Worst bass "lip-synch" solo ever?

[PWV]

At the 2:04 mark... never knew a Les Paul GUITAR could sound that way!



10cc - I'm Not In Love (Christmas TOTP '75) - YouTube




Edited to add: I've always loved this song - don't know why they couldn't have added a fake bass player or panned to the keyboards in back for the TOTPS taping...or something. Whatever.

[berwick63]

Ever consider the guitarist has flatwound strings on his LP? Definitely looks like he's playing whats being heard

[jordak]

octaver pedal?

[PWV]

Originally Posted by berwick63

Ever consider the guitarist has flatwound strings on his LP? Definitely looks like he's playing whats being heard

Agreed he's playing along - and I've been wrong before - but if that's not a P-bass with flats....I'll...I'll...do something. Like play guitar instead of bass.

[rtslinger]

Okay time to play 6 string

The Gizmo
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Gizmo (or The Gizmotron) was an effects device for the electric guitar, invented ca. 1973 by the English rock musicians Kevin Godley and Lol Creme, whilst they were members of the British rock group 10cc.

The Gizmo first featured on 10cc's instrumental "Gizmo My Way", where it is played as an interesting slide guitar effect amidst a type of laid back beach music.

Later it appeared on 10cc's second album, Sheet Music (1974) on the track "Old Wild Men". The Gizmo also appears sporadically throughout 10cc's 1976 "How Dare You" LP. It also appears distantly throughout their 1975 hit song I'm Not In Love but surfaces in the middle and closing sections of the song doing cello lines.

Its ability to create a wide range of sounds was central to the production of Godley and Creme's first post-10cc project, the 1977 triple concept album, Consequences. Godley and Creme left 10cc to create "Consequences" which was intended to be a promotional album to market the "Gizmo".

The "Gizmotron" name comes from the idea that it was intended to be a non-electronic and non-synthetic competitor in the market of other "orchestral" instruments like the Mellotron, Orchestron, and Birotron.

According to Paul Gambaccini's sleeve notes for Consequences,[1] 10cc were unable to afford an orchestra for their early albums, so Creme and Godley imagined an effects unit that would enable a guitar to produce violin-like sounds (this was some years before the introduction of the polyphonic synthesiser and long before the development of digital sampling).

The actual device, a small box which was attached to the bridge of the guitar, consisted of six small motor-driven wheels with serrated edges to match the size of each string. The continuous bowing action was activated by pressing one or all of keys located on the top of the unit. Pressing a key would allow the wheel to descend against a motor driven shaft and bow the corresponding string, while the other hand remained free to fret single notes or full chords. An extremely powerful sound could be created that changed dynamically depending on how hard or soft the wheels were pressed against the strings. The sound was also affected by the type of guitar strings (round-wound or flat-wound).

Two versions were planned - one for guitar and one for bass. Ultimately few Gizmotrons were made but bass versions were produced in a much larger quantity than guitar versions.

John McConnell, then a senior lecturer in Physics at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST) assisted Godley and Creme in the development of the prototype. He considered it critical that the instrument retain the natural decay of a note rather than the sharp cut-off often experienced with an electronic synthesizer.

[gjbassist]

Better question is what is up with that black sweater the standing keyboard player is wearing?

[rtslinger]

Did you read all of that ha ha ha just kidding although it was cool he actually used a The baritone guitar Gibson makes the Les Paul Baritone many people had used them back then to sub as a bass guitar when strung correctly

[MOEBASSPLAYER]

Originally Posted by PWV

Agreed he's playing along - and I've been wrong before - but if that's not a P-bass with flats....I'll...I'll...do something. Like play guitar instead of bass.

Didn't he play a Ricky most of the time?

[PWV]

Originally Posted by rtslinger

Okay time to play 6 string

Thanks for the info rtslinger - did not know about the Gizmo before, and hopefully those guitarists don't find out about it now! That's a pretty cool gadget me thinks, as was the Les Paul Baritone.



*Not going to switch to 6-string, but I guess I just be might be imitating tones from guitarists who are imitating bass players in the tone cycle.

[calamitus]

I just followed the I'm not in love Youtube links and spent about half an hour listening to/watching 10cc and ELO.

My dad had tapes of the best of 10cc and Into the blue by ELO in his car when I was a kid in the late 70s, so it was a major nostalgia trip for me.

I did notice a really nice percussive sound that I think was coming from the Rick's D string on Rubber bullets. Have been using the Jazz at rehearsals for about 6 months, but I might break out the Rick next week for a bit of woody, thumpy, thunder action.

[PWV]

Originally Posted by calamitus

My dad had tapes of the best of 10cc and Into the blue by ELO in his car when I was a kid in the late 70s, so it was a major nostalgia trip for me.

I wore my vinyl copy of "Into The Blue" out back in the day...

Well, this doesn't settle anything, but its an interesting fast-forward comparison with the 10cc of 2010:

*Definitely a bass at 2:37

10CC Not in Love live at Bluesfest 2010 - YouTube

And decent shots of the Ashdown rig at 4:42.

[geoff_in_nc]

There used to be a video on youtube which was a documentary about how "I'm Not In Love" was recorded. If I remember right, there's no percussion in the song, and all the synthy/string section type stuff is layers upon layers upon layers of vocals bounced down to a stereo mix... I think it was something like 128 individual tracks of vocals.

The song really does nothing for me by itself, but that documentary and the explanation of how much work was put into that song, was awesome and gave me a much better appreciation for the artistry in creating it. Unfortunately the old link I had is dead and it says that user closed their account.

[berwick63]

Originally Posted by PWV

I wore my vinyl copy of "Into The Blue" out back in the day...

Well, this doesn't settle anything, but its an interesting fast-forward comparison with the 10cc of 2010:

*Definitely a bass at 2:37

10CC Not in Love live at Bluesfest 2010 - YouTube

And decent shots of the Ashdown rig at 4:42.

Definitely not a P though!

Haha, the tone sounds the same in both videos to me too, it has that hollow body sound to it in my opinion.

[PWV]

Yes, I don't think it was a P bass now - hollowbody or short-scale maybe. But I still think the original recording used a bass at that spot. *AND I COULD BE WRONG... They laughed at Galieo when he said the Earth revolved around the sun too. But he didn't play bass so that's ok.

[toddj1s]

I've always dug the tune. Sounds to me like an octave type pedal with the direct level turned all the way down...or a Gizmotron, whatever gets ya there. I used to use the octave pedal for synthy/dance kinda tunes. Played the line up an octave and turned the direct level off.