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Stoner/Doom Bassists Thread, Part 90: Maxed Out

#59,651
I've never been a professional teacher, but near the end of high school I ended up with a free period. I started out assisting my history teacher, but then the special needs teacher got sick and their substitute was having difficulty. So, I ended up half ass teaching half of her class for a period every day. Basically just occupying them so she could attend to the other half. That was a strange experience. There was one kid in there who was doing calculus (that I only had a tenuous understanding of, if any) and only getting credit for special needs math. He knew the material, and I asked why he didn't just take calculus. His reply was he was scared he might fail at it.

Like @Kaa, my daily prostitution is as a tech worker. Been doing some sort of support/admin role since 1997. I'm back in support these days, and I'm very happy, because I'll never be on-call again unless I decide to move out of my current position. However, due to how this industry works, I do end up providing a lot of free (or even paid) education to my co-workers, though. Heck, I've had the kind of embarrassing task of teaching something to the people I escalate tech problems I can't solve or file a decent bug for - and they get my escalations because they genuinely know the software better. They actually herd the coders and often tell them in detail how to fix the bugs I file. It kind of makes me feel good when that happens, but I do wonder how I know something they don't.

In my bass playing/musical life, I've decided that I need to do some sort of cover of this song, whether I can convince my band to do it or not (the singer's definitely into it). Also, I want Eno's jacket. He looks like a terrifying suburban trophy wife.

 
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#59,652
ConfoundedBridg said:
Wow can't believe how many of us are in education! Y'all, like me, probably didn't want to talk about it given the nature of this thread, but dammit... Teachers can be metal too :bassist:!
Click to expand...

I am honestly not too surprised. I had a lot of teachers who were closet metal heads…ended up seeing some at shows over the years.
 
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#59,653
Kaa said:
So, now you have de-lurked, tell us a bit about yourself, gear, likes, dislikes.
Click to expand...

Hi! Thanks for asking. I’m JES, a Bassist since forever (ok, 1980). My current obsession is touch guitar (which is like a cross between a bass, guitar, and a piano). More info about that here. Most of the touch guitar players are into prog or ambient. I’m down with the ambient (and am a regular in that thread), but my goal is to to use it for slower and more flowing heavy stuff, as well as more grooves, rather than lots of notes.

I play through an Orange Tb500, a barefaced 12” and an old custom 15”. Savagely loud when needed. Current pedals are Xotic BB, Idiot Box Blower Box, and VFE Wood Chipper for distortion and fuzz, though I just picked up a zVEx machine which sounds usefully disgusting. I also love my Eventide H9, and use an EHX Micro POG from time to time. My dirty secret is what when recording, sometimes I like amp sims, or my old trusty VTDI. I am also a synth head. I love some of the standard stoner tools like the DOD 250 and Ricks but while they sound great in others’ hands, they sound like *ss in my hands.

I’m in 3 bands. #3 is the relevant one for this thread — just me and my wife, she’s on drums and vox. It was a Covid project when we couldn’t play with others, but seems to have legs. I sound like a competent guitarist trading riffs with a competent bassist. Our goal was post-metal / doom, but I think the first record, which we are finishing, is probably a little more indy rock meets Russian Circles or something. She says she wants the 2nd album to be heavier. You can only make so much noise with 2 people but I’m down for the effort.

My intro to stoner rock was Kyuss, doom was Om. I also like lots of other metal and adjacent heavy music—Meshuggah, Failure, Hum, Thou, Big Brave, Sumac, Boris, Russian Circles, Greet Death, etc—and of course lots of other stuff too.

I can be loquacious. I’m always on the lookout for new music I’ll like.

I am a vegetarian and like to cook with cast iron.
 
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#59,654
Of course this thread has lots of educators - don't you know we're all left-leaning hippies indoctrinating the youth into drugs and questioning their sexuality and all that? (I see that plastered all over FB lately.) Specific political parties aside, if educators had the sort of influence on students that ANY political party ascribed to us, I think the US would be in a better place overall. Mostly because we'd be able to effectively educate (and not indoctrinate!) the students! I've known plenty of educators of all backgrounds - not a one has tried to foist their politics on the youth. We just want kids to learn and do well and be prepared for life. One of my co-workers and I are about as different politically as they come, but we can respect that and agree we're here to help the kids - and working in behavioral special education they need a lot of help.

Honestly, I'm here for the hang. Not really interested in the "S" of the "S/D" thread except for the music. (But hey, whatever floats your boat. I don't care as long as it works for you and doesn't harm others.) There's plenty of other ways for me to alter my consciousness, such as the incredibly cheap 30 pack I just purchased... Us teachers gotta chill somehow.
 
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#59,655
Kawai2g4b said:
I am honestly not too surprised. I had a lot of teachers who were closet metal heads…ended up seeing some at shows over the years.
Click to expand...
At my school the physics teacher believed the earth was 6000 years old, so the metal heads were a bit of rarity :bag:

I also almost became an educator. Started college to become a history teacher, moved to full-blown history, got my MA and now I work in tech :meh:.

I've been thinking about volunteering at a museum again. Did that for a few years after I finished university, hoping that would be my 'in', it wasn't, but it was gratifying work.
 
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#59,656
JES said:
Hi! Thanks for asking. I’m JES, a Bassist since forever (ok, 1980). My current obsession is touch guitar (which is like a cross between a bass, guitar, and a piano). More info about that here. Most of the touch guitar players are into prog or ambient. I’m down with the ambient (and am a regular in that thread), but my goal is to to use it for slower and more flowing heavy stuff, as well as more grooves, rather than lots of notes.

I play through an Orange Tb500, a barefaced 12” and an old custom 15”. Savagely loud when needed. Current pedals are Xotic BB, Idiot Box Blower Box, and VFE Wood Chipper for distortion and fuzz, though I just picked up a zVEx machine which sounds usefully disgusting. I also love my Eventide H9, and use an EHX Micro POG from time to time. My dirty secret is what when recording, sometimes I like amp sims, or my old trusty VTDI. I am also a synth head. I love some of the standard stoner tools like the DOD 250 and Ricks but while they sound great in others’ hands, they sound like *ss in my hands.

I’m in 3 bands. #3 is the relevant one for this thread — just me and my wife, she’s on drums and vox. It was a Covid project when we couldn’t play with others, but seems to have legs. I sound like a competent guitarist trading riffs with a competent bassist. Our goal was post-metal / doom, but I think the first record, which we are finishing, is probably a little more indy rock meets Russian Circles or something. She says she wants the 2nd album to be heavier. You can only make so much noise with 2 people but I’m down for the effort.

My intro to stoner rock was Kyuss, doom was Om. I also like lots of other metal and adjacent heavy music—Meshuggah, Failure, Hum, Thou, Big Brave, Sumac, Boris, Russian Circles, Greet Death, etc—and of course lots of other stuff too.

I can be loquacious. I’m always on the lookout for new music I’ll like.

I am a vegetarian and like to cook with cast iron.
Click to expand...

All rad stuff... On the touch guitar jaunt, one of the top-5 shows I ever saw was the Trey Gunn band at NAMM in the early 2000's. It was a showcase of Warr guitars and all of the stuff of his Live Encounter album. I had only known him from King Crimson and it blew my 20-year old mind! In the doom context, I've always been intrigued by Desmond Dylan's tapping in Bell Witch on 6-string.
 
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#59,659
On a totally unrelated note. A few months ago I bought an Epiphone and the tone and volume pots had a weird metal lip attached to them that has no other function but to loosen the pots from body. Anybody any idea why?

F9602AD8-23A8-498F-AA4A-1365D915125B.jpeg
 

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