TimR

When we play we now tell the the person booking us before the gig when to serve the buffet. ie not when we are playing. We've also been booked purely on the strength of our performance as "it gave the guests something to watch and talk about rather than being deafened and blinded by a disco because the guests aren't the dancing type of people". The only person on the dance floor all night was a 9 year old kid skidding across the nice polished dance floor on his knees. The Bride and Groom loved it and we received lots of compliments during the break and afterwards while we were packing down. As an aside: Two years ago this September we played to an empty room until it got dark, everyone was outside smoking (the ban had just come in). I think there are less smokers now because that is happening less and less and even in pubs people wait till our break to go out for a fag. I also know bands who would refuse to do gigs if the bar is in another room.

Golden Left Hand Rule #1: No sharp angles at shoulder, elbow or wrist. You appear to either have a sharply bent elbow or a sharply bent wrist depending on where on the neck you are playing.

[quote name='The Funk' post='564733' date='Aug 10 2009, 10:12 AM']The recording was multi-tracked and my bass track was EQd by the recording engineer (not the live engineer) in my absence. The feedback I have for him is that on one song one note of the bassline is too quiet compared to the rest. The rest is up to him but I'd like to have an idea of how best to deal with it for when I engineer demo recordings myself.[/quote] If it was just a case that you played the original note slightly quieter and if it's a digital recording then you can just open up the WAV file in whatever wave editor you use, find the note and increase the volume of that one note.

[quote name='TimR' post='564491' date='Aug 9 2009, 09:38 PM']Breathe and make sure the rest of your arm stays relaxed.[/quote] I'll expand a bit: The theory is: There are no muscles in your hands, just tendens and ligments. The muscles that operate your fingers are in your forearms. Tendens and Ligaments have fairly poor blood supplies. You need to build up the blood supplies to these but you can only do this slowly they don't adapt as quickly as muscles do. Queue lots of practice By making sure that you are breathing properly you will help oxygenate the tendons so it should be longer before they 'cramp' up. By tensing the rest of your arm you are using oxygen in the large muscles that you don't need to be using. I had the same problem, but on my left hand on a couple of gigs a few years back. It only happened on a couple of songs near the beginning of our first set. I worked out that the common factor was that I had freinds in the audience and I was tesnse and not breathing properly. You can still be relaxed and dig in, just back off with the pressure, see how much you can dig in with a lighter touch.

Breathe and make sure the rest of your arm stays relaxed.

[url="http://www.independentrecording.net/irn/resources/freqchart/main_display.htm"]http://www.independentrecording.net/irn/re...ain_display.htm[/url] Is it just one note played once, or one note played several times? If it's buried in the live recording mix it's likely to be buried in the live sound too. You may be able to hear it from your cab on stage, but will the audience? If it is very important to the song, you might have to play with the arrangement or more specifically what the other musicians are playing.

[quote name='Moos3h' post='563066' date='Aug 7 2009, 09:03 PM']I make no claims to have tried every string in the book, but I find Elites (Stainless Steel) are just fantastic for me. Yes, you might get 1-2 gigs extra out of a set of Elixirs, but that doesn't justify the huge jump in costs. Oh and a dab of Fast Fret as and when they need it. Cheers, James[/quote] +1 Absolutely superb strings. [url="http://www.basscentre.com/4-string-bass-sets/elites-stadium-series-iv.html"]http://www.basscentre.com/4-string-bass-se...-series-iv.html[/url]

[quote name='paul h' post='560020' date='Aug 4 2009, 10:59 AM']But I think it's more down to inbound links now.[/quote] Given that Basschat signatures only appear when we are logged in, and Google analytics has not picked up on any inbound links from Basschat for my site. Do the links in our sig lines get picked up by anyone other than reqistered users of Basschat?

[quote name='charic' post='562266' date='Aug 6 2009, 09:22 PM']One of my favourite lecturers once said: Pessimists say the glass is half empty Optomists say its half full Engineers realise that the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.[/quote] Then the marketing department say "Make it half the size it needs to be." Then sell it for twice as much as it should be while telling everyone its 4 times as good as the old one.

