Leaderboard

It appears you are correct!

Ballroom Blitz has been in rotation in the 4-3-2-1 Club recently. Our drummers like to play it. So does everyone else. I always like this Steve Stevens and the Atomic Playboys cover of Action: And the original was fun, too. Edited to add: I want the drummer's t-shirt; looks like it says "13 Hit Wonder"

From pickguardheaven, aka pickguard planet, aka chandler music. Not sure about the white knobs. Previous black pickguard is in profile pic. Just trying things on for size.

White knobs = Nope

Went with my brother to The Eastern, a modern and well-run Atlanta venue. Sold-out show. They ran through a variety of songs from the Discipline-Beat-Three of a Perfect Pair era. It was energetic but a little strange. Danny Carey was the star of the show. Impeccable chops, and really balanced playing Bruford parts but making them his own. I couldn't pick up on a single error, and he seemed relaxed and happy the whole time. Levin was Levin. Switching between the Chapman Stick and two Music Man basses, his harmonies were spot on and he doesn't seem to age. My brother said he heard a couple clams, but nothing terrible. Vai looked like he was having more fun than on earlier tour videos I saw. The first set he was hard to hear, almost inaudible. One song into the second set a tech ran behind his amp stack and did something that suddenly made him absolutely deafening in FOH. He played a couple JEMs through a JC120 and two smaller amps, and while some key parts were essentially note-for-note Fripp parts, he was generally being Steve Vai interpreting King Crimson, which is exactly what you'd expect form someone of his caliber. A lot of really intricate tapping when you could see he was really focused, some rapid sweep picking, and not as much dive-bomb wackiness as you might expect. Belew. Well. He's always been a fun, energetic showman and he was still that. But there were a few times he got a little lost, especially in Frame by Frame. Whenever he actuated any solo effects loop (I saw a video of his pedalboard and it's like a space shuttle) it was overwhelmingly loud compared to his clean tones. He was fiddling with his amp a few times, and even opened his rack to adjust some pedal, and at one point a tech had to come out when a pitch shift wasn't working for him. By the end of the set his voice was giving out and he was yelping more than singing. The audio was pretty bad, frankly. Overall too loud for the room, and seemed to be volume wars going on, even as there were times low notes would hit a resonant frequency that made the room shake. As mentioned, Vail was almost inaudible before the intermission, then was suddenly way up front. Overall, the energy was low on stage and in the audience for the first set, but amped up considerably for the second half. The encore of Red was a highlight. It was a fun and interesting evening, and felt like, well, four all-stars jamming on the material of a beloved band. I don't think Fripp would have gone on tour with an outfit this loose, but it had it's own reckless rockin' energy.

Belew is an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He's incredibly talented but plays like he's brain damaged. When he just plays, he's a monster. Unfortunately, he gets so wrapped up in his effects and making noises, that he gets lost in a rabbit hole of sound effects, banging pots and pans and knocking on the body of his guitar that there's no longer any guitar playing going on. @BruceM and @MCChris bore witness to my Belew Rant some 10 year ago in Chicago at a Bears gig at some club, the name of which I can't remember. I wanted to throttle him at that show, and they wanted to throttle me in the back seat of the car on the way back to my hotel. And I'd do it again.

I only got to see them once - at an outdoor shed here near DC. They opened for Blondie and Pat Benatar, and just killed it.

I assumed Fountains of Wayne would be on there. I read that Chris Collingwood hated "Stacy's Mom." Paraphrasing, but he said when Adam brought the song in, he knew it was brilliant and might be huge, but also knew its jokeyness would pigeonhole them. I believe him, as that band had two songwriters who both wrote great melodies but Chris wrote serious, melancholy songs with kind of opaque lyrics, while Adam wrote funny storytelling hits for (literally) movies and musicals.

