Muzz

I've got five gigs and a rehearsal (three different bands) in five days starting tomorrow...today I shall be resting as much as possible (working from home)...

I've just got (another) new band on the go, and a dozen or more songs in the set are played in different keys to the original (mostly different keys from each other, too). Because I play many of the same songs in the original (or even differently-shifted) key (e.g. one band tunes to Eb for everything, another in concert), I use my Stomp as a pitch shifter, and it works brilliantly - I have all my main tones (half a dozen or so) in every combination, so I use the presets in Eb for one band, and I've also got specific songs in the different keys for this new band. Sounds complicated, but it's not, really - HX Edit means you can do it on a PC (drag and drop, etc) and it updates the pedal. The pitch shifting on the Stomp is very good, I haven't caught it warbling or hunting yet, even with big shifts...

I've been round this block a couple of times (I was/am thinking about flying cheapo with one, so I wanted a bolt-on to break it down even smaller), and I've ended up with a Westone Quantum, which is a 32" scale (I'm not aware of any Short Scale headless cricket bats), and it's a pretty good bass - I gig with it a lot when the stage areas are small...

One of the bands I play in has a BL who just doesn't want to stop playing (unless the landlord steps in) - if a single drunk shouts 'More!' after four encores, he wants to carry on...usually said drunk wanders off during the song anyway and you're left playing to an increasingly tired crowd, who are worrying about Last Orders and getting a taxi ordered... It happened a couple of weeks ago, after the fifth encore I put my bass down and went to the bog...that usually does it...

Oh, and I also got a new drop top for the Shuker, too... 🙂

The flooring went (moved house), the Shuker stayed... 🙂 Yeah, it sounded fantastic, but I found out a terrible truth about myself when I had it; it was supposed to be the ultimate modular setup for any size of gig...and I discovered my Bloke OCD meant I brought all three cabs to most gigs 'just in case'...and that's 90lbs+ of cab (albeit in three lumps), just when I was working very hard to reduce my lifting and carting work... 🙁

It's worth bearing in mind that Geddy's tone when heard in isolation is far clankier and rattlier (and possibly fizzier, these things are subjective and tricky to define) than with the other two at it, I'd be inclined to errr on the side of clank/rattle/fizz until I'd heard it in a band context...

Alternately, you can also run 3 x 8 ohm cabs, too... 🙂

My favourite Class D amp of them all...and very versatile: between the Contour and the Channels, lots of great sounds to be had very quickly (which is what I need, playing in a band with a wide selection of songs from lots of genres), I'd probably still have it if I hadn't moved to digital modelling with the Stomp.

The longest gigs I've been doing recently are the jam nights, tho this fluctuates wildly, depending on who turns up: last night wasn't too bad, there were a few bassists in, so I only played about an hour in total, but the week before was hard work: just one bunch of kids in as a band doing two numbers, then a guitarist played bass with his pals for three songs, the rest of the 3 hours was me...and maaaan, it was hot and sweaty: high street bar, so all windows and doors closed for the noise... 😐

I had one the Weds before last; usual jam night, same setup as always, same kit, same room, same people (well, our hosting trio, at least)...just couldn't get out of first gear. Nothing definite, nothing like a 'disaster gig', but it just sounded mostly rubbish - I was faffing about with the bass tone for about ten minutes to no avail (and I'm normally about two and a half minutes from walking in the door, setting up, getting a tone and going to the bar), and the harder I tried to bring it back, the more it persisted. Last Weds was night and day better (as it usually is), for no reason...it just happens sometimes...

Apropos a couple of Police numbers (Message In A Bottle, Roxanne) always going down well, we chucked in Walking On the Moon. Maaaan, that song goes nowhere fast; it was touch and go as to who lost the will to live first, us or the audience... Funnily enough, and proving Fitzgibbons Law Of Contrariness*, Stuck In The Middle Witchoo always goes down well... * Don't look for this one, I just made it up...

I'd just add that open mic/jam nights don't have to be about intimidating improvisation from the word go - you can start by learning a few 'staples' and asking the hosts if you can sit in with them if they know them (and even if they don't*)...it's a good way to start, and you'll make some good connections... * I co-host a good jam night with some great musicians, so I'm on the hop a good deal, but that's largely accommodating people who want to get up and say 'Do you know...?', so it's out with the iPad if we don't and often the person getting up knows it better than us...

