Dave Vader

I remember being young, and thinking it would be a great song to do, and really enjoying it, and all the older guys in bands I was in, sighing and shaking their heads. But dagnammit, the commitments had just come out, and everybody loved that song. 20-something years later I am also sighing and shaking my head... i understand now,

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1398251339' post='2432027'] £7247, IIRC [/quote] How disappointed was he when he opened your cheque?

[quote name='UglyDog' timestamp='1397755294' post='2427154'] To be honest, this has long mystefied me. I mean, when you think about it logically, it does follow that one's most sensitive and for want of a better word 'dexterous' hand should be the one doing the fretting. So why is this not the case for 99.9% of us? How do we end up doing the comparitively ploddy plucking stuff with the same hand we write with, and doing the intricate notey stuff with our weaker limb? Why is it that it feels so natural to be doing it, effectively, arse about face? [/quote] Cos that's the way we were told to do it (I reckon it was a lefty that came up with it, conspiracy theory no. 1)

[quote name='SubsonicSimpleton' timestamp='1397747575' post='2427065'] Reading through this thread I did notice that one aspect of this whole argument seems to have been overlooked, so I'll don my asbestos underpants and play devils advocate; Is lack of choice really a problem, or could it also be viewed as an advantage? Right handed bass and guitar players are overwhelmed with choices, which seems to lead quite easily to serious GAS which is basically an excuse to avoid practising because buying a new bit of kit believing it is the answer to your problems is easier. So if you viewed the situation from the POV of being a musician rather than a consumer/collector, being restricted in what is available to purchase shouldn't be a massive issue, as it is one less distraction from actually making music. The most talented musicians that I've had the good fortune and pleasure to play with all stuck to one instrument which they were intimately familiar with, and in the ocasional situations where I saw them pick up something else, they still sounded good and very much themselves. Conversely, I've also met plenty of bad/mediocre (mostly guitar) players with really extensive instrument/equipment collections, and if you can't play for toffee, a megabucks dragon inlay PRS and a boutique amp isn't magically going to endow you with talent. As a percentage, how many instruments actually get played on a daily basis as opposed to being ornaments, or sitting in their racks/cases unplayed for months or even years on end? Was Jaco Pastorius disadvantaged by using predominantly the same sunburst jazz his whole career? Undoubtably if you want to go on a massive GAS binge as a lefty and welcome the inherent financial issues that will arise, or are sufficiently rich to not care, then lack of choice is going to be frustrating, but is this really a barrier to making music, or just materialistic consumtion? [/quote] I like this.

Saw another fantastic lefty guitar player last night, he had turned it upside down, didn't even change the strings around. Played rings around most other guitarists I know. Said it was how he'd learned it, so it seemed pretty normal to him.

[quote name='Weststarx' timestamp='1397595550' post='2425585'] I'm itching to write my own stuff, I'd love to write some prog rock/metal, but the software to do so is far to much money. (If anyone has a cheap alternative please please please let me know) [/quote] And perhaps a guitar as well, has always served me quite well for writing songs. [quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1397651888' post='2426050'] I am never thinking about Moondance. [/quote] and yet you're always bringing it up?

here's the proof it was only 5 years ago I fixed it up... [url="http://www.talkbass.com/threads/rebuilding-a-p-bass-copy-step-by-step-and-fun-to-watch.558473/"]http://www.talkbass.com/threads/rebuilding-a-p-bass-copy-step-by-step-and-fun-to-watch.558473/[/url]

[quote name='keving' timestamp='1397648498' post='2425980'] Silk gloves? I'd want a pair a marigolds before I played that bass [/quote] It didn't look so bad before I chewed up the rusty screwheads trying to get the pickups out, honest guv.

Surprising isn't it? Forget relicing, if you want an aged look to your bass, just give us a lend of it for a year or so. I can add mojo.

You know the worst thing about this? I only refinished and fixed it all up about 5 years ago. Those pickups were brand new then.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1397503098' post='2424605'] Looks more like the corrosive effects of... oh I dunno... cider maybe?? [/quote] There may be a bit of cider in there...

(it didn't look much nicer around the wizards on the fretless if I'm honest, but didn't take photos of that)

Decided to swap my old pickups out for the wizards that were in my fretless P, which is probably going to get sold. As I got under the pickguard I discovered the problem with gigging it for years and years with big sweaty hands, playing right over the pickup. After managing to get the rusted to crap screws out, the accumulated finger gunk in the gaps round the pickup, looked like this. Wish I'd put big ashtrays over it to stop me doing this now.

This is my favourite, it sounds amazing, plays beautifully, and keeps making me play it over and over again. But it is not a looker...

[quote name='Truckstop' timestamp='1397167720' post='2421525'] Shirt and shoes. Cannot go wrong! [/quote] Don't forget your Trousers

Character, it has to make me want to pick it up over and over again. So I voted playability, which may be the same thing.

[quote name='NancyJohnson' timestamp='1397128220' post='2420906'] Damn, that website is irritating. [/quote] It is, but the pickups are awesomely ace, I've got set of texas floods in my strat, and they are sublime.

I'm a bit on the ambidextrous side (though I would say more ambisinister ) I did originally pick up a guitar the lefty way round, but my ever helpful Dad told me it was the wrong way up (and it was his guitar) so I diligently learned it the right handed way, I am mostly right-handed so it made sense. Shame really, cos years later I saw the guitarist in welsh band Anfehrn (at least I think that was how they spelled it) playing upside down, without changing the strings round, and he sounded awesome. Plus everyone remembered him cos of his upside down guitar.

We tend to wear this sort of thing on stage as well Was easier for me, I dress like this all the time anyway.

Scary Biscuits. Everything for a fee

anyone in the Devon/Cornwall area who needs gigs, I am being offered more than I can do at the moment, please ask if you want work.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1396446606' post='2413743'] I imagine that I'm in a minority here, but I don't gig. That's not to say I wouldn't enjoy doing so - it's just not something I can commit to at present with the demands of family and work taking priority. But it's not something that bothers me either. That's perhaps because I'm a [i](hobbyist)[/i] producer first and a [i](fumbling) [/i]bass player second. My real love is just the process of making music, rather than necessarily performing it, and that's something I can do quite happily without an audience. I get feedback on my music from various communities online (including this fine establishment! ) and the occassional airplay, and while that's no substitute for live performance it is a useful form of feedback. If I wasn't interested in production and just had the option of noodling along to songs at home then yes, I think I would get bored very quickly. I also have mid-/long-term plans to take my music out into the world and perform it live (including an ongoing collaboration with Mike/urb here on Basschat), so live performance is certainly in the pipeline. It's just not my raison d'etre. [/quote] ah, that's what I would like to be able to say. Sadly I need to gig still, mostly for the moolah.

Ask me again later, right at the moment it seems an appealing idea to not gig....

[quote name='Mark Dyer' timestamp='1396006238' post='2408884'] How would you know? [/quote] Fair point, well made has it got better since I last tried?

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1396006377' post='2408886'] Perhaps no one told him . . . . [/quote] Genuine LOL, hope the boss didn't hear....