I've experienced 'too loud' more often than not, but I think my ears are on the sensitive end of the spectrum, my friends seem ok with what actually has been painful for me even with earplugs, - that was at Big Wreck last winter, it was bearable when I went to the back of the room. I'm sure there is a range of what level volume becomes uncomfortable among different people, and I always suspect that the sound guy has partially wrecked hearing from too many loud shows.

Pictures of the whole guitar please, that's a really beautiful color! That's a prototype with another control added?

I agree with others. The black knobs look better. What pickups you got in that?

Their Orca model took everything about an LP and dialed the sexy up to ten. The Dolphin looks like something they sucked all the sexy out of.

Rick Nielsen hated The Flame when he first heard it. Now it gets played at every Cheap Trick show. I Want You To Want Me was intended as a parody of the kind of song they hated. Think about being the guitar player in Survivor who has to keep that 16th note grind going for four minutes, or the guy who gets hired to play Edge of Seventeen for Stevie Nicks.

One of my fave bands in my formative pre-teen and early teen years! I had ALL their hit 45's. Couldn't afford LPs and it was difficult to get funding for LPs past my folks given their general distrust of all things rock n roll that didn't come from with Elvis. Fun fact: the boys in Sweet had an undeniable hard rock edge and butted heads with label because the management wanted more bubblegum radio hits material and they wanted to rock! Probably explains why I really liked the B-sides of their 45s. Medusa, Burn of the Flame, Restless, etc.

Sweet started out as a pre packaged band by a record company in Britain and the music was written by Chinn and Chapman. Think the Archies, Ohio Express and to an extent the Monkeys. The thing was the guys in Sweet had band experience and a rough edge in their playing and a vision of the direction they wanted to go. When those early songs were played live they really cranked the volume and distortion and it created conflict with the record label. They started writing their own stuff and the rest is history. Aerosmith supposedly was not all that thrilled with Dream On. Not that they hated it but it was supposedly written just for the studio and were surprised that it was released as a single. When it became a hit they knew they would have to play it live and it had a different feel from their set at the time and was difficult to play live.

Posting for a friend in So Cal. This is a guitar that I bought new through Greg Platzer some time back. I sold it to a guy who is quite serious about high end guitars. (Why did I sell? I got another in korina and another with a BRW neck. You know how that goes.....) My buddy is now in need of a bit of downsizing himself. And someone who has done tons of deals in higher end guitars and has shipped all over the world. But I thought I would mention it here, as I know we have some folks that love these. These are incredible guitars. As someone one said, "The voice of the angels". This model is essentially the same as a Dolphin, but has the redwood top over a semihollow body (no f holes). As much as the Dolphin is my long term go to guitar (more than a decade), the Redwood is just a bit sweeter in tone as well as being lightweight. I will come back and update when I get current pictures and an asking price. FWIW, the cheapest used one on Reverb is currently about $6k, with new ones going as high as $13k, though the latter is much more "tricked out". I am sure his price will be very fair. No vested interest, but I know this guitar and am happy to make an introduction to anyone interested. Here are some original pictures showing the one piece top and giving a taste of the figure in the custom ordered fingerboard and headstock. Come to think of it, I should probably sell one or two other model Hubers myself. But for now, I am only wanting to sell locally. 😉

A friend and I went to see Sweet last night. The audience has been in the mood and the band played the pass. For the first time in 40 years, since the album Level Headed, they played the long version of Love Is Like Oxygen. Andy Scott turned 75 this year. He performed fairly well. Of course had they played the long list of hits and a few new ones. A great sing along show though.

I drove a van load of gear to the IL Guitar Expo last weekend in hopes of liquidating most of my gear, and well the turn out was dismal. This weekend I’ll be at the Indian Guitar Show in Danville In . If anyone is in the area stop by and say hi. https://theindianaguitarshow.com/index

Allison Roberts was a criminally underrated, straightforward, balls out rock guitarist. I was curious if her live tone live was as good as it was on Spend the Night album, and damn. . . That's the kind of sound that made me want to be a guitarist in the first place.

