Sting concert (Thetford Forest)

Kebabkid

Was anyone at this gig yesterday?

I went with the family and Sting was fantastic. At 72, he still has that voice and looks as fit as a butcher's dog.

With the outfit being just a 3-piece, I don't think any of us where under any illusions as to what material/era of his career we were going to get and those Police numbers came, hit after hit.

Dominic Miller delivered those Andy Summers' parts and sounds so well and then some. On Sting's solo stuff, because we got some of that, too, we had some great playing and 90% of it was clean & effects. The drummer, Chris Maas, did a fantastic job, too.

I've seen Sting several times, from the big jazz outfit for Dream of the blue turtles to the later stuff and he's always delivered. However, on the 2 occasions I've seen The Police, I wasn't as impressed and felt disappointed with Andy Summers, who's a bit of a hero. Well, no disappointment yesterday and for me, this was the best facsimile of 'The Police'.

Well done Mr Gordon Sumner and crew and I think I need an Electric Mistress!

stickyfiddle

I bet that was great. I'm not a massive fan but I saw him when he played in Abu Dhabi last year and he was absolutely fantastic. 

richardhomer

Kebabkid said:

At 72, he still has that voice and looks as fit as a butcher's dog.

In fairness, his nose is only 40…

I know a couple of people who saw his at Delamere Forest who’d seen him several times elsewhere and said this was perhaps the best.

Very appropriate venues too. “Trees trees. Save the trees. Woah oh”.

Philly_Q

Kebabkid said:

Sting concert (Thetford Forest)

richardhomer said:
Delamere Forest 

Very appropriate venues too. “Trees tress. Save the tress. Woah oh”.

Is he doing a tour of Center Parcs?

lustycourtier

Philly_Q said:

Kebabkid said:

Sting concert (Thetford Forest)

richardhomer said:
Delamere Forest 

Very appropriate venues too. “Trees tress. Save the tress. Woah oh”.

Is he doing a tour of Center Parcs?

Theres no center parcs in Delamere (thankfully) 

Gassage

Cos- he doesn't use an EM- Boss CE3 or an ADA Flanger!

Kebabkid

Gassage said:

Cos- he doesn't use an EM- Boss CE3 or an ADA Flanger!

Cheers and I've been looking to see if there was an update on his stuff from this but probably not but I liked that sound:-

Radial Interface [probably being used as a buffer for long cable runs], BOSS CS-2 Compressor, Ibanez Tube Screamer, A/DA Flanger, BOSS PH-3 Phase Shifter, BOSS TR-2 Tremolo, BOSS CE-3 Chorus, BOSS DD-6 Delay, Line 6 M5, Dunlop Crybaby Wah, Ernie Ball Volume Pedal Jr [With BOSS TU-2 in tuner out], Radial Big Shot PB1 Booster.

Funny, as I don't remember the CE-3 getting a lot of love back in the day but I have to say, it was very present but in a very subtle way and I liked it. As to the ADA, that was always a good Flanger and his whole sound was compressed to f**k and he could really whack the strings. Thank you

Philly_Q

lustycourtier said:

Philly_Q said:

Kebabkid said:

Sting concert (Thetford Forest)

richardhomer said:
Delamere Forest 

Very appropriate venues too. “Trees tress. Save the tress. Woah oh”.

Is he doing a tour of Center Parcs?

Theres no center parcs in Delamere (thankfully) 

I don't think there's one in Thetford either TBH, but he might be playing Elvedon or Sherwood as we speak.

hollywoodrox

I remember Andy used to use a CE2 & a dynacomp 

 sting is a bit of a bloody genius , the whole Police were marvellous and stings usual touring bands with people like Marsalis were always top shelf 

Kebabkid

For those that are fans of Dominic Miller, if you haven't already seen it, I recommend his interview with Rick Beato from October 2023. There's a break down of how to play 'Shape of my Heart' correctly and lots of other wonderful playing on a small nylon guitar, including arrangements of famous songs - 

stickyfiddle

Is Miller still playing his white Tele? He played that one guitar basically the whole set when I saw them. I'm not sure he even touched the tuning all night

That gig for me was a big chunk of inspiration behind my own white Tele build last year  

Kebabkid

stickyfiddle said:

Is Miller still playing his white Tele? He played that one guitar basically the whole set when I saw them. I'm not sure he even touched the tuning all night

That gig for me was a big chunk of inspiration behind my own white Tele build last year  

No. He stayed all night on what I believe is his battered 62 Strat

stickyfiddle

Kebabkid said:

stickyfiddle said:

Is Miller still playing his white Tele? He played that one guitar basically the whole set when I saw them. I'm not sure he even touched the tuning all night

That gig for me was a big chunk of inspiration behind my own white Tele build last year  

No. He stayed all night on what I believe is his battered 62 Strat

Ah interesting. Maybe he didn't want to bring the fancy old strat to the desert!   

