), semi weighted keys, easy to set 3x split points. Lots of in/outs. Added bonus features of in built speakers, battery power, and bluetooth to stream music through it.

My main gripe (which unfortunatly I find quite an issue) is the keys are slightly smaller than my other keyboards (15.9cm per octave vs 16.4cm), it's the Yamaha synth width keys rather than piano width which is a bit annoying for a stage piano, I find that small difference a hassle for muscle memory while also using my other keyboards and doesn't really save much space so seems a bit pointless (2.5cm over its 5 octaves). It's enough of an issue for me to consider other keyboards, but I don't think there is anything else with all the features and wider keys in this price range so I'd better get used to it. 

2 hours ago, Al Krow said:

I think the detailed YT review that @TRBboy shared was super useful.

I felt that the most of the fx ranged from meh (e.g. the octave down was glitchy, the filter/synth nothing to write home about), passable (dirt) to decent (chorus / modulation) - be interested to hear what other folks reaction to that clip was or whether I'm being too harsh? Love the form factor though.

Personally I'm going to wait and see what bag of tricks Zoom have in store with the similarly compact form factor MS-60B Plus due out this year.

 

Yeah, the form factor of it has just about won me over. It ticks a lot of boxes, but the MS-60B + is perhaps going to do all that and more. (and of course, there's always the B1-4 which is tough to beat and is less than half the cost of the Pod Express).

Linval Thompson, Westbound Plane

UK Garage

MJ Cole, Sincere

Roy Davis Jr, Gabriel

Scott and Leon, You used to hold me 

1 hour ago, Minininjarob said:

So you used their service, agreed to pay the fees, then when a problem occurred you couldn’t be bothered finding out how to sort it out and ran away from the problem and somehow it’s eBay’s fault?

The exact same issue has happended to me 4 or 5 times and each time the fees have been waived instantly when I contacted them. But then I follow their rules, strange that. 

Well, not exactly - I agreed to pay fees for a service, but they didn't proivide that service. And I tried to sort it out, but their systems didn't allow it. I don't know why you're quite so combative and presuming to know all the details and would immediately side with the big faceless money making corporation over the lived experience of an individual.

It was 15 years ago and was perhaps a different scenario to yours and perhaps eBay systems have changed since. To be honest, as it's from 15 years ago I hadn't remembered all the details correctly in my previous post but I just did a search on my emails and this is what I can find from 2009 sent to eBay:

"I sent a message explaining that there was no payment due to you - the 2 identical items 'sold' were the same listing and I have not received payment for both, something has gone wrong on your system and there is no obvious way for me to fix it or respond to you or speak to anyone. I sent the message over a month ago asking what action could be taken as 2 sales were not made, but I received no response until these messages today canceling my account and threatening debt collection unless I pay you. This is especially poor customer service- if I can discuss it with a human or get human to read these emails then it can be resolved - but you are just going direct to some automated response of  'cancel account and send in the debt collectors'."

That was my last correspondance with them, account cancelled, I moved house but a long time later debt collector letters were eventually sent to my parents. I can't remember the subsequent correspondance, but in the end I paid them for money that was not owed to them - so they basically used dodgy faceless beauracracy to bully and steal from me.

I don't know about you but that seems like some sort of Kafkaesque dystopian situation where faceless beauracracy and systems are used to erode the rights of individuals, like we are seeing from the Post Office from a similar time when people put too much faith in shoddy automated systems of big organisations and prefer to presume blame on the individual victims.

Facebook is also bad as a seller.

In quite a few years selling on BC I have never had a bad transaction or dealt with time wasters. I've only declined one sale that seemed a bit fishy (someone with a new account asking me to post to a PO box).

.... Facebook on the other hand - trying to sell a keyboard lately really had me losing faith in humanity! I had about 10 obvious scam attempts, and about the same amount of time wasters, and so many of these:

MXR M82 Bass Envelope Filter 

£75 + £5 first class recorded delivery. 

Great condition and perfect working order.

No original box, but will be well packaged for delivery. 

This is the much more funky older purple sparkly one (funky looking, exactly same inside)....or you could spend over double that for a brand new one that's less funky looking, but who'd want to do that?! 