Nice! Looks like a great refin. Black pearloid pickguards also look good on purple guitars imho. These are Squier Sonic Esquires; the necks are satin finish with vintage-sized frets and the action on both is about .040 on all strings. When I get bored with the ceramic pickups i've got a Megadrive and X2N ready to drop in, but they sound pretty good as they are. Cheap thrills as they say.

I looks great with the black knobs.

It looks great with the black knobs and sounds awesome at Platzer's hands. Enjoy. Love my stock Porto II

Is a triple-bucker mounting ring available in white? I was wondering how that would look. Or masking off the bottom diagonal portion and spraying the top diagonal white, while replacing the single coil with a white one.

Prototypes look great in all color combinations.

Well, it was your profile pic that made me decide to try a white one!

The late, great Ken Jones and I used to playfully debate Belew's playing. He was a fan, but I think he got my point when at one point he sent me a photo of Belew recording in his home studio with an array of pots and pans (I wasn't being sarcastic above - he really does this), spread out on the floor while he painstakingly tapped each one, undoubtedly looking for "The Sound." I can't find the picture for the life of me, but the look on his face was that of someone who was hopelessly lost in another universe. How ironic that he used to play with Zappa, whose 31st record was titled "Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar." Of course, Belew did not play on that one.

Exactly. On stuff like Elephant Talk, where he has to play a set part, he was in the groove and can clearly play brilliantly while singing. But if he gets some time to fool aound, it becomes randomly grabbing the neck of the Parker, abusing the whammy bar, and triggering a half-dozen wacky effects. It's really cool if you do a few times a set for ten or fifteen seconds, but the mugging and grinning at the audience while making 2 full minutes of noise... I lose interest.

White guard is cool to mix things up. I really like the black guard too.

Pickups from @JGravelin to roughly match the original 82 Dimarzios. “11.3k, Alnico 5 humbucker with a 6.7k single coil.” I got this on Craigslist and the original pickups had been replaced. I later got 82 pickups thanks to @HamStd . It seemed like a no-brainer at the time but I haven’t measured their output or felt inclined to switch them.

That’s great now!

Biggest Irish goodbye in rock n roll. No formal announcement, just went away. FIFY And when I saw them on the Bitchin' tour she sounded great.

Never heard of them.

Oddly, I am in complete agreement with all five artists on all five songs.

Dig in deep and you will find some heavy music in the Sweet catalog. This is NOT SAFE FOR WORK: The live version is even less safe for work.

I so wish I had seen these guys back in the 70’s. It just never worked out.

Fender's one-pickup Tele is called an "Esquire." Gibson's one-P90 LP is called a "Junior." Carondelet's TPA-90 pickup is a dogear/soapbar blueprint single coil that drop fits in a Tele bridge with zero mods. First-ever Carondelet custom "Esquire Junior." The three-way blade's positions are - pickup and volume only; - pickup and volume and tone knobs; and - pickup and volume with fixed 4700 pF capacitor for a funky cocked wah "schwa" voicing. If I may say so myself ... this guitar is absolutely badass.

Awwwww..! Da poor, wittle wock stars hating on songs that helped make them millionaires. Songs their fans adore. Pwayed, "Stairway...", a few too many times, Wobert Anthony? Awwwwwwww..! West assured that 8 minutes of your hootchie-cootchie, showboating scatting, ruining live renditions of the song you hate is agonizing for the audience, too. Fook dey bitchez! Give the people their hits. Better still, shut up about it and don't ruin it for us.

Church, bruv. Just ribbing ya. I'd love to jam with her, too. 'twould be a killer, dual guitar attack. Dare I say, a rock'n'roll juggernaut?

Hahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaah..! The Mathi cannot escape their powerpop roots!!

