Loretta's 60th at the Lockleys Hotel - April 29 06

For details on our next gig, at the Glynde Hotel, click here.

The Negotiators just played a 60th at The Lockleys Hotel for a long time follower of the band, Loretta. She had a ball through the evening, was nice to be able to give her back something for the loyalty she has given us. She had something like 120 people there, aged from (say) five to somewhere in the seventies - the bulk being in the later middle age bracket. Didn't lose many til after the third set, and still had around thirty left at the end, so we held the crowd fairly well. Apparently the exodus occurred shortly after a fight, which none of us in the band had been aware of until well after the gig.

Generally we did pretty good. Tempos were a bit quick in the first set, but that can be expected and it wasn't so fast that it sounded forced. After that it settled down well. Had around 15 min per break, with a last set that went for an hour and twenty.

The Cort guitar played well, was able to distinguish its various sounds quite well. Strangely for me, I played with the pick up selection in either the centre or the setting next closest to the bridge. Thus I was playing somewhere between a acoustic and a humbucker fuzz sound for most of the evening. I even managed to pull a couple of 'effects' out of the guitar, can't remember which song but I noticed that Chris heard and appreciated whatever it was I had done (I think it was in the Kinks 'you really got me', making the key chords 'warp'). Apparently we sounded good out the front in terms of mix, which is pretty fortunate as the rhythm section only heard Steve on the other side of the stage in patches.

Chris and Barry did really well, keeping up with what was for us other three a fairly well worn series of songs. At least half of them were open to experimentation on my part, so it was a fairly fun time that went quickly.

We had the privelege of Terry being there on the mixing desk through the evening. He pulled a bit of the bass out of Nancy's voice, which created some 'space' between it and Steve's guitar. This led to greater clarity of sound. He also pumped the keyboard when it took a lead role, and joined in the backing vocals as appropriate. What the audience would have most noticed was the lighting. Terry has continued to expand his lighting desk and capabilities, with a couple of mirror balls and set of floods on top of the two series of coloured lights he already had. My favorite light was the fire red flooklight on a mirror ball near the wall at ground level by the drums. Out of the corner of the eye it looked like the room was on fire, it was a very rich ruby coloured light.

We had Loretta's son, Peter, get up and sing six songs with us. These songs were his choice, and we have had three rehersal sessions with him over the past month. They were distinctly punk sounding - couple Green Day songs, Blink 182, Johnny Eat World, Living End and Oasis. During 'Holiday' we had someone come flying into the the stage and knock over stands, lights etc - she even managed to break a microphone stand when she landed on it. Quite a bit of chaos which we managed to keep performing though without missing a beat. Pretty cool for a punk song!

Probably the weakest side of the night's performance was the vocals. Nancy did great, as always, and many came up and complimented her at various stages in the evening. In the last set, however, her voice broke a couple of times which is unusual. My voice went in and out of being vocal and in tune. I think that's because I hadn't been too well the previous week. Steve seemed to be out of key several times, which was magnified by his putting his voice right up to his mike as though he were a lead singer.

Barry pulled it off. Nervous as hell to start with, I think his country origins show in the way he uses the bass to basically accompany the rest of the music. This is a different approach to the driving bass associated with modern rock. The songs where he did this, he did it well. Will be interesting to watch as his confidence develops.

The bar staff seemed to be impressed, by what I overheard of them talking as we were packing up (which task we will need to get more proficient at), and I believe we left several cards with them.

That's enough for now. See you at the Glynde on May 13.

Next Gig

Our next gig is at The Glynde hotel on May 13.

Click here for details.

For a report on our most recent gig, click here.

Guitar - Blue Cort G210

Today, I went back to Guitarworks and purchased my newest musical companion. She is a blue Gort G210 electric guitar and cost $379 (set up by Brian in store, 3 year warranty). I went to six other music stores and looked at all of their guitars. I tried several to get the feel of them.

I did a crash course (internet) last night, after looking around a few music stores in town, on guitar makes, manufacturers, styles, electrics, pickups, materials, etc. I then did the rounds again this morning with my newfound knowledge.

I ended up back at Guitarworks, looking at what had been the cheapest guitar ($200) I had looked at the day before. I finally sat down with a guitar and amp, and then played several others which were within my capacity to pay. The Chinese guitar I played first DID hold up pretty well - but I liked one other better.

