Hello all from a very rainy London town. Just realised I've been lurking here for 51 weeks, so thought it's time I put up a 2nd post.
So why am I here at all? Well, I actually play ukulele, in a punk rock ukulele band. We're called the pUKEs (punk ukes, geddit?). When I joined, I was the sole male member, in a band that otherwise consisted of 15 tattooed ladies all on ukes. Since then we've acquired a drummer and a bassist, also both male, so now we comprise me, 15 tattooed ladies and two fat blokes.
So in this band, I play this, a Clearwater solid-bodied electric concert that looks like a mini-Thinline Telecaster
.
Well, about a year ago, I walked past the music store in my old hometown and they had a massive sale on Fender guitars. I ended up with an 2008 American Standard Telecaster in natural ash with a black pickguard, just like this one:
(I'm using online images here, cos I can't see how to upload pics of my own models).
I justified the purchase to myself on the basis that 1) it was still cheaper than a MacBook Pro. 2) that there's no lead ukulele tutorials out there, so if I want to take up lead uke duties in the pUKEs, I'm going to have to learn lead guitar and transfer the skills to the smaller instrument*.
In reality, it was a) bright, shiny and new and b) just like the one on the cover of Born to Run (OK, I know that one's a NoCaster of various vintages, but still...). It is a thing of beauty and a joy to play.
However, last month, I was back there again, negotiating for another massively discounted Fender guitar. This time an 2009 American Special Stratocaster with a 2-tone sunburst finish, like this one:
.
So now along with my 8 ukuleles (to be fair, ukes come in different sizes, like saxophones: I've got 1 baritone, 1 tenor, 3 concerts, 2 sopranos and 1 sopranino), I now have two electric guitars. But they're the two guitars I've always longed after - ever since I fell in love with 1st) The Faces (Ronnie Wood) and 2nd) Springsteen.
So that's me and my guitars, I'm away now to trawl through some of the Strat & Tele forums, and especially the on-line lessons! Any advice on how to post my own images, and on how to get the best out of my new purchases (especially so far as lead guitar is concerned) greatly appreciated!
Paul
* Apart from baritones, ukes are generally tuned like a tenor guitar that has a capo on the fifth fret. So the open strings are tuned to GCEA instead of DGBE (a baritone uke is tuned DGBE. It's essentially a short-scale tenor guitar). The only real difference is that top string (G in the GCEA, D in the DGBE tuning) is generally tuned an octave higher than it would be on a guitar, i.e., the strings aren't arranged in order of pitch. Harmonically, having that top string an octave higher makes no difference to the chord fingerings; but melodically, this so-called 're-entrant' tuning is what gives the uke its particular sound. That's why I can 'justify' the purchases of my 'Casters for the purposes of learning lead ukulele

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2001 Princeton 65 Dyna-Touch™ SS Amplifier
2008 American Standard Telecaster Natural Ash
2009 American Special Stratocaster 2-Tone Sunburst
2012 Fender® Baseball

Band name is genius..and funny!

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Mona
"Music is What Feelings Sound like"

Hi there redpaul1, extending brolly greetings from the south coast! Welcome!

I think I have to bombard you with The_Nutter™ Photo Posting Post, to get you all set up - and us some piccies!! You see here we love pics (I'm sure you noticed!), so plenty of them, if you please - if possible of your 15 tattooed ladies. And the Ukes!

So here goes:

I'd create an account at photobucket.com or some other hosting service. There you upload the pictures.
You can embedd pictures if you paste links into the message you're creating, then highlight the link and press on the "Img"-button at the top of the menu.

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Or, and even easier, you can trigger an already formatted link of the desired image straight from photobucket, and simply paste it into the message.



Done. Siiimples.

Now to playing lead guitar/ukulele. I'm sure you're aware of the great George Formby - For those who don't know, the guy was a genius on the banjolele. This example has George starting one of his superrythmic soli at 2:15 or so, well worth checking out.

What I'm trying to say is: I don't think it's absolutely necessary to be a guitar player to get a good ukulele sound. Or soli, for that matter. I'd much rather listen to a uke player do uke stuff than imitate playing a guitar on a uke. But that's my personal view.

As far as I know, the biggest challenge when playing ukulele is sustain; notes just don't tend to ring out as long as on a guitar. But I see you have your Telulele there with a PU system, you should be alright, no? Does she go through a Super Triple Marshall Stack?

Anyway. Once again, welcome!

Cheers -

Nutter

Hello nutter. Thanks for the Photo Posting Post. I got the [ img] [ /img] tag pretty much straightaway, but on other forums I frequent, you also have the option of uploading images directly into your post. I was kind of hoping that I wouldn't have to go through all the palaver you describe, but suspected I might. 'Cause one thing I've found is that pages here take an awful long time to load. Just to preview this response took 80 seconds! And the thought of having to create yet another account... I will get round to it, but it took me the best part of two hours just to draft my original post.

As to a pic of the pUKEs, here we are occupying the stage at the 12-Bar Club, Denmark St, London.


As to getting a guitar sound out of a uke, in general I'd agree with you (I can actually do that George Formby split-stroke). A good friend of mine (and extremely talented ukulele player) argues that a uke is as much a percussive instrument as a chordophone, so rhythm is really important, while sustain is not high on a uke's list of qualities. However given the material we cover, and given that no-one pays money to watch me play (!), we figured it would just add something to the mix if I was able to throw in the odd lead part. Sustain is never something that particularly concerns punk in any case!

