Lot of knobs you've tweaked there, sir!

[spog]

Sent the following to a manufacturer, who's reply I am still waiting on. I then thought about the forum and an old adage about carts and horses came to mind! Anyway, if any of you can help with this I'd value your input (pun?)....
[b]"....................Ok so the bass generates the signal, in my case one that is 'actively pre-amped. Let's say, for argument's sake, you wanted the 'boomiest' reggae sound on the planet. One could well assume that, in order to 'max out' the bass-end of the spectrum, you would simply wind up the bass on the instrument, then crank it up on the pedal, do the same on the Bass Pod and finally turn it up fully on the amp itself. I doubt if anyone has ever done this, but do you get my point about successive 'tweakings' along the signal chain? Presumably there must come a threshold point beyond which you simply can't mess with the sound any more. If so, how do you know where this is? I'm sure I once heard someone say that you should set all of your instrument controls at zero and then let the amp do the lot. But what about the rest of it? Why, given that scenario, do so many people bother investing in all of the other stuff? Incidentally, I did try the above approach only to discover that adding the pedal and all the other gizzmos did help! Do you see how this can cause confusion? Just how do you know the way to stack these controls up? Nobody has ever explained this to me...............". [/b]

[cytania]

Some signs that you've gamed the sound-chain too much;

1) Boominess, not good bass boom but a ringing bad sound.
2) Muddiness, losing note definition. You mentioned reggae, here part the vibe is big notes with spaces in between. If the notes are sludgey and mashing into each other you can't jam.
3) Undue fret noise, you want treble but are getting scritchy string sounds.

Rule 1 is keep it simple. If the amp is hollow without much uumph then nothing you can do can add it. I found an awful Peavey Centurion (?) at a rehearsal room once, I could barely stop it clanking and it never sound better than my cheapo practise amp.

If you've got an active bass then you've arleady got a preamp, adding a second is just asking for worse signal to noise. Experiment with amp, alot of 'gate' and 'sound shaping' etc buttons that can be ruinous, also check compression. Ideally leave compression off but always check if things sound better with it engaged even if it's set to zero!

Sometimes tube preamps are used to subtley 'warm' the sound rather than tweak it's EQ.

Phew...

Edited October 21, 2008 by cytania

[bass_ferret]

Sorry I dont understand the question. There is no right and wrong. If it sounds good then it is good, if it sounds sh*t it is sh*t. Some of us playing active basses keep them flat, some have everything turned up to 11 - which of course means there is nowhere to go, whereas if you turn the amp up to 11 you can then go up to 22 on the bass. Its not right or wrong though - different strokes.

Likewise effects. I use an active bass into a compressor into a preamp into an amp. Others use loads of effects, others use none.

[Guest]

[size=1]Don't forget controls can go up as well as down[/size]