Paul K

Lunch Money The Shenanigans (Hugo: I like "Tongue 'n Groove". )

The Snot Rockets

I do "Another Day" in my solo act. I like playing it, it's a great song. But I hear crickets. It's a tune I'll play when there's a slim crowd and so not a lot of background noise; it needs the sonic space for nuance or else it doesn't sell.

Sweet. Done buying basses? Ha! You funny!

I totally dig M-5's first disc, no doubt. There's three of those tunes in my solo book. My bad for losing track of what they're doing except for what's on the radio. But the first disc was on constant rotation for quite some time in my five disc changer BITD.

Dread Mullet

Ladies and Gentlemen; I've long said that with CNC machining, body and neck construction and construction materials are highly over rated. Pickups, strings, setup are 95% of electric guitars and basses. It appears I was off by 5%. You'll dig this. Cheers, Paul K

Ladies and Gentlemen; No, not really. But a year ago I did buy an Ovation Celebrity that I never really got to be friends with. I changed strings three times, and still cold because it wasn't the strings. I watched some youtube videos on fret leveling and crowning, bought some cheap tools and spent two or three hours making things right. I should have done this a long time ago, as I now have a nice guitar. OK, so...shame on Ovation for selling such a crappy setup. But my message is don't be afraid. Cheers, Paul K

I believe the rules are: "Pics or it didn't happen". I don't make the rules, I just enforce them. Very glad you've gotten the "all clear."

I chatted with the fella who I think I got the viral cootie from. He's in the hospital on oxygen. Not intubated. Everything else like clotting factors and yada yada's are good. But....you know. So glad I was vax'd.

Presence or absence of glasses has nothing to do with when/if you get cataracts; the two are like a broken leg and pneumonia. They might both suck, but they have nothing to do with one another. Bottom line is that if you get old enough, you will get cataracts. And gray hair. So I hope y'all live long enough to get cataracts. "They" almost never do cataract surgery just to get rid of the need for glasses, even though ditching of the glasses is a wonderful bonus part of the procedure. Dunno if that's good news or bad news?

Ha! I certainly understand that changing horses mid-stream because of an internet doctor's advice would be...uh.....weird. But it shouldn't change the insurance claim and there's lots of lead time for the surgeon. Surgeon's office is very used to fielding questions about that stuff. But yes....I get it. "But honey! Dr. K from the guitar forum said......"

Indeed, the idea of trying it first with contact lenses works in theory but not in practice because when we try it out the patient usually already has some decent cataracts to start with, so the result is that....They All Suck. I find that if a patient has a previous history of monovision contact lens wear before their cataracts got to be the limiting factor then it's a really easy clinical decision to make. No history of that in this case, so that is why I suggested that the near vision eye be not really all the way near vision but only 36" computer vision distance. It's much less of a difference Right vs left than a full-on 16" reading distance lens and is much more likely to be tolerated.....but also much more likely to need to put on reading glasses to see the fine print, yada yada. Avoiding a second surgery is clearly a worthy goal.

I'm an optometrist for the day gig. So just thinking out loud....for the second eye: if you get it corrected so the second eye is still a little nearsighted, say, so that it focuses perfectly at 3 feet away then you'll still see good enough for distance vision to drive without glasses but will be able to see at the computer screen distance and music stand distance perfectly with the second eye without glasses. You'll be able to see your phone if you make the font a little bigger and hold the phone a bit farther away: good enough to check your messages. Then put on the appropriate power glasses to see small print and other really small stuff at your normal reading distance. And perhaps, if you're really finicky about distance vision, a light pair of glasses to make your near eye see great for distance to make driving at night or in the rain a little easier. Yes, I know: you'll still need glasses, but you'll need them a whole lot less often. And of course, YMMV. For instance, people with small pupils reach for their reading glasses much less often than people with large pupils. Anyway, that's my plan for when it's my turn. And I'm happy for you that it's working out. Ain't that just the coolest sh*t on the planet? Stunning stuff. Right up there with my artificial hips. Life changing.