She is deep ocean blue stratocaster shape with three pickups, the closest to the bridge being a humbucker. Her machine heads are diecast. Her neck is maple, with a rosewood fretboard, and has 22 frets. Her body is alder (same wood combination as many Fenders). She has five pick up selections, and two control knobs (volume and tone). The jack is at the bottom of the guitar, and her upper strap 'button' is placed on the rear of the body in the upper corner, rather than the more usual side. She is strung through the body, and has a white 'tap' plate.

Her action is relatively low, and quite comfortable on the neck. The humbucker give a more meaty sound at the 'lead' end of pickup selection (so I probably won't use it much), the single coils middle and neck pickups give a fairly bright sound. Even sparkly - which could certainly never be said of the Squire and Fernandez!

She is made in Indonesia. Initially, this gave me the shudders. After I bought it I thought of the cheap wages which probably keep the labour force at subsistence level and shudder again (too late). I can't help the later now.

As for the quality issue of instruments built in Asia, it seems that a lot of the world's guitars are built here now. Even five years ago, quality was dicey (the infamous 'Monday and Friday guitars' which were an inevitable consequence of then production methods being a source of angst).

Now, by all acounts, there has been a massive improvement in quality as the industry tooled up with computer and robotic gear, to more closely replicate the manufacturing of the 'traditional' sources. Many 'name brand' guitars are being built there now. Ibanez guitars are built at the same plant my Cort came from. Be that as it may, too me she felt better than comparably priced american, chinese, mexican or japanese guitars.

I am looking forward to working with this instrument, it will be exciting to develop my relationship with this guitar.

Guitar - Classical Yamaha

My Yamaha G228 classical (nylon string acoustic) is my oldest musical companion. I got it in around December 1, 1994. I woke up one morning and thought, 'I'll get a guitar today and start learning to play'. I was a student at the time, and it is therefore some kind of a miracle that I had around $120 to my name. So I went into town to the smallest guitarshop I could find (Guitarworks, then on Flinders St) and had a yarn with the young bloke behind the counter.

I said I wanted a secondhand guitar. He said they didn't have any. I looked disappointed. He relented, told me they had just received one on a trade in but it still needed to be fixed up and this would take a couple of days. I had a look at it. He played it a little (scales). I thought it sounded beautiful. We made a deal, I went back in a couple of days and it was waiting for me, all set up (adjusted) cleaned and polished (I bought a book on classical guitar and borrowed a friend's old Yamaha classical in the interim).

She's my favorite instrument. It's now had a flamenco tappa plate added, and is a wee bit battered (having been around of most of south eastern Australia and accompanied many campfire singalongs), but it plays as sweet straight and true as when first purchased. Truly, my oldest musical companion.

To visit the rest of my band blog, click here.

Guitar - Black Squire

My backup guitar is a black Squire Strat Affinity (with white tap plate), made in China. I bought it second hand for $120, I've seen new versions for price between $300 - $500, with mine in the lower third of range.

I've never really had much of a go on it. In it's younger days it tended to saw through strings a lot and have very high action which was quite difficult after the low action Fernandez. Rob, who was with Requiem from mid 02 to 04, adjusted the action down, which made it more comfortable.

It has a harsher sound to it, good for long hard sustain power chord type stuff. It's main disadvantages are that it is a bit heavier, I don't trust it not to break strings, it's electrics occasionally have a bit of crackle and, most significantly, it goes through periods when it doesn't hold tune at all.

I've never really developed a relationship with it, but it's been good as a backup in gigs.

Guitar - Black Fernandez

As regular readers of this blog will know, I have had lots of problems with my guitars over the past year and a half. For the record, I have a black Fernandez (borrowed from someone called Allan six years ago, haven't seen him for years, am still waiting to return his instrument) and a backup Squire Strat ('Affinity series). Both of these instruments have done me fairly well, particularly the Fernandez.

The biggest problems with the Fernandez have been its stringbreaking history, the lack of sparkle in its sound, a certain flatness in the harmonics between the first and thirteenth frets and the output jack's connecting screws constantly loosening themselves, creating on at least one occasion a bird's nest of wires as the whole assembly left the guitar body when I tried to pull out the lead!

If you're wandering why I have persisted with Fernandez despite the above problems, I can only see because it feels good, is good to play and it has withstood a lot of use over the years. However, every guitar has its day, and its day has come.

Next Gig

To see some previous Glynde photos, click here and here.

To see a report of our most recent gig, click here.

To see a report of our most recent gig at The Glynde, click here.

The Glynde Hotel is on the corner of Payneham and Glynburne Roads.