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Slap effects advice


gub
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Don't really do effects apart from a big muff for a couple of numbers but our covers band seems to be introducing some numbers which I will be slapping on such as some rhcp songs , I will be using the jag through an orange terror 500 head , any advice on effects would be welcome and much apriciated ;)

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You really need to say what sort of slap sound you want before throwing effects at it.

It's worth looking into different types and qualities of compressor. Some clean up and even out your sound, others do 'squashed' bass really well. Most sit in the middle.

With chorus, it's worth looking at ways of blending your wet and dry signal to get the classic slap sound with a hint of 80s cheese. Some higher end pedals have this blend wet/dry built in.

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I'm thinking along the same lines as Gub (pedals for slapping).

I understand the need for an eq pedal to scoop the tone and reinforce the loss of low-end, but would a limiter be better than a compressor? Is something like a Boss LMB-3 more appropriate than an out and out compressor?

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OK, you dont [b][i]need[/i][/b] any effects to play great sounding slap bass.

You need great technique to play great sounding slap bass, [i]and great feel[/i]. Otherwise all the technique in the world will make no odds, you'll sound like someone putting up a shed.

However, a bit of compression, if you know what you are doing, can help you control the larger transient on the attack of the note, it can also help even out the probable apparent volume change due to the move from fingerstyle to slap. Conversely if you dont know what you are doing you will almost certainly use a pedal with no metering and ladle on far more compression than you should (cos I cant hear it if I dont set it like this) and that can be very detrimental to your tone and your slapping: you will play too hard, especially if the attack is too short on the compressor, effectively fighting the compression circuit, and that will lead you to the incorrect conclusion that compressors ruin your dynamics.

Its worth noting that Flea doesnt go stomping on an eq pedal to suck the mids out of his tone when he starts slapping, and that because in a band mix you dont want to do that, that bedroom poseur slap bass tone sounds rubbish in a mix, it will have no definition, be overly clacky and have no girth or punch either. Dont go there! A decent bass with a decent set up and new(ish) strings will deliver a great slap tone and fingerstyle tone in a mix without resorting to eq at all when you change. A lot of Flea's stuff mixes slap and fingerstyle all the way through, so you would do well not to have to hit any fx for this at all.

Chorus, envelope filter, phaser, flanger etc all have their place (all of them together can sound very very Bootsy!), but really Flea only uses any fx like this very very sparingly (Sir Psycho Sexy being the most obvious I can think of)

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