51m0n

[quote name='Bilbo' post='987034' date='Oct 13 2010, 03:25 PM']There is a lovely story where, early in their career, Van Halen were touring in support of Ted Nugent. Eddie Van Halen's sound was the talk of the town and Nugent asked to try his gear. He picked up EVH's guitar without touching a single knob on his guitar or amp and sounded exactly like Ted Nugent.[/quote] You see this is nonsense to me. Is anyone suggesting that if Ted had played an E chord or just an open E string it would have sounded 'exactly' like Ted's rig did? Really? Or are they all confusing playing nuances with tone (ie the actually sonic timbre of the guitar/strings/pups/fx/amp/room combination)? Or is is that both rigs actually sound pretty similar tonally? So if I were to offer Ted a go on a guitar rig, then regardless of [b]anything[/b] I might do to it setup wise it would always sound [b]exactly[/b] like Ted's rig would it? I'm willing to bet considerable money that a) thats not so, and b ) I can show that it isnt so. [quote name='Bilbo' post='987034' date='Oct 13 2010, 03:25 PM']I find every bass I play (which are few, to be fair) sounds more like me than it does the label on the headstock and would not buy a bass on the basis of a website 'sample'. But, then again, I have cloth ears and can't hear the difference between basses the way some of you guys say you can. I don't know what a 'classic' Fender Precision or Jazz sound is. I can recognise players but not the basses they play.[/quote] See I dont believe that either Bilbo, I believe you when you say you hear yourself playing the same way, I dont believe that it makes no difference what bass you pickup or how you set the controls, that bass sounds the same as all the rest. That is, the nature of the waveform produced by the instrument will not be different, I just think you may be listening to the notes/harmony/melody/MUSIC rather than the sound. For instance my Roscoe has a seriously overpowered eq, are you really trying to tell me that whatever I do with it its always going to sound the same if you play it? I can almost always tell a P bass vs a Jazz, so can you. Its startlingly obvious, especially with roundwounds IME. Extreme eq can do a lot to camouflage them. I'm not a Fender nerd though, so I cant differentiate a 60's vs 70's jazz. In fact I find that its the pickup configurations, electronics and strings that make the biggest differences in similar quality instruments. Not the wood, construction (ie neck through vs bolt on) or colour.

Whilst its true of cabs that you have mic placement, room blah blah blah we are talking about a bass here. If you D.I a bass with as short a signal path to the recorder and apply no eq then you have a really good representation of what that bass sounds like. Clealry you need to note the strings used, piuckup selection, preamp settings and the playing style as well. And yes it wont sound exactly like you playing the part, but it will be a good indication of the timbre of the instrument. If the basses all sound significantly different in that line then the company has a huge problem with QC. WIth todays modern build techniques and reliance on machined parts then the actual piece of wood is the diff, and I reckon thats a pretty darned small tolerance to be able to notice. Its slightly different for entirely handcrafted instruments I would think. My cans plugged into my machine are good enough to mix on (at least pretty well), I can certainly gauge a bass tone with them! Ed Friedlands youtube clips are spot on IMO, albeit the audio is compressed. It would be even better if they did it as high quality FLAC downloads though (24 bit/96KHz) because you really really can hear the difference (assuming you dont have impaired hearing).

[quote name='urb' post='986662' date='Oct 13 2010, 10:08 AM']I second your comments on Mark Bass slappers too - to my ears these amps have a very generic sound and really shape the way a bass sounds, to make it sound like 'the mark bass sound' - I'm sure this can be avoided but it's almost getting to the point now where I can hear a Mark Bass rig a mile off! Nice gear but not my cup of Earl Grey at all... Cheers Mike[/quote] Really? I agree the cabs are definitely 'voiced' but I find the LMII based amps to be really good at not overly colouring the sound of the bass (to be fair they are 'warm', but not wooly at all). Of course a lot of people do tend to just reach over and use the filters and so they are adding a predetermined voicing there as well, maybe thats a lot to do with it too!

Ultimate use of hipshot detuners on a bass?

oooh boy, can you say "can of worms!"??? Whats your budget, what kind of bass rig are you recording? If I had to choose one mic for ever to record bass with it would be a Heil PR40 I love it! But it isnt cheap Oh and yet another +1 for Reaper

[quote name='obbm' post='984127' date='Oct 11 2010, 10:03 AM']How are you going to mix the outputs of the 4 mic pre-amps?[/quote] Exactly!

[quote name='Pete Academy' post='984064' date='Oct 11 2010, 08:19 AM']She's one of the best groovers on the planet, and can make a few notes sound amazing. Also, a great reason to buy a Fender Jazz. [/quote] +1

Big meths user here Even bothered to build the tube thingy too. Usually there's a set festering in there ready to whip out and slap on.... Rotate strings whenever I'm going to play in front of people - big believer in being able to cut what I dont want with eq, but you cant add it back if it ain't there to begin with!

[quote name='itswac' post='982008' date='Oct 8 2010, 08:47 PM']Hi Everyone, Just checked into this thread here...my apologies for not jumping in sooner! (sidenote: PM received and replied regarding Tri-Mod Wah). /CUT/ [youtube/youtube] [youtube/youtube] /CUT/[/quote] Cheers for that, as a software engineer as well as a bassist that was really interesting to watch!

