Musical Adventures

Back in the late 80s and early 90s I was part of a numbers of bands as a bass player starting with my mate saying will you play bass.  We paid £10 for a "fretless" base and an amp, I say fretless as the previous owner had removed the frets.  My mate Sout tuned the strings to the notes I needed for Bryan Adams' Summer of 69 and 7 days later we had a gig with Disaster Area.  

Following several band names, Pickup Truck, Bare Necessities and others I can't remember, various band members and an upgraded bass and amp, on the 13 May 1990 as Shute the Tailor, me, Sout, Sammut and Julian hit a recording studio somewhere in Telford.  

A few hours later and we left with a cassette with three songs, ready to take on the world.

 

Life and time moved on and the cassette sat in my cassette box for 29 years, until I had the bright idea to publish it.  I had already played about with The Twelve Days of Project where my daughters and I sang a reworked version of the Twelve Days of Christmas for the project management profession.  I made a couple of mixes and released it via Routenote (referral link here https://www.routenote.com/rn/referral/2f85505c) to the world (available here https://amzn.to/3PcZPBj0).  I thought why not do the same for the demo on its 30th year anniversary, I spoke to the boys who were delighted and on the 13th May 2020 it was released on all platforms. Here is link to the Amazon https://amzn.to/3OTDtDn

In the time between my musical adventures we stalled, I always had a bass, bought a cheap electric guitar that I never really learned to play and even bought an acoustic bass that I played a bit.  In 2020 during lockdown I discovered the bridge on my acoustic bass had started to come away and I decided to buy a small "sheeran" size acoustic and found one on eBay for £20, cheaper a cheerful.  I learned more in the following 6 months than I had for years.

In Summer 2023 I started playing the bass again, I repaired my acoustic bass and found a rock school jamming session to attend with a couple of mates and I have got the bug again, this time performing live for the first time in quite a few years after only four sessions, followed up by a Christmas show and the latest June performance again with me singing, something I have always fancied a go at.

In between times I have got the bug for Cigar Box Guitar build, discovering the joys on Youtube when looking how to create a small travel bass.