Gasman

Acrimonious? Violent? Boredom? 'It's not you, it's me...' (or vice-versa)? Well, my band managed to disassemble itself in 24 hours, largely by Whatsapp. I wasn't too surprised because the new PA had become a running battle between the guy who had managed the old analogue one for years (tbh not too successfully) but couldn't get to grips at all with the new digital one that our gitrist had specced and obtained for a good price. Trouble was, the setup time for the new one seemed to be two-plus hours versus 40 minutes or less for the old one, often leaving little or no time for a proper sound check. A further complication was the emergence of unexplained feedback, that in retrospect might well have been due to an acoustic guitar and/or my sax sitting on stage ready for use but not muted (could only mute them at the desk, and desk operation by the original mix-man was one of the big issues...)

Anyway, after last weekend's gig the old guard's spokesperson messaged all saying that they had decided to use the old PA until things were sorted (that is, probably forever) without discussing it openly with me and our guitrist; he saw a conspiracy theory, read people their horoscopes and walked out. I was left in no-man's land, initially inclined to follow him as the band is going to be very bland without him, but then relented somewhat, agreeing to play the upcoming gigs until the others find a new bass player - I will then leave and probably regret it, but something will turn up.

Such a shame really, but when I consider the vast differences in experience, background and musical ability between the two 'sides' I'm amazed the band lasted as long as it did... Whatever, I will remember it for the good times, and move on - what else is there to do?

Another day at the seaside for Mustang Sally, one of the very few gigs we do that's within walking distance for me, on the seafront at West Bay. It's the annual Pirates' Day event so lots of plastic cutlasses, funny hats and shouts of 'Avast behind!' (not I hope aimed at any of the punters' a*ses...)

Weather was iffy, bright sun mixed with sharp showers. There were two stages (curtainsider trailers) so plenty of room width-wise but no depth, especially unfortunate as the open side faced south-west; guess where the weather was coming from? We're still having trouble taming the Bose PA, but then having to set up and get it sorted for FOH and foldback in an hour was always going to be a challenge. The outdoor venue made it even more so - no natural reverb/feedback from France (70 miles straight ahead) rather than the concrete warehouse walls where we played in two weeks ago!

Musically it was good - no blunders, fast follow-on between numbers, radio-link for bass (Nux) makes its handover to our Gitrist easy when my sax set comes up in the middle. I put the setlist together specifically avoiding the new under-rehearsed numbers that fell apart at the last gig, so the punters danced and sang along but we had to chop our single 90-minute set by five at the end as the rain finally came down - nice to have the curtain-side slid along to keep us dry as we packed up!

There's trouble brewing between the original band members who really want to go back to a classic three-box PA with knobs to twiddle and a ten minute set-up versus the more avant-garde who think it's worth persevering with iPad mixing, wifi links and quality speakers. Which side am I on? I couldn't possibly say!

By general band member agreement on the night, Mustang Sally's gig on Saturday was 'the worst we've done', but paradoxically the punters loved us and the 80-year old birthday boy whose party it was seemed delighted to hand over the wedge at the end. I've been trying to work out what went wrong to make us feel as we did - we're normally very tight. The venue didn't help - a large sports hall with high ceiling and a solid floor - took ages to get the PA right, by which I mean not feeding back randomly - after a generous 2 hour set-up. Maybe the other thing upsetting our vibe was the over-ambitious inclusion of several new numbers which I'm ashamed to say were under-rehearsed but thrown into the mix on the basis that 'the endings and verse/chorus structures will sort themselves out'. That's a recipe for disaster, as we found out.

'Footloose' is a speedy number, but not SR71 Blackbird-on-afterburner fast, leading to a triple- instead of a double-coda then a collapse into a silence that would have gone down a storm in a Trappist monastery. As for 'Money for Nothing' with me on bass+lead vocals, I actually got it all right only to find that after the last verse about banging on the bongos our gitrist had forgotten the need for a final chorus and had gone straight into that riff instead, leaving the rest of us wondering how to stop, but no worries, it just dribbled out like an old guy's piddle in a handy hedge after one too many Mackesons...