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2001 Princeton 65 Dyna-Touch™ SS Amplifier
2008 American Standard Telecaster Natural Ash
2009 American Special Stratocaster 2-Tone Sunburst
2012 Fender® Baseball

Have you an audio clip to hear?

Never mind... found them in your band link.

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...I for one, sure would appreciate the return of intelligent conversation, spirit of assistance and the simple yet effective ignoring of those who can't seem to hang with that...
Best regards,
rob

Hi once more Nutter, I missed the reference to the Marshall stack the first time round! No, not a Marshall stack, but I do have a Korg Pandora Mini-FX processor. This is me giving Britney and Toxic a good thrashing, using the 'Telulele', and played through the Korg and an L Fisher G-5 Desktop amp (from the London Guitar Studio, and with my tongue firmly in my cheek:
http://soundcloud.com/redpaul1/toxic.
Enjoy! Well you will when it stops

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2001 Princeton 65 Dyna-Touch™ SS Amplifier
2008 American Standard Telecaster Natural Ash
2009 American Special Stratocaster 2-Tone Sunburst
2012 Fender® Baseball

Hello redpaul1. Greetings from the sun drenched beaches, the coral reefs and palm tree shrouded azure lagoons of Peckham. Fine, fine weather we've been having. I'm off to the festival in Hyde Park this weekend: I hear that after Kylie cancelled today they've been hard at work installing a lake in the area right in front of the stage for our special pleasure. Bruce Springsteen demanded it.

By the way, a few years back there used to be a gentleman posting on this Forum called Red Paul with a lot more than a couple of posts to his name. Was that you under a previous ID or is the name a coincidence?

Cheers - C

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Hello Ceri,
Ah, Peckham! How I miss its balmy breezes *sigh*.
No, any connection between myself and any other posters with the names 'red' and 'paul' in their monikers is purely coincidental. Thanks for the heads-up though, and for allowing me to set the record straight.
Funnily enough, my old college tutor went by the name of Ceri Peach. Now, I'm sure that is just a coincidence!

Enjoy the Springsteen concert. I wish I was going too. I'm sure it will be fine. If anyone can shift this jetstream, it has to be the Boss!

Paul

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2001 Princeton 65 Dyna-Touch™ SS Amplifier
2008 American Standard Telecaster Natural Ash
2009 American Special Stratocaster 2-Tone Sunburst
2012 Fender® Baseball

My favorite uke player: http://www.eastriverstringband.com/?page_id=94

Hello from across the Atlantic. I love the whole concept of your group! If I actually manage to go over there, I'll have to try and check you out. There is a strong possibility of that happening, the way things are happening musically right now for me.

A punk rock big band mostly armed with ukeleles, what is there not to love

Speaking of getting uke to sound like a guitar, there is an Icelandic MP that can make full grown accoustic guitar sound like uke, by accident. He really doesn't know how to play the guitar. Here is the culprit: http://www.althingi.is/altext/cv.php4?nfaerslunr=38

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Deyr fé
Deyja frændr
Deyr sjálfr ið sama
En orðstír
Deyr aldregi
Hveim er sér góðan getr

howdy paul,

more brits on the forum, yay! Loving the sound of the band, and nice to see a 12 bar pic up here too Im mates with a band in bournemouth called the `mother ukers` who do a similar thing, but they are just a 3 piece, your mob looks epic!!

Im also off to hyde park this weekend, paul simon and soundgarden only for me though, the only boss im interested in is an sd-1. Lets hope its not rained off....

tally ho

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`I prefer not to listen to music that I can't rip off or improve on` - Ian Dury

G'day mate,

Ukelele's in a punk rock band hey? I've got a uke, I must admit it can be some damn good fun.

Had no clue you could play the buzzsaw sound on the uke. I must experiment

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former user radio_friendly_unit_shifter

Me too, this is my fav

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Halong bay tours-Halong bay cruise Prince junk-Ginger cruise

Thanks to all for the welcoming comments!
rileymcc: is the buzzsaw sound you mention on my version of 'Toxic'?
ollyclam: yes I know the 'Mother Ukers' too. I was hanging out with Paul, Jonty and Darryl at the SUS Square Uke Fest in Worth Matravers just two weeks ago. Small world, eh?
NonniC: thanks for the love!
Arc-n-spark: Hope you liked what you heard.
BassPaulL: you can find our gig listings here http://thepukes.co.uk/?page_id=34. Let us know if you do make it over. I will try to get you on the guest list, though I can't promise anything. Promoters generally aren't happy about guest lists for a band our size!
GTG & Orlando89: thanks for the heads-up re: The East River String Band. There are some very talented female ukesters out there. Check out Little6ster from France http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFG6WDEe76M or Hawaii's own Taimane Gardner http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3q6VoOb6OM, though she shreds a little too much for my taste. For my money, the best ukulele player around is Canada's James Hill. Check out his version of Billy Jean, where somehow he manages to tap out a rhythm, play the bass loop, the guitar riff and sing the vocals all at the same time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gyxeXW_2T8 !

And if any of that inspires you to pick up a uke, remember that Fender do ukes too!

http://www.fender.com/en-GB/products/index.php?section=acoustics&bodyShape=Ukulele

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2001 Princeton 65 Dyna-Touch™ SS Amplifier
2008 American Standard Telecaster Natural Ash
2009 American Special Stratocaster 2-Tone Sunburst
2012 Fender® Baseball