Not during a gig, but there's a very talented chap comes to the jam night who plays guitar (and bass) left handed, but if no-one's brought a LH bass, he just takes mine and flips it over. Gives me a mild panic attack watching him... 😐

'How many sound engineers have you got?' 'Two...two...one...two...' 😀

I use a Stomp now (after a few forays into bigger pedalboard setups), it's very very versatile, and in the covers/function bands I'm in, it makes a lot of sense; I can set my tones (I have about half a dozen that cover all eventualities (and a couple of 'dedicated' ones, like for Hysteria and Sledgehammer)) and I also have them set in different pitches for different bands - one band is tuned concert, another is Eb, etc, plus there's the odd song which gets played in a different position depending on the singer, so I have have all of my presets everywhere from low B to high(er) Bb (this is dead easy to set up; just a cut-and-paste in the software, took about 15 minutes). I'm not a cork-sniffer when it comes to the tones themselves, like a lot of things I'm happy with '95% there for 5% of the time and effort', especially when the drummer starts hitting things: it works for me. One guitarist/BL I play with has a huuuuge pedalboard, and he never stops fiddling with it; soooo many individual knobs... 🙁😀 I just turn up, set the overall level, and go...

I've ended up with a BB414, because it feels like the slimmest neck I could find in the range after my 80s BB3000; the 1024 was bigger, which is the only thing stopping me from getting a 2024. That and the weight...it wasn't heavy per se, but just a bit too much for me...

I've no idea if my substitution is totally effective, but I'd done some reading before I bought it, and it's very common over the pond, so I did it for a sort of insurance, really, but it's never not been enough. We did a gig last weekend in a big pub in Bolton where the landlord's rig (there's a dancefloor, it's a very big room, so he's keen) was absolutely deafening after we'd soundchecked, so we were more or less obliged to turn the mains up (and we're talking a pair of RCF 15s on full, plus the desk up to +10db, and we have a fully miked kit), and even then the little Rumble was fine onstage (I had my ACS plugs in)...

This has now morphed into people shouting the (not) hilarious 'Alexa! Play xxxxx...!' 😡

'If we've got time at the end' usually works for the more persistently ridiculous, especially when (if) they're still around and bleating at the end, you can blame the venue for having a strict cutoff time... Oh, and 'Alexa, play....' is starting to get shouted at gigs these days...ohhhh, the irony... Apart from the usual things like 'Play Mr Blue Sky' (this one to us as an acoustic trio), there's been... Had a residency in a very Oirish pub* in Manchester City centre for a while, and despite doing a good 45 of Oirish songs, we'd get (usually mid-song, obv) unending requests for obscure stuff: 'Play Paddy McGinnerty's Pig**' 'Sorry, we don't know it' 'Ohhhh, you do' 'No, we don't' 'Sure you do; it goes...' The worst we ever had tho, was some punter at a private gig (bloke, 30s, Weasel Dusted to the eyebrows) with half a dozen mates come up to the singer (at mic's-length away) during the first song of the second set and shout 'I'll sing the next one.' 'No, mate, you won't' 'I'm better than you, you're sh*te' 'Still no...' He stayed there, literally at the other end of the mic from the singer, shouting the lyrics. We stopped, muted the PA, and spoke to the bloke whose Do it was. Apparently Weasel Dust Boy was some kind of local Face, so he paid us off, put the disco on (whilst looking for the karaoke mic for WDB), we packed up and left. Home by ten, full pay. Wasn't so bad, but we thought there'd be a scuffle, and I didn't relax till we were well away from the place... * By which I mean a big Oirish contingent in the crowd, rather than one of these Plastic Paddy places that puts a couple of Guinness pumps in, hangs a couple of plastic shamrocks up and thinks that's what it takes... ** Insert obscure song title here...

That Sims would still be a compromise, because of the difference in positions of the original P and Ray pickups...now a sliding Sims; that could do it...hmmm...

My other half and I met him a few years ago when he played a small club (The Trades) in Hebden Bridge. Lovely lad.

Naked?! Imagine the scandal! 😀

It's a lovely neck, tho... 😐🙂