Leonard Smalls

Some jazz rocky stuff.

I've spent much of the afternoon with an log-splitting maul and sledgehammer making logs for next winter from a Scots Pine that lost a huge branch a few months ago. I shall test 'em with my moisture gauge before burning...

Was it Mr Quigley's doing? He was attempting to sway our budding new-wavism towards 70s cheese!

First sort of gig was at 14 turning the pages for a pianist doing somethingorother at Chester town hall... First actually playing was me on keys with @lurksalot 's little brother on bass doing Dylan and Barclay James Harvest covers at a school anti nuclear do (!) I was praps 18? And first time on bass was in the Tartan Bar at Leeds Uni early 80s, with Dredd and the Badass Weeds.

Wasn't there a hooha about NE14 ABJ recently? But the only one I'd spend £15 on is BE11 END.

Indeed! Did you ever hear any episodes of Round The Horn with Kenneth Williams? Good thing the BBC commissioning editors didn't know Polari!

Are you posting from a phone? When I do, a vid comes up as a link rather than embedded.

There was an original meaning, but Robert Blackwell, the record's producer decided that the lyrics needed to be changed as it was considered somewhat ribald: Tutti Frutti, good booty If it don't fit, don't force it You can grease it, make it easy Tutti Frutti was slang for a gay man...

I'd always go for ebanol. I had a sip of some meths once with a tramp on the Rows in Chester and had to spit it out; if booze tasted like that I'd never have another mouthful! So I always check and make sure it's ebanol in my whisk(e)y before shelling out.

And it looks like we've got the most excellent Dead Sheeran opening for us... Edit! Looks like Dead can't make it, so it's just us and MC16. Should still be a cracking night!

Our next gig is at Babar Cafe in Hereford with MC16. A night of funkypunkyfunkypunk! Here's a VidAd, featuring a snippet of one of our funkier numbers... ChokedBabarvidAd19-5-23.mp4

Bumpity Bump!

Heard this on the Craig Charles show yesterday, and surprisingly, considering it's modern R'n'B, I like it. as Mr Charles says, it's got a wiggle!

That's what we discovered!

We did one of those recently and it turned out to be a contest of how many Instagram votes you could muster. Sadly, our Facebook followers tend not to bother with it being a touch older... We'd been told there were three judges, which is why we did it!

Raph's just bought one to replace his unfixable Trace... Shall know how it is tomorrow!

When I were a youth, mind, I was able to wander about and "sing"! Here's proof on the singing part, though I fear that shouting would be a better description - at the Marquee, early 90s...

Tis a thing of beauty - cheers! 😃 Though we're not in an exclusive relationship - I sometimes gig the Parker... And record with the Wal and Lightwave.

Here's my main big gig rig... I split the bass signal in the Helix, left being an octaved guitar effect and right is an overdrive bass sound. Both go into separate channels in the dbx compressor then into the stereo Crown amp with L signal going into the 2x10 and R into 4x10. I'll send the separate split signals to the PA as well. If it's a smaller gig I'll bridge the Crown and feed it from the BBE pre amp with Helix inputs being centred. Works quite well! I'm tending to gig with the ACG Recurve...

It's still going strong! We took part in a Battle of the Bands recently, and there were 27 bands in it, we were the oldest by far... And they were all from a small area of the Welsh Borders, and all were relatively traditional in that they had bass, drums, guitars and vox; musical styles were very varied too. People have been saying "music's not like when I were a youth" since before the days of Methuselah!

Unfortunately, I don't think I have a copy of the original VHS. And even if I did, I haven't got a VHS player!

I blew one up once for a chemistry demonstration video! We found just the shell, someone presumably having put the metal bits in a scrappers horse'n'cart...

The Dickies...

Never in unison! Needs to be one forward, one back. However, as it's only me so far it's not a problem. But when other bass and (Gawdelpus!) guitar start doing the same we'll have to employ one of them choreographers, like what Madonna does...

I'm quite excited by the fact I can walk forward and backwards while slappindabass, a bit like a CrapFlea in a Dr Feelgood band! But singing as well would be a step too far...