I think totally differently. My speaker is not a part of my instrument. What I hear in my headphones or on my studio speakers is what I want to hear live or recorded. It's easier and more consistent gig to gig, place to place, and in your case, coast to coast. So all I need is a decent PA speaker; flat, full, loud, cheaper. No low B string, so that last half octave isn't an issue. Get to the gig before the drummer so I can place my speaker in the corner....and I'm done. Before lockdown I bought an Alto TS308 for my solo gig. I've used it on several jazz gigs (trio, no drummer) on bass to great results. I've been tempted to buy an Alto TS312 and make that be my all purpose bass-or-solo-act amp. Rock gigs have PA support, so the board gets a direct out and one well powered twelve is enough for stage volume. But if another piece of gear comes into the house, then something else will have to leave the house....so we'll see. Might have to sneak it in the back door when she's not around.

Vaccinated and healthy: you'll test positive for the antibodies but not the virus. The test they give you to see if you have it tests for the virus. It's not 100% accurate; there are some false positives and false negatives. So I could be down with a regular cold but falsely tested positive for COVID. But I doubt it. And word is that yes, if you get sick anyway post-vaccination, the cootie will tend to be less severe. Mine is more severe than I anticipated. Not near needing a ride to the hospital, but have officially run out of Nyquil at my house.

Ladies and Gentlemen; So I got on the VAX train early thanks to being in the health care industry. I played a couple shows this past weekend on bass. You should'a heard me; I tore it up. Fearless Leader was moaning about how a couple of his workers tested positive. Later in the Sat. night he mentioned not really feeling well. I got the note on Monday night that he tested positive himself (so he must have had the test Friday). Monday afternoon I was also feeling kinda bad, so skipped my work trip scheduled for Tues-Fri and got tested. Positive, so I'm on the shelf for ten days. I didn't mask up at the gigs, but didn't think much of it at the time as I was far away from the crowd, vax'd, and only close to my three band mates. So...my bad. And boy howdy is the Mrs. K pissed at me. I'm on the mend and it didn't hit me hard, thankfully. So in the words of the old guy at the beginning of "Hill Street Blues", uh...."Be Careful Out There." Take it seriously and mask up even when you think you don't have to anymore. Cheers, Paul K

Indeed, I agree. Interesting. My hunch is that working the inside of today's electronics would be a tough nut to crack unless that's already your bag. I have an Ashdown Superfly amp that has two 250 watt power amps in it. I wanted to re-work it so that the effect loop return was stereo; I figured that should be easy since the effects loop return goes straight to the power amps. Ashdown sent the the schematic and said words to the effect that "Not gonna happen unless you start from scratch". (And you know...how come it wasn't engineered that way from the beginning? Would have cost an extra 50 cents.)

Where I live buskers can't do any amplifiers. So check your local requirements. Or I'd say just find a spot with 110v nearby until the constable tells you to move along. You won't go to jail for the first offense. And a permit if there's one to be had: I have one, but nobody has ever asked for it except for in Alex Bay, NY where they knew damn well I didn't have one, and in Savannah when I was busking near the line for early voting where I wasn't supposed to be. The voters dug it. Did not play any political tunes. Another option is get the permission of a store owner and use their juice. If the cops give you grief you can say, "The shop owner said it was OK."

Happy birthday, baby! Ooooh! Me loves the tapewounds!

I had a gen 1 and a gen 2. Loved them, but the motors need a tear down at exactly 120K (or 85K if you got the turbo....) No one in town knew how to do it, as this was before Youtube. I miss them both.

I also owned a Peavey Hernia, and for a good long time. I put wheels on it. Still heavy. I put side handles on it. Still heavy. I even put a tweeter in it, which added a lovely hiss noise. Still heavy. But it fit into my first generation Mazda RX 7. Wish I still had that car. I bought mine used, and it came with an even heavier EV speaker that sounded great. I put it on top of an 18" cab with another EV in it. F'n great! The 18" cab did not fit into the Mazda. Those 200/300 watt numbers were very, very conservative. It was loud.

My first fretless was a Peavey Foundation. It was solid, easy to play, easy to adjust, solid. I only culled it from the herd as it had fretless lines, so the side dots were in between the frets instead of at the frets. Love the slim neck, tighter string spacing. Congrats on the Budget Find.

Backing tracks I recorded for the jazz standard "Just Friends". It needs a melody and solo, but needs a different voice, as more bass or guitar would be just more bass or guitar. Anybody know a sax player that could fix that situatioj?

Back at 'cha, baby!