Dr. Gonzo

Yeah probably, but that's Rodgers fault for ever opening his mouth about anything after he's asked a question tbh

Nah I fucking wish. There are few people in football I hate as much as Brendan Rodgers. Genuinely despise the fucker.

That he "never considered leaving" - no shite mate, you weren't fucking asked to leave.

He's talking about how great he and Leicester are, instead of just saying "there's nothing to talk about it". I get it, you both like Rodgers and I fucking hate the cunt, so you're going to see it differently to me.

Yeah, now look at their players' wages - he's very cheap considering the ambition of the club.

I think he's just bullshitting that he was in contention for the job, because he's Rodgers and he likes to big himself up every chance he gets

I honestly doubt the fuck out of that. Levy is notoriously cheap - he's just spent a lot of money sacking Poch. He's also going to have to pay a new manager. Mourinho's got the better pedigree and was unattached to any side since being sacked last year - and literally hours after the Poch sacking we heard rumours hat Levy and Mourinho's agents were in talks and a deal was "close." I can't imagine him spending all that money to sack Poch, then being willing to pay Leicester for their manager, then giving Rodgers what would likely be a big pay rise for him. I also imagine if any club came in for Rodgers right now, he'd tell them to wait until the end of the season. Top 4 with Leicester will look good on his CV.

Wtf is he talking about lol. I don't think Spurs were ever in for him for a second - they sacked Poch and promptly went for Mourinho. Granted, this is the man who said that Milner joined his Liverpool side "because he wanted to win the Champions League" - and it's all well and good saying that after we've just won the Champions League with Milner and we're about to play Leicester... other than the fact that when Milner joined us, Rodgers had fucking ruined the side and we were total dogshit and nowhere near being a Champions League winning side. He's a man of baffling media quotes.

I've never played a Yamaha instrument I didn't think was a much higher quality than the price point they're available at. And with their guitars, you jump up $100 from the last model you looked at and the upgrade in quality is absolutely outstanding. The THR amps (which I have back at my parents house, I'm pretty sure my dad uses it all the time now) are also pretty remarkable little devices. Imo we've already seen Line 6 benefit from being a Yamaha subsidiary - the Helix gear is top notch and competes with Fractal and Kemper stuff at a (slightly) lower price. As a kid I remember the Line 6 Pod being a good, not great, the Pod HD stuff that came out shortly after Yamaha took control was really great (for the time - dunno how they hold up now, considering how much better modeling technology is now). Even the fucking Line 6 Spiders, which are famously dogshit, have improved pretty significantly in quality. My opinion of Line 6 has changed pretty significantly after the Yamaha takeover They also own Steinberg. And a top notch Piano company that I forget the name of. I know Yamaha does stuff outside of music... but their music division and subsidiaries are all top of the line imo and their contribution to music is pretty significant. Yamaha and Boss are... fucking great companies. God bless Japan, eh?

Going back to the mid 90s when I started playing... the options that were available were a fucking joke. Especially the low priced solid state/modeling amps (other than the Roland stuff tbh, they always made pretty nice solid state shite) - you compare what was available then at a low price point to now and it's night and fucking day. Especially Line 6 modelers, oh my god they were fucking awful - I'm so glad Yamaha bought Line 6 because it's really turned them around IMO. But a big part of it is technology is so much better. CNC means we can get consistent quality from countries where it's cheap to build a guitar. The amp modeling technology seems to make leaps forward year - which is great for beginners and experienced players alike tbh. Something like a Boss Katana would have been my prized possession as a kid - an amp that cheap, that sounds that good with that much tonal diversity? And the power output setting means you can use it in a variety of settings - from the bedroom to actually gigging (although you'd probably want the 100watt one for gigging). Insane how much better it is than the Crate I started playing on that I'm pretty sure cost just a tiny bit less than what a Katana 50 goes for. Also, alright I'll try fucking around with the NS-2 when I'm back home tonight. Because if I can fix the fucking thing, that's ideal. I also really don't want to get rid of it, because it's the piece of gear I've owned the longest.

Don't understand how she's taking a picture of him protesting against Apartheid and then using it to say that Corbyn's a racist. Apartheid was racist as fuck, protesting against it is... protesting against racism.

The last time I saw Sabbath, which was on their third and final farewell tour (I caught them 2/3 times as they were saying farewell lol, which is great because never in my life did I think I'd see Sabbath twice), I thought it was very funny when Ozzy said: "We love you! God bless you all! …. This next one is GOD IS DEAD!"