Perhaps I'm being too hard on us - it was first gig for a month due to cancellations, I was feeling very tired and wobbly due to some meds I'd had to take that day, there's angst about the new PA which some members feel is no improvement on the old one but £4k dearer; in the end I guess it was just another day at the office, to be forgotten as quickly as possible! 

Mustang Sally had an unexpected gig-break this month due to the cancellation of two outdoor events due to rain and soggy ground. We now start gigging again (I hope) on Saturday, so we had a rehearsal yesterday to polish off, sorry, UP the new numbers we practised nearly a month ago. 'Footloose' went well so that's in the songbook now. 'Money for Nothing' with me desperately croaking away in an ersatz imitation of Mr Knopfler whilst trying to remember the lyrics and the bass notes in the right order - that wasn't so easy. I thought that the rest of the band were taking the piddle when they said it would be OK for Saturday's gig...

The failure was 'Maneater - (me on sax). Although the Hall & Oates original has only drums, bass and keyboard behind the vocals and sax (same as our band would have had) the problem was with getting a full  enough, authentic Hammond then synth keyboard sound from our chap's Korg Stage Piano, which until then I hadn't realised was just that and not actually a synth - yes, a Gasman lightbulb moment; apparently it's an electronic piano-emulator without any meaningful way of delivering sustain or other useful alternative voicings - at least, that's what our chap said - so I gave up the struggle and told the band to ditch it. Disappointing, as I'd worked hard to nail the original (deceptively simple) sax solo by H&O's Charles 'Mr Casual' Dechance.

Never mind, I said, let's do some 50s-60s Rock'n'Roll with sax instead. 'Yay, result!' was the reaction...

One of my first junk-shop vinyl records in '65 - a 78 (yes!) of the good Sister singing 'Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho' - what a voice!

1. 1948 SML Rev C Tenor Sax since 1974

2. 1961 Fenton Weill Bass since 1972

Ill try it and see - might be the answer - thank you!

I'm giving up on this - will now resign myself to posting on the desktop PC only instead of enjoying contributing whilst in bed, eating, drinking, ignoring Mrs G's choice of TV in the lounge or at my daily constitutional(s) - shame but there it is... thank you for your help - as they say, it's not you, it's me!

I wish they were! But they ain't...

Still the same problem, I'm using Safari as a browser, but switched to Opera to see if it made a difference - nada.

I have taken screenshots of the problem, but for the life of me cannot find where the iPad has stored them despite asking Uncle Google.

Will update again - in the last resort will take a photo of the screen!

Well, I've cleared the cache and rebooted the iPad, but alas, it still won't let me input any body text. Never mind, thank you for your suggestions, it's doubtless something to do with my iPad following that update - I'll keep trying in slow time or maybe buy a new one!

Hi! No, I can't grab them to resize  - and this  problem only affects Basschat on my iPad...

Another weird thing is that although I'm clearly logged in as me, I can't see my own name field nor the create button top right, nor click on the bell and mail icons.

All is OK here on my PC...

Posted from my Windows PC: as per title the body text boxes on my iPad have shrunk to zero depth and will not accept input - any ideas please?

Sunny afternoon - Kinks

I try hard to stay on the opposite side to our excellent but loud guitarist - I don't like my ears ringing for 24 hours after a gig...

Last night's rehearsal for my band Mustang Sally was in a beautifully restored Victorian village schoolroom in the middle of nowhere, use of kitchen, sparkly bogs and a flat load in and out - it even has acoustic panels on the ceiling, so a good sound too - it made me feel good even before unpacking the bass.

I used the Roland Cube 100 combo and took along the new Talman shorty 5-string for a change. Three new numbers (Footloose, Maneater (me on sax) and Money for nothing). All went well until our lady singist said she didn't feel right fronting the last of these, not able to phrase the words laconically enough, and a bit low for her too. I stood next to her and sang along with her to try and help her fit the words in - big mistake! I suddenly found myself catapulted into the lead vocalist slot for this number by popular acclaim having successfully avoided it by shoe-gazing whenever this 'opportunity' had arisen before...

What a fool I am... have pity on me!

By agreement with the other 4 members I'm always the last to arrive at gigs - gives the drummer, KB and PA chaps time to get set up - also, I usually have furthest to travel.

End result of this is that I have no choice where I position my gear, so my response would be 'I'm squeezed into any corner available, and grateful for it!"

