Gasman

We still play a couple of WMCs with bingo in the middle and a meat & bottle draw at the end to keep the punters there as long as possible, not for the bands sake but for the bar! North Dorset traditions die hard...

The axe-wielding bass man could plead self defence after aural assault and mental cruelty...

Strings Beaten Lifeless...

...or possibly penned by Sun Ra circa 1967 for ‘Somewhere There’ but they weren’t free jazzy enough?

Fascinating I’m sure, but could you please just rearrange the words so they make a bit more sense to mere mortals?

Another disappointing development - Post-Modern Jukebox seemed to have morphed into multiple versions on tour in different continents simultaneously, almost a franchise. Last time I went to see them in the uk some years back they had a reduced lineup with none of the names that made them such a fantastic show a few years before.

10cc used two live...

MM Bongo runs 18v...

The Enid - Live at Peterborough Town Hall 1980 (on record label 'Letthemeat vinyl) Excellent Prog/rock/synth/orchestral stuff featuring Francis, the guitarist with my current band...

Godley and Creme’s later album ‘Goodbye Blue Sky’ has some cracking numbers as well as some inevitable self-gratification; it focusses on the post-nuclear doom scenario and features harmonicas... bass, tenor, blues, squeaky, the lot. My fave track is ‘The last page of history...’

I’m now on the thomann returns adventure, the Aguilar dB preamp I bought from them failed last month. I got a returns label from them but was told that I had to take the package to a ‘DHL parcels pickup’, NOT a dhl express. Now there are four express pickup points in my town, but no parcel pickup closer than 20 miles away. Ok, drove to Weymouth yesterday and dropped it off at the nominated tatty seven-eleven store, on top of a dusty pile of other people’s stuff. Yes, I got a receipt, but I now wonder how long ago the last pickup was, and when the next will be? I fear the worst...

Perfect remedy - needs posting on Guitarchat!

In my current band minus two, the guitarist (otherwise an intelligent talented responsible bloke) did this at the slightest opportunity. Bad enough at rehearsals (the rest of us trying to work out a number while he started playing about at full volume with his looping pedal), even worse at gigs. Maybe at a performance it's an insecurity thing, reminding themselves how a riff or melody goes before starting in case they c*ck it up, but why doesn't the rest of the band have to do the same? Meh....

Back in '72 I was with a London-based covers band (Sweeny) on sax. We worked exclusively through agents and got some interesting support act gigs although none anywhere near London! One of these involved a trip to Scunthorpe Baths Hall to support 10cc - nice guys to chat to and a stonking set from them with Donna, The Dean and I, Rubber Bullets and many more done to perfection; we were very impressed with them having two drummers - one to cover when lead vocals plus drumming were just too much to do properly, also they had a brand-new Merc 600 van. Ours was a dodgy old transit....

While my guitar gently weeps - I cannot see why or how anyone could dance to it but it seems to be a permanent fixture in our set list.

I'm sure that 99.95% of the punters at a gig don't care what the band's gear looks like or cost, as long as it doesn't sound terrible. The other 0.05% are probably other rather envious bass players who haven't got a gig that night...

There is indeed a de-activated phone box there; it sits in solitary splendour outside the village hall as a memorial to that epic confrontation you mention. There's even a Doctor Who annual in the 'box amongst the other books-for-swap stacked inside!

@alant on my bathroom scales it's 3.5kg. It hangs exactly level (no neckdive) Its got lightweight Gotoh tuners and has been upgraded to Nordstrand PUPs and a pull-up selector added to give the choice of both or just the PB pickup. Very punchy sound thru the AG700 and Darkglass 212.

Mustang Sally played three gigs over last weekend, a Saturday afternoon village party in Kington Magna (no, I'd never heard of it either!), evening as part of the shaftesbury fringe festival in the Two Brewers pub. The afternoon was excitingly dangerous with rain tipping it down the whole time and a mini-whirlwind busting one of the lightweight tents just as we started playing. The punters were all county-set rich landowners and suchlike, barbours, leather hats, red trousers and expensive wellies, average age 68-ish. Their picnics comprised champers, foie-gras, etc. We thought that starting with Guitar gently weeps would scare them off but not a bit of it -they danced in the mud, got a bit tipsy and we even had some of the ladies balancing on straw bales to bind freshly-hacked branched from the trees around to splint the bent and busted tent poles with gaffer tape, doubtless carried in their Gucci handbags for just such an eventuality - the Empire spirit or what? The evening pub gig was warm and sweaty, rammed with punters who danced, drank and sang while the rain continued to soak the band outside in their wall-less tent - they were Dreamweaver, an originals power-punk four piece and bloody good - I'm hoping to book them for one of our West Bay minifests in 2024! Sunday was an afternoon gig at the Shaftesbury FC clubhouse, all of the band still feeling a bit stunned from the day before, but the punters rolled in, sat in the sun and danced for the whole afternoon. I used my new-to-me short-scale Harley-B (thank you, @knicknack} all weekend with the Bongo relegated to spare. Our guitarist loved it (less wrist stress than a 34") when I did my sax bit - he's now keen to play more - did I subconsciously buy it for him so I get more sax-time?

Hmm, sounded like a good idea, so I’ve just been out to the garage and checked out the possibilities (yeah, it’s 2am but I can’t sleep...). As I thought, unfortunately the amp is an upside-downer, with the chassis bolted to the inside top of the case and valves dangling. Without totally dismantling it, there’s no access to the strap bolts and blind drilling from the outside would be, er, a bit too adventurous for me so i think I’ll struggle on lopsidedly for the rare occasions it gets gigged.

My fender silverface Bassman 100 I bought new in ‘80, still the best sounding amp I’ve ever had, the weight is in hernia territory but would be much more tolerable if only the amp didn’t suffer from chronic transformer dive!

Love the colour-coordinated galoshes!

I realise that there’s not a lot of love for jazz here, but that’s where I started, and through that had to develop a good ear for changes, helped by subconsciously knowing the structure of a load of songs that I’d listened to but hadn’t actually played. As several contributors here have suggested, I find watching the rhythm guitarist’s chord shapes helps a lot too, but the lead guitar is not much help at all!

OK, thanks! 😀

No, I'm not, haven't asked the others, although I believe at least one is. Your point was?