The name game

If you're paranoid about the name of your band being pinched by unscrupulous music business crooks who will then use it to levitate themselves to stardom, there's now a service which might come in handy.

Calling themselves The Central Register of UK Bands, this organisation offers to put the chosen name on their computer and notify anybody concerned if there are any real or prospective clashes. For instance, if your band Sweaty Plectrum applies to be registered and there is already a band using that name on their books (or in fact, computer) they'll get another band of the same name applying for membership they'll put the two of you in contact and let you fight it out.

But now the bad news. It'll cost you a tenner for registry and there is no legal backup whatsoever behind their registering of the band name, other than the copyright reason that it will be possible to provide proof that you were using a certain name at a certain time. Obviously the more bands that use the service, the more established, respected and believable it'll become. Unfortunately, unlike the process you can go through to register yourself as a Trade Mark, which is fully legal but costs £100 and takes over a year, there is nothing you can do if a band starts using your name and says 'yah, boo, sucks' or the like when you tackle them about their ripoff. And there's nothing The Register can do, either.

But if you think it's worth the tenner — and after all, the more people that do think so, the more likely it'll succeed — you can contact The Register at (Contact Details). CM

IM Reader in success shock

The new breed of studio owners is on its way already — and in one case at least, with a little help from us.

19-year-old Lee Beddow, who lives in the outskirts of Birmingham, was looking through a heap of old IMs a while ago in search of our Remo junior drumkit review for a miniature percussionist of his acquaintance.

And when he found the article in question, he noticed on the back of it an advert for a recording course at nearby West Bromwich College. He'd long been a Portastudio devotee and a man with an interest in recording, so two and two clicked together resoundingly. He applied for the course, got in after a gruelling interview and kissed goodbye to the A levels he was doing at the time.

A freelance job on radio station BRMB followed and when the course was over Lee managed to secure a grant from the government's Young Enterprise Scheme which pays you £40 per week while you struggle to setup your own business — obviously, in his case, a studio.

So through four months hard graft, two rooms in an old abbey at Rugeley, Staffordshire were cleaned up, soundproofed and filled with a selection of eight track gear carefully chosen to fit within Lee's budget.

Just think, if it hadn't been for Bob Henrit's Remo review... doesn't bear thinking about, does it? If you want to find out what the results are like, contact Lee at Abbey Sounds Studio on (Contact Details). CM

Therapy session

They came, they ate and drank and they went away with ludicrously large amounts of expensive gear. The winners of our fabby March competition, that is.

If you cast your mind back to the Group Therapy competition in our super-big bumper 10th anniversary issue, we set a series of ridiculously difficult question: in return for the correct answer to which you could have won a Yamaha DX7 synth, a Simmons SDS8 kit, or a Fender Squier 62 Precision bass. The sort of prizes to make the Sun's Bingo bosses blush.

The Simmons, which arrived in a fetching shade of yellow and accompanied by the equally fetching Andy Skirrow from Simmons themselves, fell into the eager hands of Andy Jakeman from Lytham St Annes, near Blackpool. He's the drummer in a pub and club outfit that do the circuit in the selfsame resort and its surrounds, and his glee at receiving the kit and thereby saving himself three-quarters of a grand was tempered only slightly by the thought that his band would now have to sort out their PA to make the most of his newfound electro-percussive power. "I'm really pleased," he said, "but the local music shop won't be when they find out I'm not going to buy one from them anymore."

Clashing nicely with the Simmons was the pale pink Squier bass, which was received by probably our fittest reader, marathon-running bassist Simon Bolton from Hastings, Sussex. When we phoned him to tell him the glad news he was so surprised, in fact, that he missed half of his daily seven-mile training run. And you thought IM readers were a flabby lot. Simon also builds and modifies basses, but he promised he wouldn't touch this one and thereby ruin its vintage appeal.

And the third and by far the most voluble of our winners was the fast-talking and fast-thinking David Nicholson, who astounded his Sheffield newsagent by buying no fewer than five copies of the mag so he could pepper us with entry coupons. His ruse succeeded, because he won the DX7 and is now going to up the prices for the sessions he plays in his home town. "All they want is string arrangements under their bleeding Heavy Metal solos," he moaned, "but at least now the strings will sound better." Providing the boost to the orchestrals was Yamaha's svelte, pouting adman Jon Ward who skilfully fielded a couple of high-tech questions about Dave's old CS80 and gracefully gave up the £1300-odd worth of keyboard.

Editor Horkins demonstrated his social graces between sausage rolls, the rest of the IM herd were in attendance and on their best behaviour, and the party went on until the neighbours started banging on the walls. CM

Long rides

It seems that every new set of strings these days is designed with the wammy bar in mind, which is all well and good but not everyone uses a trem (believe it or not). Dean Markley have come up with a new range of general purpose strings — the SLP's — made from an alloy of iron and nickel and designed to last longer, hold their tone and provide increased sustain. The Super Long Play strings come in a variety of gauges from extra light to medium for both guitar and bass.

I tested out a set — the Lite gauge .009" to .042" — with very pleasing results. Certainly the sustain was excellent and after a few rehearsals the strings still sound good and hold their tuning very well.

Dean Markley strings aren't cheap, however, with the six-string ones retailing around the £7.00 mark, but certainly if you want a reliable long lasting string these LLP's might actually save you a few pounds in the long run.

Dean Markley are distributed in the UK by Rhino Music Spares, (Contact Details). DB

'Pooling Resources

Liverpool, a city somewhere North of Watford famous for its twin synagogues, rugby teams and concert orchestras, is currently in the process of tapping two new resources. One is a people's County Council, and the other is the people.

The latest chapter in Liverpool's bid to offset Thatcher's hatchet is a variety of music resource centres for unemployed musicians throughout Merseyside. Various Centres offer various resources, but one of the most exciting must be the North Liverpool Music Resource Centre, the recording studio facility which was officially launched on 2 May '85 by everyone's friend, Merseyside County Council leader Keva Coombes.

Basically the Centre offers places to kids who for 12 months get paid £50 a week for doing what any reader of this mag loves to do — get better at making music. As well as instrument tuition classes, there are songwriting workshops, practical classes where the newly penned masterpieces are arranged and rehearsed on instruments provided by the Centre and, now, also the chance to record them using the Centre's brand new 16 track recording facility.

The only qualifications needed to enrol (or, as things stand at the moment to put your name on a waiting list!) are that you must be between 16 and 25 years old and be unemployed — criteria not that difficult to meet. You don't even have to be able to play an instrument!

The first year's pupils, who include both experienced players and complete novices, have been involved in the installation of the studio and in its setting up. After only six months of the course the 15 strong ensemble have formed themselves into three bands, all of which are now gigging.

Currently the Centre is jointly financed (pause for an editorial insert about the City's black market) by the European Social Fund and Merseyside County Council. But if Maggie has her way and does away with the County Council, then the Centre will be either forced to close or seek some kind of sponsorship... (Interested parties should get in touch now to avoid the rush).

In the magazine though, it's a case of the people of Liverpool helping themselves, and who knows — pretty soon the city could have a name for producing bands!

Further details can be obtained from the The North Liverpool Music Resource Centre, (Contact Details). PB