[quote name='Paul S' post='981682' date='Oct 8 2010, 03:24 PM']This might sound like a daft thing to say but would it be of value to anyone other than myself if someone were able to demonstrate how various amp settings - low gain/high gain, different EQ settings etc - affect the sound. Happy to volunteer my TE rig for the purpose. It is something I just never seem to get time to do it at rehearsal as everyone is always noodling as soon as they get set up, so I press the 'pre-shape' and get on with it.[/quote] [quote name='Happy Jack' post='981690' date='Oct 8 2010, 03:31 PM']A good idea in principle (it must be - I've thought of suggesting it too! ) but an absolute bugger to demonstrate. Different basses, different rigs, different venues, above all different bands. Not saying 'No', far from it, just not sure how even a real expert on the subject (paging S1mon, paging S1mon) would actually present it.[/quote] Well I'd certainly be up for an informal chat about anything like bass tones and stuff - thats why I'm going, I'm hoping to learn something I'm pretty sure that by the time I've finished yacking about compressors the last thing anyone will want is me to talk more about, well anything actually! Alex C is comng along, he's a reknowned talker about all things bass tone, and a chap who really knows his beans, maybe he'll fill in on this one?

Cheddatom let me grab the stems of this off him to have a crack at a mix. Anyways, heres my wee effort done on cans. Its a VERY different approach to the drums from Cheddatom's, far more close mic'ed and compressed to 'pop' more. If anyone is interested I could waffle on a bit about how I got this far, I sent Cheddatom the project file so he could see for himself.

[quote name='lowdown' post='978232' date='Oct 5 2010, 12:36 PM']Another bunch of nice VST freebies here. Enjoy. [url="http://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/vst-effects/"]http://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/vst-effects/[/url] Garry[/quote] +1 - and a very big one at that, I use these ALL the time, they rock!

Priceless! What a tool....

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' post='976096' date='Oct 3 2010, 04:11 PM']People worry too much about bass breaking guitar speakers. Bass amps will, if you try and make it sound like a bass with eq, sticking a bass output into a guitar rig is happy though, unless you have loads of bass boost somewhere to try and make it sound like a bass. Trying to sound like guitar is fine.[/quote] Massively disagree with this, I've seen this fail occur. As soon as you turn it up to gigging volumes the whump causes far greater excursion than a guitar will, result over excursion and very bad things.... You dont need to octave up (though you can if you want) you do need to filter out the whump and it would be considered belt and braces touse a limter to tame the larger transients.

New I'd seen one before:- [url="http://www.sfxsound.co.uk/mainpage.asp?page=xm"]SFX XM[/url] I'm sure this little wee beastie from SFX would do exactly what you need, preventing damaging low end from trashing your guitar combo. Excellent!

Surely our very own Mr SilentFly of [url="http://www.sfxsound.co.uk/mainpage.asp?page=home"]SFX[/url] could do that kind of mod for you?

What you really really need is a crossover or hi-pass filter on the line going to the guitar to knock the bottom octave or so off. Maybe a limiter too so you dont hit the guitar amp/cab with too big a transient. Then you could go from your amps tuner out of fx send and not damage the guitar amp.

[quote name='M-Bass-M' post='973840' date='Oct 1 2010, 12:43 PM']Have to say I'm finding this thread useful reading, so cheers to everyone for the advice so far. One of the things that I am a bit stuck on is getting a good slap sound to come from my amp. I think I read previously that from an EQ perspective, you're looking to boos the treble and bass, and really cut the mids. Is this correct? Anybody have any more specific advice to give? PuP blend would also be useful too.[/quote] Well thats one sound. If you blend pups on a jazz bass equally you get a mid cut due to the phase of the two signals. A little bit of low end and a little bit of top may be necessary, but if you have a nice new set of strings on you shouldnt really need to eq a special 'slap' setting at all IMO. If you do scoop the mids then you will diappear in the mix with a band....

That is a righteously funky tune, and I [b]love[/b] that bass tone!

[quote name='mrtcat' post='914357' date='Aug 3 2010, 10:12 PM']Nice bass tone! I wrote a blues tune way back when for my GCSE music (I was only the 3rd year after GCSE's were created which shows my age) which was about having everything reposessed (how the hell a middle class boy from oxfordshire was any kind of authority on blues especially reposession is beyond me) and it was nowhere near as well tracked as that and it earned me an A so I'm sure that'll be a winner.[/quote] Ibanez BTB470 with DR Lo-Riders into a Joe Meek TwinQ, lots of top rolled off, and squished beautifully by the opto compressor. Its a yummy chewy sound isnt it! Personally I think being a middle class boy from Oxfordshire warrants its own special kind of blues

Sorry chaps, didnt see the replies before! Well he got 100% for it, and an A overall The mix that went in had a bit more upper mid on the bass to help it with less than excellent playback equiptment. I think the bass is right on this one if you listen on a decent hifi though. Anyway thanks for all the positive comments!