Grooverjr

Almost inconceivably ugly. It will never play, anyway - someone nicked the pups and replaced them with giant Jenga blocks.

Kubicki factor. Not strictly a headstock but.....phwoar! Of my current basses, the ACG angled headstock is my favourite

This is true but sometimes just working on getting simpler stuff perfect makes me feel like the articulation has improved when I go back to something harder. May just be perception, of course....

Interesting topic. I'm not in a band so I can't get the same locking in joy from a chugger that you get from connecting with another player. For me there are some lines that are just more fun or more 'right' than others because they chime with me or because they define the song in some way but I think mainly because they are the Goldilocks of busy enough but not overplaying. Obviously skill level is a factor so I'm not trying any Sheehan or Marcus Miller and I wonder whether it's skill or a weirdly protective attitude to Alphonso Johnson that make sme just not like Jaco (probably the former). Christmas Wrapping was mentioned earlier and that's a great example of what I love because while it's not 'hard' it's busy and varied enough to keep it interesting and a real challege to get the main verse line really clean every time. I think the bass on Silk Sonic is masterful because it ticks all the boxes for me and again sits in the interesting but not hard camp. And that use of space - glorious. Rhythm Stick as recorded is about 4bpm too fast for me to get all the notes across all the strings cleanly in the verse line but it's such a good workout that I still love playing it and when it does flow perfectly on the odd occasion it's a lovely feeling. Psycho Killer or Roxanne or Sound and Vision are good examples of lines that are very simple but there's something about how they lock in that is just so satisfying. Same with lots of the Cake basslines which I've been having some fun with recently (I could sit on the verse riff of Sheep Go To Heaven for 10 mnutes straight and not get bored because it feels so good in a tactile way) . Roly Wynne (RIP) is my all time favourite bassist and the 'classic' Ozric Tentacles lines are often a real challenge because they don't always sit right under my fingers but I can appreciate their brilliance all the same and enjoy trying to understand all the little variations, even though I don't know enough music theory to get half the weird modes they're using so some of the notes just seem 'wrong' to my brain even when they sound right to the ear.

It was either Johnny B Goode (with me on vocals - once and once only) or White Room. Scout hall in Bexley when we were about 16. Crowd reaction? Well, I was on a promise with a girl I was very into until she saw that gig and went off with someone else. We were bad, but it kept us off the streets and I quickly learnt that drummers are complete nutcases so it wasn't wasted time!

I thought it was Dean then decided that I had always got it wrong and didn't check. Thanks for letting me know as I am allergic to wild boars 🤣

Veering off topic somewhat but speaking of men of their time, is that The Hairy Cornflake at the beginning of the 'My Generation' clip? I only remember him from his 80s iteration but he looks a bit more aggressive there. As a London lad the only time I have been genuinely scared in a pub was in the Forest of Dene in about 1995. A few mates went down for a weekend and we went into a pub where, in my memory at least, everyone looked like that - almost as if they were still in black and white. They made sure we had all bought a drink but had not had time to take more than a sip or two before they told us to do one if we wanted to leave with legs intact. We assumed it was thier way of getting free beer so finishing someone else's drink / cigarette / food became known as 'doing a Dene' for a while.

Thanks for this - I had never seen it. Fantastic. That's what a tight, creative, musically very accomplished 4 piece can be at its best. Always better live for me and I'm not a big fan of their studio stuff in general but even there Moon's drumming just jumps through everything and smacks you in the face.

All the entrances will be covered by CCTV and it's not that easy to slip a bass under your jacket so nobody is going to steal it without being very easily identified. As such I'd think they are probably safer in a hotel room then just about anywhere else.

I find it's much easier to keep the tightness on the skippy pedal in the verses of COTG with a pick. I'm not a big metaller so don't have that kind of stamina and I start to fall out of time a bit after a few minutes with the fingers. Or it may be because it's one of the very few tunes I still play from when I was a teenager with a pick (but without a clue 😆). As for the best Geezer lines, for me it's Paranoid pretty much from start to finish. From that noodling at the start of War Pigs onwards it's consistently great. The killer tone, the ability to squeeze soooooo much heft and feel out of just pentatonics and R 5 O and the way his parts weave so perfectly with the guitar and drums. Stellar stuff.

It's more of a winter drink, isn't it?