@Mel81x my cab came in yesterday and... it's pretty fucking great considering it only cost a bit more than just buying a Celestion Vintage 30 (even if it is just the 8 Ohm version). The difference between the Harley Benton cab with a nice speaker and the Peavey cab with a shit speaker is night and day. I emailed Thomann about it after I asked the question on here about "how the fuck is this so cheap?" - it's because they buy in bulk from Celestion, generally (because, ya know... they sell the products) and as a result they're able to make a pretty high quality cabinet with their in-store brand Harley Benton. The one concern I'd have about it is with gigging - I don't think it's high quality wood or anything like that. I think it's made as cheaply as possible but with a nice speaker - so people playing and recording at home have something cheap that sounds good (similar to their Harley Benton instruments). It's sort of the exact opposite of the Peavey cab I was borrowing - which I think was designed to give people who play live a well made cabinet with nice wood... but with a dogshit speaker they'll probably end up changing. It's a bit bigger than the Peavey cab as well, which I wasn't really expecting - but the Peavey cab is much, much heavier & feels like they made it out of really solid wood. Doesn't really impact me too much, as I haven't played live in a very long time and I probably won't. And if I did play live, I'd probably use a 2x12 cab (or a 4x12), rather than a 1x12 - even recording, I think I'd rather use a bigger cabinet than a small one tbh - granted, I'm totally dogshit at recording and I don't know wtf I'm doing most of the time - plus the little red record light scares the fuck out of me and makes me nervous as fuck when I play (which is weird because I got over stage fright basically 2 minutes into the first time I ever played live - but the red light fright is very real). And when I jam with my pals, I typically go over to my friend's house where he's built a studio and then I have a nice 4x12 he built to use (which is fucking great, 2 Vintage 30 speakers and 2 G12 greenbacks... it sounds fantastic with every amp I've seen it used with). I'd recommend these Harley Benton cabs to anyone who wants a nice speaker cabinet for cheap - but if you're gigging you'd probably want a flight case for when it's not on stage (or just be really fucking careful loading it in and out of venues). I'm pretty sure Thomann's got Harley Benton flight cases for pretty cheap though. Sadly, though, there is no DI output for you to plug it into an interface. But I am pretty happy with the cheap little rig I've put together for myself - it sounds much higher quality than what you'd expect for the amount I paid for the amp & cab. I'm also still seriously impressed with that Micro Dark Terror amp - it's great having a little head that can produce nice tones at low volume... but then if you want/need it to get really fucking loud, it can absolutely do that and get incredibly loud. I'm also pretty impressed with the tonal diversity I can get from it, considering it's only got 1 knob for the EQ - even when I'm not using my EQ pedal, there's plenty of tonal variety to be found in it. For an amp marketed to high gain players and with so much gain on tap, you can get a really really nice clean tone. It's also got a fuckload of gain on tap, which is obviously great for me - the low end is a bit loose (because it's got that typical Orange high gain sound)… but with an overdrive that loose low end tightens waaaaay the fuck up. And then the high gain tones are absolutely brutal. Makes me want to start a website or a youtube channel or something where I take cheap gear and try to coax great tone out of it lol. Because this must be the best time ever to be a guitarist - I never would have thought I'd be able to put together a rig this cheap that sounds this good. And in the last year, I've used a ton of pretty inexpensive gear that has sounded fucking fantastic - and many of what I've tried is most certainly possible to gig with pretty easily. Just goes to show you, you don't need to spend a lot in order to sound good. Although tbh, all of the crazy expensive gear I've played and owned... generally produces pretty phenomenal tone & like I said with this cab... I'm not sure it would hold up on the road unless you took very good care of it or had it in a flight case. With a Mesa Boogie cabinet, you're paying a lot more for the cabinet design that Thomann copied for their Harley Benton cabs... but it'll survive gigging for years and years. Also what did you end up getting when your Boss NS-2 died? Because mine isn't dead... but it's also not consistently working & I'm not sure if I should crack it open and need to resolder some connections or if it's time to replace something I've had for 15+ years.

Sadly, I do think you're underestimating how much TV has taken over and killed football. Compare Inter Milan or AC Milan's Serie A attendances from the 1990s to now... or not even now, just 10 years ago and it's pretty similar to now. You see an almost packed San Siro to a noticeably not packed San Siro. Having said that, I do think your plan of cheap tickets for people that live around the ground is a great idea. I'd maybe boost it to more than a mile, maybe include certain postcodes? But the local fans are the backbone of every club and it's shit to see how many local fans are priced out.

I wasn't sure if I was going to watch it before yesterday. Now I 100% am - you know the Poch to Mourinho switch is going to make for some good TV for sure.

https://www.givemesport.com/1523136-jose-mourinho-claimed-in-2015-that-he-would-never-take-the-tottenham-job I guess that's why you never say never

Robertson and Salah out of the Palace match.