I was backing a very talented Nashville-based (all original) duo last weekend, and the singer/lead guitarist had been joking before we went on about not being able to remember some of his parts lately (he’s late 50s, and has been playing professionally since he was a teen - great musician). Maybe the third song into the set, he got a funny look and turned to me and said “Fuck! I can’t remember how that intro goes!”. I hummed it to him and he started chugging a few chords, until I stopped him and said, “No - that’s fucking “Jessie’s Girl”! You’ve got to start on D”. When we took a set break, he said he’s got to start writing easier parts. 😂

I’ll bet, ya pervo!

Most of the audience don't recognize what you think are gaps and misplays. I have the discussion with my son frequently. Anytime he pops up in the breaks and complains about fucked up parts, I say I haven't noticed. Which is actually true.

Unfortunately, I cannot divert my attention to read screens for parts. Plus, I'm of a mindset that the audience deserves better. Everyone's concept of entertainment is certainly subjective but a rock musician gazing at a screen to read their parts does not really fit in with mine. I guess it's along the lines of the HFC's commandment of "Thou shalt not wear shorts on stage (unless you're Angus Young) Not knocking tablets and prompters on stage- I know a LOT of pro's and semi-pro musicians who use 'em. I just can't and don't feel like I'm giving the audience a good visual portion to the show, staring at a screen.

"my memory functions akin to old Echoplex tape cartridge" That's a great line...can I use that?

This is a bass which I did not know existed a week ago. I had known of the MIM Geddy Lee Jazz Bass for years, and people said good stuff about it, but I was always like "well it doesn't have active electronics, blah blah blah". Well a week ago I was looking at Rickenbacker 4003 basses like a maniac, and got BGAS really bad. Then I sold two Carvin basses I had been trying to move to a new home for a while. (Don't worry I still have three Carvin basses), so with my 2 out 1 in policy, I could now get my first new bass in 7 years. I just typed in "Geddy Lee Jazz Bass", saw the USA model, and said "well crap". My first jazz bass was a Lake Placid Blue MIM standard jazz bass. I loved that bass, or more the look of it. The neck, well it may have been warped, or I just didn't know how to set them up yet. Anyway, I tried modding that, kinda screwed it up, and moved it on. But it stuck with me, and I have been planning, and still AM planning on getting a another lake placid blue jazz bass 4 banger, but with 60s pickup spacing. However the first jazz bass I ever saw was black, with a white pickguard. It's such a classy look, so I couldn't say know. Looked at a bunch on Sweetwater, saw a demo that was too beat up to interest me, and then really liked the neck on this one, and pulled the trigger. I got it in today, ran home from work, and after dinner, decided to learn how to play Tom Sawyer on bass through the GED-2112 preamp. This is advertised as having a "thicker" C-neck profile, and as far as I am concerned, it's perfect. Not super thin like some Jazz bass necks are. The fretboard and neck are gloss poly, but the back of the neck has the the finish sanded down a bit and oiled, apparently by hand, which makes it really comfy. It came with a great setup and fantastic intonation out of the box. As for sound, it sounds like a 70's Jazz bass. The bridge pickup is a bit more aggressive due to the slightly closer (3/8") position next to the bridge. The fretboard is really comfy, and feels great. This one I think is 9lbs 9 oz, so right around the middle of the range these seem to come in. Came with the usual case candy that "regular" USA fenders usually do, and i like how the price point of this bass is "regular", and not some custom shop level price. The fact that FMIC was running a 10% off promo through select dealers also definitely helped sweeten the deal. Now I think I need to calm down for a good while and work more on selling guitars instead of buying them.

I guess Dave's rig went to 11👊

Price?

Yeah, I am sure it is exquisite. But I like the green one. And, frankly, a Krautster with a wrap and one P90 (2 would be OK, too, but one is just cool). Pelham Blue or just a little bit more gray. No fake wear. Ebony Board. No inlays. There, I said it.

This huber is cool. I went and looked at the green thorn, though, and that is the bees knees. nice guitars.