New amps! Blackstar HT20 and HT5. After years of playing modellers, I’m blown away. And I preferred the sound of these to most of the £k++ amps so win-win!
New cabs! I’ll be keeping the bigger NL212 cab on the left. Neodymium speaker – super lightweight! It’s bright, so it couples really well with the darker-voiced Blackstar heads.
New gadget! I’ve yet to use it but I can stream anything from my phone to my amp for practising along with. Alternatively, I could have gotten a WiFi speaker..
New pedal-board, power supply and case! I’m sort of gutted to have sold the BCB60 board as it was so compact, the power supply worked fine… it was a great little package. This is more “professional” but we’ll see how it goes.
New acoustic pickup! I bought the K&K Pure Mini over other pickups as I’m not playing too many acoustic gigs where I need stellar output. It’s non-invasive and should work well. Sounds great. I also got an Orchid DI box which was cheap as chips and works well.
All that and….. I quit the band! You know what it’s like when you put a lot of effort in and others show up late or don’t practise etc… well, it had to be done. A shame, as it was so good for so long. Due to Edinburgh noise rules, it is difficult for a 6-piece rock & pop band to get gigs, so I’m now looking at acoustic gigs, with me doing some singing! Hopefully in future I can get back into a rock band so I can use my gear!
While I’m at it, here is a selection of songs our band did. I did a lot of adaptions to make songs recognisable with the absence of keyboards etc, so I hope to record myself playing them so I don’t forget all the nuances.
ABP songs:
Fleetwood Mac - The Chain Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way Billy Idol - White Wedding Alanis Morisette - You Oughta Know Abba - Does Your Mother Know Bryan Adams - Summer of 69 ACDC - You Shook Me G N R - Sweet Child O' Mine Kenny Loggins - Footloose Halestorm - Bad Romance Journey - Any Way You Want It Journey - Don't Stop Believin' The Vapours - Turning Japanese Cher - Turn Back Time Pretenders - Only Wanna Be With You Eurythmics - When Tomorrow Comes Survivor - Eye of the Tiger K T Tunstall - Black Horse + Cherry Tree Adele - Rolling in the Deep Bangles - Hazy Shade of Winter Anastacia - Left Outside Alone Blondie - Maria Whitesnake - Here I Go Again Texas - I Don't Want a Lover Kelly Osbourne - Papa Don't Preach Heart - Alone Bon Jovi - Livin' on a Prayer Pat Benatar - Heartbreaker Glee - River Deep Mountain High Pretenders - Brass in Pocket Joan Jett - I Love Rock and Roll Janice Joplin - Piece of My Heart Amy Winehouse - Valerie Pink - Who Knew Kelly Clarkson - My Life Would Suck Without You Adele - Rolling in the Deep Cameo - Word Up Deacon Blue - Real Gone Kid Tia Carrere - Ballroom Blitz Poison - Ride the Wind Marth & Muffins - Echo Beach Amy Mac - This is the Life Pat Benatar - We Belong Peggy Lee - Fever Laura Branigan - Gloria Patti Smith - Because the Night Pretenders - Hymn to Her Cheap Trick - I Want You to Want Me Blondie - Atomic
The acoustic set should hopefully feature some of these (plus more!):
1. Tainted Love
2. Say you Will (Foreigner)
3. Stand by me
4. La Bamba
5. Somewhere over the rainbow
6. Dust in the Wind
7. Big Love
8. Landslide
9. Holiday Road
10. Gentle on my Mind
11. Cheers
12. Cold as Ice
13. White Wedding
14. You’ve got a friend
15. More than Words
16. I kissed a Girl
17. Sweet Child of Mine
18. Hazy Shade
19. My Life Would Suck
20. Every Breath you take
21. We will rock you.
22. Iko Iko (Natasha)
I decided to stop writing articles on technique because technique develops over time, as does musicality (which is more important!), and I don’t want to offer erroneous advice. I still stand by my earlier articles, though 😉
I will be going to see these guys in a week or so (edit – I’ve been, and it was great!):
Looking forward to that!
The ALBUM is still progressing. Mainly drums for 3 tracks which is slowing me down. I need to do bass for a couple, some FX/vox for a few, and drums for another one. I have decided to leave off a few songs as there are already 11 on there. A shame, as it was a killer track. This thing needs to get finished, though – and soon, so I can reclaim my life!
No new videos – all effort has been going into the album, acoustic workouts and non-musical ventures (work!).
Ciao for now!
tommysixstring 