If that doesn't explicitly break any election laws... it fucking should. A new low for Tories, astounding how far they'll go to prove they're the most morally reprehensible party around.

@Fairy In Boots - I'm not don't really want to touch the socialism shite, I don't think we'll ever really agree - especially as you want to be rid of the NHS in favour of a system more aligned to what they've got in the US, which is an absolute disaster if you're a perfectly healthy person (and allows for US drug prices to be absolutely ridiculous, compared to countries where the state's healthcare system negotiates with drug manufacturers for prices that aren't fucking unreasonable). I think there needs to be a healthy mix of social programs that actually benefit ordinary people, while still promoting capitalism. I think where we might both agree regarding social safety-nets (although maybe not, given you want us to follow in America's footsteps for healthcare) is the government shouldn't be giving handouts to industries & let the market decide if unhealthy businesses live or die. But let's put that aside for a second and talk about that internet plan. But regarding the internet... I'm not so sure Iran's example is the best example of the dangers of a nationalised broadband structure. Primarily because Iranian internet... isn't nationalised. People have had their internet shut off despite the fact they pay a monthly fee (granted, much lower than what we pay) to their ISP. That's more a danger of living under authoritarian rule. And if we want to talk about which party is more authoritarian regarding the internet... I do believe it was the Tories that wanted to ban porn? If we want to avoid a slide into authoritarian rule... we've got to make sure that our politicians can be held properly accountable when they do bad things. Right now, I'm not really convinced that's the case tbh. Broadband's only really viable as a private industry thanks to government subsidies. And all the providers are selling is access to Openreach - which, yeah, it's owned by BT... but the framework for Openreach was paid for by the taxpayer & continues to be paid for by the taxpayer in the form of government subsidies. And I'm pretty sure Openreach started out of a settlement because BT was throttling other providers access and giving them a shit connection so customers would feel compelled to switch to BT. So in my eyes, that's the best argument for government provided broadband. But I can think of many reasons to be wary of the internet being provided by the government: 1.) shitloads of people would likely lose jobs, 2.) chances are government tech support would be absolutely dogshit and private entities are better positioned to provide technical support to people who'll need it - which happens hundreds (if not thousands) of times per day across the country, 3.) given recent government positions on the internet... I'm not sure I trust them with internet regulation. Personally, I think the cons outweigh the pros here - especially with the Brexit uncertainty, this is no time to be floating policy ideas that might lead to massive layoffs in a particular sector in the UK. But I would not mind if the fact it's being floated as a political idea would put some pressure on ISPs to drop prices- because broadband providers really aren't doing much in the way of innovation or providing great services & need government assistance to be profitable.

What colour is the Yamaha bass? Because to my eyes... it just looks like a bass. I can understand wanting a band to have an overall aesthetic, but at the same time... I'm one of those people that doesn't really give a fuck about the aesthetic of a band. I've seen metal played live on a Tele with singlecoils - I don't care too much about how it all looks, I care more about how everything sounds. Ah well, probably easier to just deal with it the way you did since you've got the instruments that'll fit that aesthetic.

All the more reason to get it, tbh. Nah just kidding, I know you want that JEM

I miss my Jacksons - even though I just sold one. In other news, my cab has cleared customs and was last reported to be in SF. Should have it in 1-3 days! Can't wait until I can return my friends shite Peavey cab with it's shite Sheffield speaker. Pretty impressed with how quick Thomann could get something out from Germany to me tbh.

Our first experience with a DOF was also a miserable failure as well - but he actually had experience in that role before. Then we had Rodgers, who refused to work under a DOF and was part of our famed "transfer committee" that actually signed good players when they weren't the players handpicked by Rodgers - just that Rodgers didn't have a clue on how to use the players he didn't pick (granted, he also wasn't that great with a number of the players he did pick). Third time was the charm with us... but it was with Michael Edwards, who didn't really have any experience in the role. He was just our head scout. Turns out he's more than good at identifying players, because he's proven himself to be one hell of a negotiator as well - especially with our outgoing transfers. It's probably something that differs by club, how well the DOF will actually operate. Because like you say, I don't think Walsh was necessarily in the best environment for him to thrive in the role - whereas Brands's bosses are probably going to be a bit more hands off unless things are absolutely going tits up on the pitch.

Iron Man 3

I've seen some white JEMs that are less gaudy. They've all got that inlay design on the fretboard though - it's just way too flashy for my taste. I'm sure they play nice because... Steve Vai… but I've never even picked one up at a store to fuck around on because the way they look (obviously not the most important thing about a guitar) meant I'd never really ever truly be interested. And I'm one of those people that fucks around on all the expensive guitars I can at stores - played a nice NAMM ESP model the other week.