gjones

From the BBC website "A waste of time," argued one concertgoer, who did not give their name. "It was all miming. Very disappointed. She never sung at all." I'm amazed that the average Madonna fan would even notice, or care that there was no band and Madonna was miming. Now Grace Jones, well I'd spend some of my hard earned cash to see one of her gigs - just for the hula hooping alone.

I came into a decent amount of money about 5 years ago and decided it would be a better investment to buy secondhand basses than put the cash in a savings account. So I ended up with about a dozen very nice pro basses but actually only gig one or two of them. The others will slowly be sold off when I need the cash. When I do sell off the 'investment' basses I'll be left with my MIJ Fender Jazz (with John East pre amp) and my Fender Elite Precision, which is all I'll ever need.

The stage monitors in my local music bar are Gear4Music\Subzero and they're pretty loud and clear.

Yes, they're basically the same as the old Mexican Classic Series. Fender have just changed the name to give the illusion of something new, at a higher price than the old range. Just as they did with the Deluxe, Elite, Ultra - same bass different name. Although I'm not knocking Fender for doing it, if they didn't induce us to buy basses we didn't really need, they'd go out of business real quick.

Many times in the past I've been like Michael Corleone in Godfather 3. 'Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in!'

We have played at a local large venue many, many times but haven't been asked back recently for some reason. I suspect it was due to a last minute gig the venue asked us to do, due to a cancellation. Myself and the drummer couldn't do it so the singer and guitarist got a couple of deps in to replace us. It obviously didn't go down too well with the manager at the venue as we've heard nothing from them since.

I can use a soldering iron but I'm no expert. So if I change pickups on a bass I tend to add plastic connectors to the wires coming from the controls as it makes future upgrades much easier. You can get them on ebay and then you can forget about soldering if you want to play around with different pickups in the future. Just google 'Terminal Strips' on google.

I bought a TC Electronic Classic450 head but really didn't get on with it. The low mid control didn't appear to have much effect on the sound. I thought it might have been my amp that was faulty, so went to a local shop that sold them, tried their demonstrator and the low mid didn't work effectively on theirs either. I sold it and bought an Ashdown instead.

Any band would find it hard to compete with the visuals in a venue like that and U2 look like 4 ants on that stage. It would almost be worth the ticket price (which I'm sure was insane) just to see the show, above and all around you, and forget about the band.

As the years have gone on I've become economical with my fingers. I used to use two but I've noticed I'm down to one on most songs. I suppose if it was good enough for James Jamerson it's good enough for me.

If I've learned anything over the 40 years I've been playing in bands it's, you can never go too loud, or too light. If you can get both in an easily transportable box then you've hit the jackpot. Fender Rumble 500 V3, or Markbass 121 CMD P are the combos I'd go for, they're both loud and light. I own the Markbass shown above and it can mix it with a loud drummer. I have friend who owns a Fender Rumble 500 and it can also go very loud and is ridiculously light. Both can be bought for around £350/£400 secondhand.

I haven't been able to read the whole thread but in your initial post you said only the vocals and drums go through the FOH. It makes me wonder why the drums aren't loud enough to be heard acoustically out front? If your drummer isn't loud enough to be heard above the band, when you're playing in a pub, then the band is too loud. I like loud bands but I've rarely heard a band, playing in a pub, that drowns out their drummer.

I was at the back, the only other person behind me was him and his pal. Maybe he snuck up behind me so he could complain.......we'll never know.

The guy was making a point, as his view was not spoiled by my videoing. I'm not sure what point he was making?

I was at a gig of my Niece's band. She plays loudish rock and the venue had about 150 to 200 people there. I don't usually video bands that I go to see but decided I'd video one of the songs as a memento. After about 20 seconds some guy behind me asked me to stop videoing because it was spoiling 'his view'. I attempted to explain that I was videoing my niece and was only planning to video one song but he was having none of it. He could have stepped a foot to the left and he would have had a perfect view of the band. At that point I realised he was just being a total d***head and I felt I had no choice but to tell him to **** off! and have a nice day.

From looking at that picture it looks like the bridge is higher on the blue one than on the yellow/orange one. Which might account for the gap below the bridge? edit: double post!

From looking at that picture it looks like the bridge is higher on the blue one than on the yellow/orange one. Which might account for the gap below the bridge?

I played the exact same model in Edinburgh GuitarGuitar and, for some reason, didn't like it. It may have been badly set up, or had a chunky neck or something, I can't remember? I loved the look though. On the same visit I tried the MIM deluxe precision and loved that - probably because it has a Jazz neck.

When I was told by a management company in Glasgow, that my band had approached to take us onto their roster, that they couldn't take us on because, even though they liked our music, myself and the drummer were too fat. I was 23. ...and I'm still fat.

Learn to play guitar and to sing. I may sound like I'm being a smartiepants but I have a friend who is a professional bass player but got fed up being a sideman all the time. He picked up a guitar learned a few songs and now plays solo gigs to supplement his income from playing with bands. He can get a solo gig midweek gig much easier than he did playing with a band.

Good choice. I own a Rumble 100 V3, it has a great sound, it's loud enough to play live with a quiet drummer and is ridiculously light.

Tears for fears - songs from the big chair Prefab sprout - steve mcqueen Sade - promise

Well I've got 10 basses, 3 amps, 3 cabs, two combos and I now know what works for me and what doesn't. GAS is a distant memory now.

Ed Friendland has had a set of Labella flatwounds on his Precision for over a decade. He says they're just settling now Personally I can't wait that long, the set I got was replaced by roundwounds within a week.