[quote name='Pete Academy' post='562161' date='Aug 6 2009, 06:55 PM']Another thing I've noticed is that when younger people, especially, try out a bass or drumkit in the shop, everything is played as fast as possible. I just want to say 'slow down! It's harder to get the feel right on slower tempos. And I NEVER hear anyone play a fairly slow slap line.[/quote] That's just their hormones. 'Young' people do EVERYTHING too fast. I did when I was young. Again this brings to the table the idea that feel is a maturity thing. When we hear a musician with great feel I guess we sometimes say that they have a very mature aspect to their playing. While the drums and Bass may lay back on the beat, someone, possibly the Vocalist or another solo instrument, maybe even the hi-hat needs to play on or ahead of the beat so that the beat is marked out, otherwise the laid back feel is lost. It takes a lot of skill to lay back all the drums and not slow and even more skill to leave a soloist to carry the tempo

That raises the questions. Is it taught? How can it be taught? At what stage in a students education is it introduced?

Good question. Some people get feel naturally. Some need to be told what it is and then they get it. Unfortunately there are also those that will never get it. It depends on how well someone can listen and how open they are to trying new things. There is some discussion that even classical pieces 'swung', but there was no way to convey this on the sheet music at the time, and classical music no longer has feel. I can particularly remember having this discussion with two people. The first was a horn player (classically trained) who couldn't understand why when she played exactly what was written on the sheet music it still didn't sound good. I told her to use it as a guide. The music tells you what notes to play and when. Imagine reading a book out loud. The words and punctuation tell you what to say and the rhythm, but you still need to understand the meaning in order to read it with any emotion. It was a light bulb moment for her. The second was a drummer (marching band trained). We were having real trouble playing a tune. But he couldn't understand the concept at all, and wouldn't listen. Everytime I tried to explain about playing slightly ahead of the beat he replied that you should always play exactly on the beat otherwise the tune will speed up. We had to drop the tune from the set.

[quote name='woolleydick' post='557641' date='Aug 1 2009, 10:33 AM']Hi folks as an update, we finally traced the fault to a 4-way extension block. This unit, bought in the UK and of a reputable brand was a filtered type. The filtering was achieved by a capacitor on each socket between live and earth. One of these caps had shorted thus connecting live and earth. Now of course we do not know why it shorted, it is extremely unlikely that it did it all on its own.[/quote] An RCD fitted to that type of filter can sometimes nuciance trip as there will be earth leakage through the capacitors under usual working conditions. Normally it wouldn't be a problem, but when multiple devices are plugged in to it each with their own filters this can lead to high earth leakage currents. Often people will just take the RCD out without checking further for a real fault. Some types of equipment just have high leakage currents and cause problems when using RCDs, washing machines and fridges can play havoc with them. I am surpised that the fault current was still low enough not blow the fuse. If you do get a frequenly tripping RCD, use it to determine which bit of kit is causing the trip, by plugging each bit of kit into in turn until you find the offending article. Don't use the offending article until someone who knows what they are doing has checked it out. Shocks are an occupational hazzard to me, but luckily I've only had 2 'cup of tea' shocks in 15 years. That smell of your own burning flesh and feeling of galloping horses on you chest are not pleasant. I had an interesting gig where we were late on and the dep keyboard players amp kept cutting out. He had to keep his foot on the mains plug and everytime he moved his foot it cut out. We were then further delayed while I rewired all four of his mains plugs. After fixing the one that was showing problems I thought it wise to check the others and found they were all in as bad condition. Keep music Live not LIVE.....

That is why I referred to it as 'feel'. It depends greatly on the style and mood of the piece whether the beat feels pushed or behind. 'Dragging' implies to me that the whole tune is getting slower because someone is not keeping up. 'Rushing' implies to me that that someone is speeding the tune up. Playing behind the beat is not dragging, it is a technique used to make a tune sound more relaxed, and playing ahead of the beat is not 'rushing' its a technique used to make the tune sound more exciting. Good musicians will know whether to play ahead or behind, but again by how much is up to the drummer to set, (although a lot of fun can be had when the bass is behind what the drummer is playing and vice versa) and if they are not playing it right, you will probably need to talk to them and rehearse that passage. This is pretty advanced drumming and not many drummers get the concept. Again sweeping generalisations.

