What instrument do you play?

[V M]

I tend to do my tweaking on the tone and volume pots. Adding push-pull pots so I can split the coil or coil tap. I tried EMG active pups for awhile and immediately went back to my stock pups or Seymour Duncans or DiMarzios or a combo there of.

[klodefm42]

Does anyone have recordings? audio? of them selves playings? Dont it suck that analogs synthesizers have become so pricey.  I think vst's are awesome. Theres this thing called the vmachine. Its a box which you can load up vst's which is sweet cause one can have a variety of synth's in one box! http://www.smproaudio.com/english/products/v-machines/v-machine.html So I take it that no one here has played a navigator series guitar and or bass. I play to take my j5 into a shop and get it set up properly. Virginia, my J5 wont play in tune properly. It stays in tune sort of okay but in some plays it sounds out of tune. Could it be the fret board?

[Shana A]

if I start practicing again

Practice is over-rated.  Lets work on bad haircuts, even worse clothes and lots and lots of good press first.

Silly me, I've been going about this music career all wrong... actually learning to play my instruments!   

Ooo a one woman bluegrass band =D.

... with a baritone voice 

When I used to live in Atlanta I used to go to The Red Light Cafe a couple nights every month to listen to live Bluegrass.  Something I definitely miss.  American roots music has this essential charm about it I find totally endearing. 

What I love about it is that it's real. You can't hide behind effects or volume... what you hear is what someone actually played. It peaks form the heart.

Z

[tekla]

Silly me, I've been going about this music career all wrong... actually learning to play my instruments!

Doesn't that thought occur to you just about every other time you hear the current 'big thing'?

I often have thought that if you know more than three chords, your pretty much over qualified.

And hey, I've heard some pretty slick and commercial bluegrass over the years.  I'm not even sure about the 'roots' deal as it is largely a creation of the 1930s.

[V M]

You actually learn to play your inst.s? What an odd bird 

[Constance]

I'd love to get my hands on a Moog analog synth. But, there's this little spot of bother called "rent."

From the limited searching I've done so far, it looks like the microKORG XL is only about $500.  While that's still too much for me right now, that's a lot more affordable than a Mini Moog.

[tekla]

There is a well known female artist - and I'm not going to use her name - that when we were setting her up and told to pull out the guitars one of my coworkers said 'they are not really guitars, more like six string tamborines.'

Ouch.

And hey Shades, how do think I feel when I have to pull out and walk around with some $3,000 keyboard?

[Constance]

And hey Shades, how do think I feel when I have to pull out and walk around with some $3,000 keyboard?

If it were me, I'd be pretty damned nervous at first. Then, a potentially bigger problem would be that I'd get used to it. It seems that in getting used to it could lead to getting complacent.

[V M]

KlodeFM - I suppose it could be the fret board. But if the tuners are good, I would suspect the intonation settings at the bridge.

[Monique Martinez]

Does anyone have recordings? audio? of them selves playings? ..........

eek! Do I have no shame? This is the last thing I recorded over a year ago... my computer soundcard stopped working and I haven't fixed it yet *more shame*. I did this simple track just to test out my new big muff pedal, which surprised me.. ten million times better than my old proco rat.
http://www.upload-mp3.com/pfiles/57539/bigmuffer160.mp3

[klodefm42]

Great track! what did you use for the drums? A live drummer or a vst like bfd?

[V M]

I like it too. But it sounds like one of my old songs from 20 yr.s ago

[Monique Martinez]

Great track! what did you use for the drums? A live drummer or a vst like bfd?

Nah just fruity loops with upgraded drum samples that I recorded straight into cakewalk sonar.. you can hear the latency drag everything out of time towards the end.. yay >_> Will be recording live drums very soon though.

edit: hehhe! Yes this also marks an end of an era for me... everything from now on will be less formulated and more experimental!

[V M]

Everything has been an experiment for me.

[klodefm42]

hey virginia, do you have photos of your gear? And for songs, I tend to go with Reason. I sort of with the sequencer it came with was polyphonic, and the arpeggiator was more tweakable.

[Alyssa M.]

And hey, I've heard some pretty slick and commercial bluegrass over the years.  I'm not even sure about the 'roots' deal as it is largely a creation of the 1930s.

.... which was a result of people like Alan Lomax going all over the country and paying people ten dollars to sing into his can.

Old-time music (not really heard anymore is the roots of '30's "roots" which is the roots of country which is part of the roots of rock; spirituals are the roots of gospel which are the roots of Motown which are the roots of rap and hip-hop. The roots go down deep. You'll never dig them out completely.

[tekla]

Music lovers owe so much to Alan Lomax, and his  daddy John that it's almost a debt that can never be repaid.

[Shana A]

Silly me, I've been going about this music career all wrong... actually learning to play my instruments!

Doesn't that thought occur to you just about every other time you hear the current 'big thing'?

I haven't listened to anything currently popular in a long time. And I don't miss it.

I often have thought that if you know more than three chords, your pretty much over qualified.

Yep, that's pretty much the way it is.

Actually though, some of my favorite music doesn't use any more than three chords... I particularly love songs that only use one chord....

Z

[tekla]

I've come to the almost tragic conclusion after years of hearing the 'next big thing' before they became that 'thing' that the more I hate them, the bigger they are going to be, the more I like them, the faster the road to total obscurity.

[V M]

I've come to the almost tragic conclusion after years of hearing the 'next big thing' before they became that 'thing' that the more I hate them, the bigger they are going to be, the more I like them, the faster the road to total obscurity.

Hate me Tekla. Hate me more with every day. Then hate me more than that