I believe I have enough patch cables now... #music #bass #pedalboard #guitar #synthesizer #wah #blog

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Rebuild pedalboard KLAXXON! This is one task my personality can really get into. My experiments with pedals (I’m usually a multiFX Guy) has yielded enough surprising tone that the pedal count needs a bigger board. So... I GOT A BIGGER BOARD. @gear4music did next day on this without asking and delivered yesterday, bless ‘em. So now the synth rack is going to get a serious mounting. Looking forward to the Great Arrangement... it’s all for the new project in the new year, exciting times #blog #musician #bass #synth

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Open Mic night down at the Redan bar in Wokingham. During the summer it's all outdoors out back, but its moved back inside. Suddenly it's like an oven in here! Full band is on call, the house already has 2 sax players, 2 drummers and 3 bassists. The inimitable Jack Craig is on guitar. The mans's a machine. The quality of the musicians at this is daunting - the PA is great too: actual live mixing. The sax is getting an excellent reverb treatment as I type. Moody. #blog

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My office for the night - the Fisherman's cottage in Reading, right next to the Kenner and Avon Canal. When you see it from the front, you have no idea how nice it is inside! Music night out on by Laaz of Laaz Readirock. Good acts, just jammed with a looper act and on with the Old Souls @ezra78 @silqemusic @demetriuslawrence @jajiiofficial soon. #blog #music #bass #basslife

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Nice lighting for a gig in the wilds out west just before Xmas - Rikkers in the house #basslife #blog

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More surprise weddings! I'm here near Cambridge on a 24-hour notice Dep gig with LoveShovel (Berkshire's hardest working band!) - the venue is a beautiful converted barn, and the set is very funky indeed. Good times. #blog

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Playing a “serious” gig on an unfamiliar instrument… insight and connection!

Great weekend – I played a wedding gig at Beaumont Estate in Windsor: and it got me thinking about my style of bass playing, and the way I tend to play at the moment (I’m playing a lot of open mic nights, covers of funk and soul stuff in the main).

The venue itself is pretty grand – you’d think Obama lived there (the bride and groom left via this door, epic wedding photo) – we played the first set during parts of the ceremony in the Hampton Suite (arf arf!)

The setlist was in two parts – the second being the reception, your classic wedding gig. But the first half was something else: playing around the actual ceremony – I’ve never done this before. Bird did a great job of pulling rehearsals together, including smaller ones for this “acoustic” set – no drums, but a little percussion. The setlist was a nice little collection of songs to cover the initial wait for the bride, then a song to play as the bride comes in – I had no idea what this would feel like – and a couple more tracks to play while the register was signed and the cake was cut.

So – a great little gig with something completely different!

All the rehearsals were done with the modified Tobias – I used the different modelled basses (P-Bass, in the main) for the soul and funk tracks to give a little authenticity to the sounds. I can’t recommend Roland’s bass modelling enough – it’s supremely tweakable, and the tones really are very good, particularly in a band setting. All this from the same GK-3B pickup which can drive MIDI. Genius stuff! The rehearsals went pretty well – the 4 tracks we were doing for the ceremony part were:

• Ordinary People (while the guests were waiting)
• Can’t Take My Eyes Off You (Aisle song – for the entrance of the bride)
• At Last (Etta James) – for the bride and groom to walk out to
• Somewhere Only We Know – for the register signing. This is the Lilly Allen cover, which is really stripped back and quiet, but pretty.

The night before the gig, I was looking at the tracks and wondering – could I play these in a more sympathetic way? The electric bass can be sophisticated, and quiet, but… what about double bass?

I was lucky enough recently to purchase a secondhand NS Design 5-string upright bass – this thing is futuristic, goes down to a low B, and has a switch to move from fingerstyle to bow playing – and it came with a bow! “The bass sounds great”, I thought, “but I’ve only been playing it for 3 weeks… could this work?”

The evening before the gig I tried a few ideas out: the tracks aren’t too tricky – ordinary people has a nice simple structure, I know can’t take my eyes off you really well from previous gigs. After maybe half an hour of practice, “At Last” started to sound the part – that track in particular really benefits from double bass, it makes the track swing and jazzes it up in a way the electric can’t.

But the real revelation was Somewhere Only We Know – I spent half an hour trying to make it work fingerstyle: the original Allen cover doesn’t have any bass on it, so it wasn’t working too well. Then I tried the bow – long bowed notes were a little intrusive, so i wondered about doing a sort of pizzicato bow thing – much beloved of Coldplay (irony!!!)…

It felt good – it put some rhythm back into the track, and made a great counterpoint for one or two longer bowed notes. When Nic got back home in the evening, she said it sounded great, so I decided to give the double bass a try – my first ever gig with a double bass! This is the beast…

Simple controls – volume, tone and the toggle switch to switch the pickups between fingerstyle and bowed use. If you try fingerstyle while it’s in bowed, you get a lot of attack but no sustain – the pickups align their sensitivity somehow, I suspect they may have 2 sets mounted in there at different points on the bridge.

On the day, the guys in the band were blown away by the difference it made to the set – I was really pleased with the result: it felt so much more sophisticated for the happy couple, who, of course looked amazing.

Here’s some more pics of the venue, from the inside:

Stretch yourself out there. Comfort zones can be breached – but make sure it’s going to work first!

Sometimes the Music takes you to beautiful places. What a place to get married! #blog

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So much fun last night headlining BBC Introducing at @purpleturtlereading with @shaydesagram - nice working with you, @demetriuslawrence! And @marisasingsalot was in huge voice. Massive sounds from David on keys and violin, I call him the "polymuse". #blog

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Time for a gig with the wonderful @shaydesagram - @marisasingsalot and @demetriuslawrence the talented buggers #blog

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It's painstaking work, but it'll be worth it. Matchsticks make excellent filler for pickguard holes drilled in error by previous owner. She'll have full pickup covers and look very retro chic. Just redrilled the front pickup position so it's actually centred on the strings. #blog #bass #bitsabass

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The #bass build continues. This is a nice Allparts body (http://ift.tt/1ObKUyh) which a fella loaded and sold fully loaded to me on Fleabay for £117. The fella who worked on it tried to fit the scratch plate and bridge at least twice - luckily the hardware covers the scars. I've just spent the last couple of hours filling in all the screw holes!! #blog

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I'd say I have a project to finish... #blog #bitsabass Seymour Duncan quarter pounders, ebony fretless neck, Schaller tuners, and full fender pickup cover set. It'll be a beauty and sound good with any luck!

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I'm out here at Yates's bar in Reading (near the station) for the Jam night! 6 string to the fore #blog #music #jam #bass #Roland #gr55

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Ready? Set? (Yes)... go. #Shayes #blog #music #camden #proudcamden

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Just repaired an old friend: my Crafter BA-500 acoustic. New nut, new brass pins: she's as good as new! Ready for summer acoustic gigs. #blog

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Marshall do a Bluetooth speaker(!!) - they do these for £150 at GAK, and they sound really good! http://ift.tt/1RfIkMs #blog #music #Marshall

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Jam Night at Yates's in Reading - nice venue up here! #blog

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Not just a pretty #bass groove - I can fix 'em too! The OBP-3 stopped working last night: tracked it down to the blue cable which had dropped off the volume part of the Warwick pot. FIXED! Yay! #blog

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The only trouble with this MarkBass cab is that it's waaaaaay to fluffy and comfortable. #FelineBassLovers #LowEndBeds #blog #shaydes

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