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So.. on Tuesday night we sat down (YFA, Eric and I) and watched the Worship Band Workshop DVD (led by Paul Baloche) and it was short.. but had a lot of good ideas.

Baloche starts of course with the main reason for worship and where our hearts ought to be. Nothing completely new, but the DVD has a lot of promise to inspire the NTCAC worship teams to a higher level of musical standard (somewhere above noise.. I kid). The greatest is the two counter-examples that the band plays.. one is of NO dynamics (haha hello NTCAC!) and the second is of inconsistent tempo (hello NTCAC again! except we dont slow down again).

Baloche presents some basic ideas, but hopefully in a way that those who aren’t so dedicated/committed to worship will at least get some kind of clue. He talks about not playing so much, about playing bass/mids/treble and staying out of each other’s way. They’re pretty simple and I think we could implement them in a fairly rudimentary way. The biggest culprit at NTCAC is definitely the piano (bass/guitar/drums tend to stay out of each other’s way naturally) playing all over the place.. and way too much.

Anyhow.. last night I watched the band interviews (only 10 mins :() and they also reinforce some good things, like being spiritually supportive of the leader, being attentive etc. Just things which should be “common sense” but really need to be reinforced.

The only downside of the DVD was the 15-20mins which were just Baloche’s team playing songs.. and taking up valuable talking time :p

It was pretty funny after watching it, Eric saw the “light” and was really gung ho on setting a high standard, a level of musical ability that we should strive for.. and YFA kinda reminded him how he just shot down the whole idea at the EWC meeting a week ago. In about 15 minutes Eric went through exactly the same thought progression that we’ve been going through, except we could quickly explain why it wasn’t possible.. and what middle ground we settled at heh.

It really all comes down to committment and heart. I mean.. talent or no talent, if you don’t even commit to the team, to practicing, to the ministry.. then it’s not going to happen by itself by “God’s grace”.. My countdown of.. 1 and 1/2 year until we can form a TPX worship team is on the wall :p

Well I tried to write this post yesterday but I hit reload and lost it.. grumble. So on Wednesday night I changed my strings. The actual process itself was simple enough (first time changing my bass strings) and the only thing is I may have cut the E string a little short so it doesnt wind enough around the tuning peg for my liking.

Note the price isn’t too cheap.. granted its the first strings I’ve bought for my bass, and it’s been a year. But it was something like $34.99 + tax. The box totes them as handmade.. i wonder what part of it is actually handmade.

Anyhow.. onto the sound:

It should be no surprise since the strings are what vibrate to make the sound.. but I was quite amazed how much the sound changed with the new strings. They sound VERY raw in comparison. The sound is a lot nicer.. but after two evenings of playing with them.. have decided they really aren’t that “tone” I’m looking for, for worship. On the “bright” side.. (hohoho..) they give my sound a lot more character which is good for overdriving for songs like l’arc and glay.

They’re really smooth, but still very detailed.. I think the detail is a regular product of the EMG-Hz pickups in the ESP. This truly has become a metal/rock bass. Get a pretty good slap sound out of it too, much nicer than the old strings.

I also changed my order with my friend from the cheap J-Bass to a cheap P-Bass.. but no ETA on when..

-weak volume
-5keybaord != orchestra
-losing voice in POPULARRRRR
-sitting too far
-wayy to comfortable for a theatre.