Or maybe he's just a gear slut like the rest of us..

CaseOfAce

I've seen some of the clips. I guess Sting isn't touring the original Police since it allows him to do these more intimate shows and his solo material without all the huge venues, machinery and expectation that would come with his old band?

Must have been interesting how a 3 piece would approach the material on the big production albums he did?

I would certainly ditch the headset mic thing though Sting. A mic stand would be so much classier - and a lot less like Gareth Cheeseman doing a power point presentation to the Wernham Hogg paper company.

stickyfiddle

CaseOfAce said:

I've seen some of the clips. I guess Sting isn't touring the original Police since it allows him to do these more intimate shows and his solo material without all the huge venues, machinery and expectation that would come with his old band?

Must have been interesting how a 3 piece would approach the material on the big production albums he did?

I would certainly ditch the headset mic thing though Sting. A mic stand would be so much classier - and a lot less like Gareth Cheeseman doing a power point presentation to the Wernham Hogg paper company.

Yeah I'm guessing they also want to stay relatively friendly with each other and know that a tour won't help that! Also he no doubt wants to play his solo stuff too. 

Agreed on the headmic. Best left with Madonna c. 1990 imo. Edge uses one in U2 these days as well. I've never liked it

Kebabkid

Re:head mic, I dont think he was making any statement and he did wander the large stage from side to side, but also sat on a high stool with his leg up on a small cab and looked incredibly relaxed and so I think he was using it for the sheer ease and convenience.

As to the ratio of Police to solo stuff, it was about 70/30 in favour of the former and as I said in my original post, they sounded better than when I'd seen The Police in the 80s. OK, whilst the drummer Chris Maas was excellent, that 'something' that Stewart Copeland possesses was missed at times. However, drummers, drum tutors have told me on several occasions that Copeland is either sloppy or not a good timekeeper, which surprised me and I don't agree with

stickyfiddle

Yeah, as a thoroughly-average technical drummer myself, Copeland isn't a metronomic machine type of drummer, and he's not got the sort of technical chops of your modern instagram guys and whatever, but he's one of the most expressive guys out there, and the pushes and pulls in tempo he does are phenomenally musical. That's far better than being technical right imo

Kebabkid

stickyfiddle said:

Yeah, as a thoroughly-average technical drummer myself, Copeland isn't a metronomic machine type of drummer, and he's not got the sort of technical chops of your modern instagram guys and whatever, but he's one of the most expressive guys out there, and the pushes and pulls in tempo he does are phenomenally musical. That's far better than being technical right imo

Absolutely and he has character

digitalkettle

Kebabkid said:

...
OK, whilst the drummer Chris Maas was excellent, that 'something' that Stewart Copeland possesses was missed at times.

That dude only gets one gig a year!

StefB

digitalkettle said:

Kebabkid said:

...
OK, whilst the drummer Chris Maas was excellent, that 'something' that Stewart Copeland possesses was missed at times.

That dude only gets one gig a year!

With the North Pole-ice.

mokosuke

Hello. 

I am writing for the first time. I'm not that good at English, so I'm sorry if it's hard to understand what you mean.

I am Japanese and I have been running a Dominic Miller fan site since last year. I am running the site with the approval of Dom himself. I have been a fan of Dom since the Soul Cages tour. By the way, my website is also available in English.

https://dominicmillerjapanfan.com 

I stumbled across this site a while ago and the reason I write it here is because you all seemed to have some old information about Dominic's rig.

Right now my site only mentions Dom's equipment as a '61 Strat (Dom used to say '62, but he was wrong) and K-Yairi guitars, but by the middle of this month I will have an article on his latest rig as well as his major equipment since 1991.