9 hours ago, tauzero said:

I'll repeat my suggestion of a Roland XV or JV module, or for that matter a Korg one, or similar. Or a hardware soft synth - https://zynthian.org/ or https://geekfunklabs.com/products/squishbox/ for example.

I would be keen, but the trouble I'm finding with that route is that external modules for Piano/Rhodes/Hammond don't seem that common, most tend to be focused on synth sounds and are quite old tech - discontinued for about 20 years so I don't know how well they'd compare to modern stuff, they are quite big and not too convenient for gigs (unless I start getting rack mounted stuff), I'd forsee connectivity/reliability faff (e.g. Midi mapping organ drawbars), and the ones I can see avaliable are quite expensive. Hardware soft synths just feel like they would bring a world of connectivity and reliability pain for gigs. 

A second hand Yamaha CK61 or Roland VR-09-B are top of my list right now for about £400 second hand budget. 

I'm with you on the newfound keyboard GAS.

Bass Guitars are bad enough, but arguably one £500 Bass can pretty much do everything, but there's an almost legitimate 'need' to have a few different types of piano/keyboards/synths! 

Personally, I've got a Yamaha home piano for... well, home piano playing (big, heavy, 88 weighted keys, built in speaker, good piano sounds but other sounds not so good). An M Audio MIDI keyboard for Laptop DAW/VST stuff (and live stuff while I'm selling my MPC Key 61), it's fine - but I've ran into reliability issues using it at gigs.

So now I have my eye on something sort of in between: a stage keyboard for gigs, smaller than a home piano and more sounds, more reliable live than MIDI keyboard and Laptop. Ideally with decent organ sounds and drawbars. It's not a cheap game though (Yamaha CK 61 & Roland VR-09B being my front runners for my budget). 

Nice new mix from Earl Gateshead

https://on.soundcloud.com/UhW4y

HX One looks good, I'd be interested to hear how you get on with it @Rodders handy for occasionally needed things like modulation and delays and looper, and the flux controller looks useful. 

I kind of regret selling my GT Core.

All I need for gigs are: Tuner, Compressor, EQ, Drive, a way of switching between two basses, and to split the signal -  XLR to Mixer (for IEMs) and line to my Amp/Cab (I can do the XLR to mixer from my Amp  though so don't really need a pedal doing it).

I've gone for Boss Compact pedals for foolproof/bomb-proof (LS-2, TU-3, LMB-3, BB-1X, and a SubZero DI Box) and that covers those needs. But actually, they probably cost about the same that I sold the GT Core for, they're bulkier, in some ways the 'what you see is what you get' of individual pedals is more foolproof - but in other ways there are risks like patch cables and power cables coming loose, and obviously individual pedals don't have the option to do all the other stuff I don't really need but is nice to have (HPF would be good live, cab sim to mixer would be nice, all the other more exotic effects for mucking about at home).

So, if anyone isn't into their GT Core, perhaps give me a shout!

2 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

If you are working off massive generalisation then the UK is just about XFactor tosh and insipid Beatles rehash bands.

Yeah, I'm not saying  in generalised terms one is better than the other. But if generalising (which is what this is all about), my view is that the UK tastes are for slightly more quirkiness, US a bit more conservative and macho/boastful. 

4 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

Take a trip to places like Seattle, Nashville, Portland or Brooklyn. You might revise your opinion.

I'm talking in massive generalisations (and have lived in the US) 

Back once again, the funkiest paint job in the pedal kingdom:

To be quite honest though, it's not quacking as well as I remember - probably due to my dull flatwounds and the rest of my setup. 

It has no use in the bands I'm in. So I dunno, might sell it, or I might keep it until I invariably get a new Bass/strings and lust for the purple funkyness again. 

US mainstream market seems to me generally more macho/conformist. 

UK Ska was quite political/anti establishment, the US stuff was a bit more for the Bro's. US hip hop has generally been more macho and boastful. Queen's 'I want to break free video' pretty much killed their US career but didn't do them any harm in the UK (or most of the rest of the world). 