[quote name='TheButler' post='552843' date='Jul 27 2009, 04:38 PM']... We appreciate your efforts over the last few weeks, but we're can't really see it working out, and this is perhaps as much to do with the fact we have been together for a few years now and would struggle with anyone new, as it is to do with you. I'm sure you'll have no problems finding a new vehicle for your bassing - there are plenty of folks looking for guys like you - so all the best. ....[/quote] So they've asked you along to play with them and decided after a few weeks that you're not really what they are after. Maybe they thought from the begining that you wern't exactly what they were after but would give you a shot. I expect they already had a set sound, particular way of playing or even an image that they were after. After a few weeks of working with you they decide that you don't fit in. They gave it a shot, you gave it a shot and it didn't work for them. The positive thing is that they've suggested you will have no problem finding another band so it's not your ability as far as they're concerned.

[quote name='iamapirate' post='550696' date='Jul 24 2009, 11:12 PM']Now I have a question that is based on what this guy will probably experience: The lead singer/guitarist goes out of time. The drummer can't quite tell - but he knows something's gone wrong. The g-tard singer decides in his mind that he is right and everyone should follow him. The drummer's heard that he's the centre of the band and carries on. Who do you follow??[/quote] The drummer is the metronome of the band. Always move to follow the drummer. Guitarists and vocalists can be miles out and a lot of the audience won't notice. The bass and drums have to continue driving together, especially if te audience are dancing. If the drummer doesn't understand 'feel', then it can be very hard to play anything. This applies to funk and rock equally. Its a sweeping generalisation to say that 2 and 4 should always be dead on the beat, there are plenty of tunes where the beat is implied and no one plays dead on the beat. Drum machines generally have no feel.

[quote name='iamapirate' post='545016' date='Jul 19 2009, 11:23 PM']I think that after 7 pages, we can sucessfully conclude 5 things: [b] 1) Some people care about the band's appearance on stage when they see a gig 2) Some people don't. 3) Some people Have a uniform/dress code in their band and try to make an effort 4) Some don't - although this doesn't matter to some people as they don't care (see 1)) 5) For the sake of the people that do care we should all make an effort when playing live[/b][/quote] 6. Most people will look at a band photo and decide whether to listen to or book them based solely on that image. Think SuBo!

[quote name='OldGit' post='542088' date='Jul 16 2009, 11:29 AM']Ah sorry I really meant that the concept is easier to agree on rather than the details.[/quote] I still find it strange that anyone would think of performing without at least discussing what they are going to be wearing. This is what happens if you get your image wrong. Possibly.... [url="http://www.rockandrollconfidential.com/hall/index.php"]http://www.rockandrollconfidential.com/hall/index.php[/url]

[quote name='OldGit' post='541808' date='Jul 15 2009, 11:34 PM']It's vastly different, and a lot easier, in a functions band though.[/quote] The principle is the same as this thread demonstrates. I've played with two other bands this year and witnessed the exact same discussions. A pub band and a thrash metal band. The difference in a function band is that you need to look conventionally "smart", but even this leads to arguments as to what is smart. Are polo shirts smart formal wear and acceptable at a wedding? The common factor is that you dress to give a cohesive feel to the band. You wouldn't have the drumer playing a waltz with the bass player playing straght 4 so why dress at odds. The thing that everyone seems to get wrong is not meeting with the clothes long before a gig to agree the look. Too many gigs I've turned up having had long discussions on what to wear. Usually a the practice 2 days before the gig. Only to find on the night that one person's version is different to anothers. Often two members have a strong conflicting ideas of what the look should be. Don't get involved, as long as one person has a strong idea (usually the leader) the look will work. Be careful of being too general in instructions. Beige suits seems pretty straightforward, but as we've seen even that can be misinterpreted. I played in a band where the instruction was to wear a single bright colour shirt. I turned up in a red shirt, the other three coincidentally all turned up in blue. So even that needs a certain amount of co-ordination. In the metal band, for one gig I was told to wear a black t-shirt with the name of a band on it. I just asked the drummer to get me a t-shirt that was similar to his. Another we were to wear Marvel comic t-shirts, again I deferred to the drummer. If you fit in with the rest you will feel comfortable, especially if you've all met beforehand and everyone has said how good you look, or told you what doesn't work. In the video the drummer is too different. A skinny fit v-neck t-shirt would still show his muscles and blend with the suit and dress look. Just because he is half hidden behind the kit doesn't mean faded jeans work.

