I bought a bass guitar! I just went on Trademe and had a look for a giggle. Bid up to $79 and I actually got it!
Auction finished on a sunday morning – bad move for selling to muso’s, but hey – their loss, my gain.
I’m really excited about it. At first it just seemed like something cool to do, that I could do – another thing I like about being older now – often you can actually see that somethings just not going to work out.
But since I got the thing home, and realised what a good deal I got, and started playing, I got really excited about it, I got a big rush, just playing again and getting into it.
I had actually talked about getting a bass earlier on the blog, but I can’t find any of the best examples at this point, so just for your info its not exactly just out of the blue.
For a bit of history, I played bass in our high school indie/shoegaze band “Furver” which I am tending to invoke as I move forward on the next step – originally it was my Trip Hop outfit “Further” and I think that’s what it will be whenever I collaborate on non-drum and bass projects, well you can be in my band Further.
If you want.
It’ll still be a Trip Hop thing, but also a more indie, more spaced out and even dubsteppy thing. So back to the roots, but also baring fruits!
The idea of the Bass came in seeing so many white stripes type line ups emerging in my vicinity – there was cure motel and there was the neo-kalishnikovs, both which I toured with on Short Circuit tours, neither of which had a bass player.
But it was also a concept I called “Blenheim on a Tuesday” I saw singer/songwriters playing places like Blenheim on a Tuesday and I wanted to work out how I could play a cafe in a place like Blenheim on a Tuesday, so I could tour hard, playing 5 or more gigs a week.
Not with a pumping drum and bass set. But I could if I did low key trip hop/indie/alt country vibe.
This also came from a lot of discussion between darcy and I which led to him doing Cure Motel, that we felt instruments were needed to connect with audiences when the bloom came of the rose of the dance/electronica scene that grew in the 90’s. People wanted to see action, and as long as it sounded good then, great.
The common thread of course was versatility and economy when on tour or putting together a nights entertainment, and if you dig deep enough on this blog and elsewhere you’ll see how the concept of convergence led to idea I had of how a perfect performance would pitch itself.
I can play trip hop and slung back spacious and basscious stuff at the beginning of a gig, I can make it deeper and more meaningful with a vocalist there and I can progress toward more indie and alt country vibes, they can get heavier in their indie and punky disco influence, another band could take over at that point or I could just forge ahead into nu disco, indie rave, and electro, I could do some reality compound electroclash if I wanted to or just play the instrumentals. A DJ could take over playing house, breaks, electro even dubstep, or I could be the DJ, using my own way to get to the drum and bass place, then I’m able to go to the full blown shoegaze dubstep business, it could be an epic headliner, or completely slung out to be a dreamy wind down, and then back to where we started, trip hop, dreamy beats.
36 mins – trip hop / dreampop / alt country
36 mins – indie, electroclash, nu rave
36 mins – electro / house / breaks
36 mins – drum and bass
36 mins – dubstep / dreamstep / trip hop
and though each step mixes together, each can be played an individual short set, parts can be removed or added or elongated as is suitable to the venue.
If people want a drum and bass set or a live indie dubstep fusion band they can have it.
Or they can have the show I put on, and possibly, where I had to, I could carry a whole night on my own.