My first brand new bass, a F Jazz bought in 1981 had this same problem in the same place. Returned it to the local music shop (remember them?) that I bought it from and demanded that they took it back and got me one that worked properly. I had to wait three months but a new one eventually arrived - it played perfectly. The shop assistant apologised and said it was a known problem on that model of instrument - the 'new' bass they sold me had been returned once before, but the manager had told the staff to re-sell it at full price and hope some idiot never played the G string above C... (well, that's perhaps a lot of us, I guess)

To tide me over a mate sold me his Hofner President for £20 (about £100 today), a very nice bass indeed.

26 minutes ago, nilorius said:

It's all InGen fault!

Honest Injun / InGen? De quoi parlez-vous?

Is there a gig bag or case?

5 hours ago, Chienmortbb said:

Were you in the Bar or the Skittles Alley, we have played both.

 

The Rebbels played Marnhull a few weeks ago. I agree about the acoustics, we were constantly asked to turn down, although we are not the worlds loudest band.

 

Which pub did you play ion Shaftesbury? Shaftesbury is usually a live music wasteland.

We were in the bar at Mere, we used the alley to dump the bags and cases. The pub in Shaftesbury was the Two Brewers - last year we played the farewell night for the two previous proprietors who are now running another pub in Ilfracombe, the new landlords are still feeling their way, I think. 

The location of the Marnhull RBL is weird, middle of nowhere, Deliverance vibe...

Here's a brief catch-up on Mustang Sally's gigs since our Jan-Feb rest period. First off we were asked to play a Sunday afternoon gig (3pm) mid-March at a pub in Shaftesbury that had recently changed hands. Rain stopped us setting up outside as originally requested (thank gawd - it was ruddy cold too!) so we played in the bar to a maximum 'crowd' of about 25 people. I can't imagine why the new landlord thought it would work, but we got a paid rehearsal and a few compliments from the punters out of it.

Next up we played the Mere social club, a tiny venue with the acoustics of a concrete prison-block shower room. More punters this time but I didn't enjoy it, had great difficulty trying to hear what I was playing; the miked bass drum was interacting and clashing with my bass in the PA mix, in the end I disconnected the line-out from my amp and played old-skool direct to the room - better but still not happy with it.

Most recently played at the Marnhull British Legion - fabulous acoustics (real wood floor) perfect mix, good crowd, and as compiler of the set list I 'accidently' forgot to include Sweet Home Albania - result!

Not exactly Glasto-level gigging, but they all count on my admission scorecard to Bass-Heaven in the afterlife, where I hope to be hitting the frets alongside Bruce, McVie, Nilorius and all the other bass legends...

I would thank my cat for finally proving that my bass looks much better claw-worn and reward him with some more fillet steak...

We were supposed to finish at 11pm but the 'one more song' brigade persuaded the singer to keep going until just before midnight. I packed up my gear while pretending that I could hear what one of of the drunken punters was shouting at me (I'd been deafened by the guitar amp on our tiny pub 'stage' in a window recess) by nodding and agreeing with him about everything; he looked surprised - he was probably telling me that I was a truly  'king terrible bass player. As the gents was swimming in p33 I crept out into the car park, found a dark corner and pi55ed into the bushes - alas, it was up a slope and my efforts flowed back down to kiss my shoes good night... 

Said cheerio to the other guys, loaded up, fired up the Jeep, turned on a Peter F Hamilton sci-fi audio book, cracked a can of Red Bull and munched a Yorkie bar - enough caffeine and sugar to see me through the 55 mile drive home in the rain without falling asleep at the wheel (I did that once, crashing the Transit on Bodmin Moor at 2am after a Penzance gig with my London band., not a good end to a 20 hour day..) 

Got home at 1:45am totally wired, cup of tea and Marmite on toast, sat with cat on lap in lounge watching DVD of 'Apocalypse Now' until 3:30am with subtitles so as not wake Mrs G ; fell asleep then was woken again at 5:30 when said cat wanted his first breakfast and litter box clearing out - life can be so exciting, rock'n'roll all the way! 

My current favourite is the line from Echo Beach, main riff with and without arpeggios, thunderous descents, stops, all played at warp speed...