Not so much US popularity for bands along the lines of Erasure, Pet Shop Boys, Pulp, Suede, The Cure. They'd be considered too sissy and odd for a lot of the US market that go for more conformist stuff like Country music that doesn't do so well in the UK. 

6 hours ago, tauzero said:

 

There's a simple non-paying bidder process. I've used it on a couple of occasions when selling a car which the "buyers" never turned up for.

Whatever it was at the time (about 15 years ago) certainly wasn't simple. I can't remember all the details of why it became such a mess, some wrong clicks and that was game over. 

eBay. Someone clicked to buy a £1.5k motorbike from me but never actually turned up to buy it, no money exchanged, but ebay insisted I owe them their %. I never got to speak to anyone, just stuck in some Kafkaesque loop of bureaucracy 'computer says no'. In hindsight there are probably processes to deal with that, but I gave up trying then ignored them. They closed my account, sent threatening letters, I moved house, years later they sent bailiff letters to my parents. In the end I gave up and paid them the money they basically bullied and robbed from me. 

To my shame, I've actually used ebay a few times since. I try not to though, unless it feels I'm particularly shooting myself in the foot not to. 

I bought a pedal from Stuart, and all was good - quick delivery, well packaged, all working well and as described. Thanks!

1 hour ago, pete.young said:

Another option might be to keep your Midi keyboard and find a used desktop or rack synth. I have a Korg X5DR which makes reasonable piano, organ , strings and clavinet sounds, they seem to go through ebay for 100 - 200 . There are probably other makes, but it's not something I know very much about.

That is a good call. They don't seem to be particularly in fashion for piano /rhodes/organ sounding stuff but the miditech piano (mini and pro versions) seem like they might fit the bill. 

I'm starting to loose patience with the Laptop and MIDI keyboard for live stuff. 

Band practice last night and the Piano VST decided to start making a high pitch whining noise, I couldn't see why, it's a simple VST and no settings had changed since I last used it - restart the DAW and all was fine so I can only assume it's one of those 'ghost in the machine' things (Laptop - heaphone out issue? DAW? VST? ASIO or other software settings? Cables? Mixer? ....other?!)

Later, try an organ sound and there's very noticeable latency (but not with the Piano, so must be something to do with the Organ VST), again - it didn't do this last time I used it at home! So again, stop the whole band while I faff about with all the potential issues. (Edit: I've now changed ASIO settings to force the DAW and all VSTs to follow the same sample rates, it seems to have solved it).

These software issues are going on while the Laptop is balanced on the edge of a nearby Cab with USB cable dangling from the keyboard and then using the Laptop headphone out into a DI box to mixer. It all feels quite precarious - both physically, and with the software.  

On the plus side, it's a cheaper than a decent stage Piano or synth, and has access to pretty much unlimited sounds and effects, but I'm seeing why it's common to use MIDI keyboards with DAW/VSTs for home studios and why it isn't very common to see then used by pub bands where simplicity and reliability are king. 

It seems my options are to look into software issues (which I expect to spend a good portion of today faffing about with!), Laptop upgrade (perhaps just more RAM), interface upgrades (perhaps something like a Focusrite, and/or a USB DI), more road-worthy live setup (rack mounted etc). it all potentially adds up to quite high costs.....or  I'm tempted to give up on Laptop/Midi keyboard for live stuff and get something cheap like a Casio CT S1, Roland Go Keys, or Yamaha NP-12. All are about £200 (I mean, ideally I'd get a higher end thing like a Nord Electro 6, but I'm not sure I can justify that sort of expense),  they have 61 full size keys, decent enough piano/ep/clav/organ sounds for my use, no need for a laptop, portable, and MIDI so I still have the option of using with my Laptop at home, and I can easily move it around the house and practice through in-built speakers. 

I'm looking forward to the MS-60B+ Possibly an all-in-one pedalboard in a Boss compact pedal size?

Presumably it can be battery powered, 6 effects is  just about enough to use as an entire pedalboard  - to use it as an all-in-one I would want to use four effects just as 'always on' :  compressor, EQ, High/Low passes, Drive, so that leaves 2x blocks to add other effects per preset (e.g. synth and reverb),  and scrolling up/down presets will be a good addition as it's a bit of a faff on the older version.