We've had this discussion endlessly. In the end I persuaded everyone just to buy a smart striped shirt from Next as per their own taste and wear black trousers and shoes. It works at weddings, pubs and hotels. We've worn evening dress on special occasions when asked. We used to wear all the same colour shirt, but things started to get uneasy when people started 'losing' their shirts, and bringing a blue one that they thought was close. We had 5 different shades of blue all in different styles and the drummer insisted on wearing a short sleeve one. All or nothing, no halfway measures, otherwise it looks like you've not made the proper effort as the "Cream suits" shows. We also have screen printed t-shirts with logo. We have them in red and also in black, some in long sleeves, some short sleeves. We wear them to arrive and set up in and occasionally for charity freebies as advertisement. I've also been involved in heated discussions where one member wants to wear them for paid function gigs. Hmmm - no don't get me started.

I watched your youtube clips. My 2p. You look good in the suits look for Guitar and Bass as per you Troubador vid. BUT Matching suits and shirts and Drummer should get trousers that match your suits and a short sleeved shirt to match. Might be easier if you all wear the same short sleeve shirts, no-one will tell as it'll be under your jacket anyway. Although plain white v-neck t-shirts might work better. Forget ties. Shoes as already mentioned. I'm not sure what the singer is wearing on her feet, or whether its a bag on front of the stage but I think whatever it is is a distraction.

Unless you are running through a PA with a dedicated sound engineer, it is very difficult to manage your effects well. Each effect subtly changes your place in the mix and can have a big effect on the other musicians' sound as well. An effect well selected in home or practice studio will need careful use of EQ to make it sit well in the mix and depend heavily on the room acoustics.

Assuming all you want is a headphone amp with guitar input and line in to mix your bass and ipod together: [url="http://www.musicstreet.co.uk/ctech-pocket-rockit-bass-guitar-headphone-amplifier-p-2361.html?osCsid=llt5c4ruh0ca6t0p1jogou8fa1"]http://www.musicstreet.co.uk/ctech-pocket-...a6t0p1jogou8fa1[/url]

We don't go out for less than £50 each, which is generally what a pub will pay. But we also do gigs where we get £300 each. We price to the event. Once you know the type of event, the venue and the number of guests you get a good idea of what to charge. If you want the gig then you have to price competitively. If someone is willing to pay £3k+ for a band, they will have a huge hotel with separate rooms for meal and dancing, several hundred guests etc. If someone can "only" afford a function room and 200 guests then its likely that they will only have £1000 or less to spend. If its a 30th birthday in a social club then its going to be less than £500. You just have to be a bit streetwise. You don't start at the top. By the time you're charging £1k+ you will have already built up a client base and have loads of people recommending you. Unless you join a £3k band or have a lot of contacts, it takes some time to get to that stage. You're not competing with a disco either. People either want a band or they don't. Usually people who want a band will book a disco as well (unless you can supply a DJ as well )

Also I [b]SUSPECT[/b] that as the 300W is specified into 4ohms that the combo probably uses an 8ohm speaker. So you may only using 2/3 of the power or less. Whereas the 100w is specified into 8ohms and the Hartke uses an 8ohm speaker. There is very little on the web or in the manuals though. The different speakers will also have different sensitivity. Never go by Wattage alone, look for SPL figures in dB.