Live bands compress bass - since when?!

[Al Krow]

Compression and bass. Marmite. Divides opinion. We all know.

But how long have really good professional bass players actually been using compressors for live performance (NOT studio recording where sound engineers will have had their input and say, like nearly forever)? Is it a relatively modern phenomenon that has become more common with the advent of D class amps?

Just how widespread is the use of compression pedals by the bass players, when playing live, whom we each really admire or do they play au naturel unfettered by signal squish in their chain and let the Sound / FOH guys do their thing as required?

As ever, looking forward to getting your views! 

AK

[Steve Browning]

John Deacon's bass rack with Dbx compressor. That will be late 70's I reckon.

http://www.geocities.co.jp/Broadway-Guitar/1391/bass-rack-unit.html

 

[arthurhenry]

Has commonly been used live on bass for many decades.

[Al Krow]

11 minutes ago, arthurhenry said:

Has commonly been used live on bass for many decades.

For sure. But has it also not been used live for many decades? When did Paul McCartney and John Entwistle start using compressors on their pedal boards?

[mike257]

Not everyone uses them on their pedalboards, but almost everyone will be compressed. A lot of amps will compress naturally anyway, and, at small club gig level and upwards, it'll almost certainly hit some sort of compression somewhere between arriving at the mixing desk and departing from the speakers.

[Dan Dare]

19 minutes ago, mike257 said:

Not everyone uses them on their pedalboards, but almost everyone will be compressed. A lot of amps will compress naturally anyway, and, at small club gig level and upwards, it'll almost certainly hit some sort of compression somewhere between arriving at the mixing desk and departing from the speakers.

Very good point. Although bass players may not use compressors per se, a lot of bass rigs (especially smaller combos) do indeed compress naturally by virtue of the fact that they run out of headroom.

[Jack]

Whether it's on your board or in your amp or neither, there's a good bet the soundman has you compressed at the desk.

 

My gigging experience only goes back 15 years as I'm just a wee bairn but it's been like that at every gig I've played.

[Al Krow]

Agreed about the soundman. But equally is it fair to say that pro bass players won't be adding their own "additional" compression to their signal chain because it's being looked after elsewhere. Many pro bass players will have a pedal board (with dirt or filter pedals etc). Will a compressor typically be on it?

[Cuzzie]

Bas, dirt pedals compress the signal 

most people using an envelope pedal will have some form of compression after it to control your quacking, can be the same for chorus type effects, but they are less particular to compression before or after.

pitch shifters respond well to compression before as it’s a steadier signal to work with

tune amps compress a signal

DI output compresses the signal before it hits the mixer board as well as the other things people above have said.

its pretty ubiquitous.

i suppose you could change your question to do they have a compression pedal on their board, but the fact is still there is compression going on with a pedal or not

 

[Al Krow]

Agreed - but I thought that was my question  "Just how widespread is the use of compression pedals" (I'd kinda assumed that a compression pedal as with the rest of their pedals would be on their pedal boards) and, if so, when did this start to become the 'norm' (if ever)?

[Cuzzie]

Title says

”live bands compress bass since when”

since the Dawn of time....

[Al Krow]

13.7 billion years ago then?

[stingrayPete1977]

19 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

13.7 billion years ago then?

Adam tried to impress Eve by 'doing a Jaco' but she said it was aimless noodling.

[Dood]

1 minute ago, stingrayPete1977 said:

Adam tried to impress Eve by 'doing a Jaco' but she said it was aimless noodling.

Eve then piped up... "Jaco only needed..." 

[Al Krow]

...to play a bit more like James Jamerson (with no compression).

[Dood]

Just now, Al Krow said:

...to play a bit more like James Jamerson (with no compression).

Adam then found out that Eve had been secretly chatting to James and Jaco on WhatsApp(le)..  

[Cuzzie]

@Al Krow except James used ancient strings from the dawn of time and foam under his strings to limit the vibrations and therefore potential frequencies of his strings.

he also went straight into the board with Altec equipment with guess what, compression drivers to get a line level sound as well as up to 5 pre amps

Live he had an Ampeg B15 which would guess what......

[tonyquipment]

Some people compress. Some don’t. It’s a matter of preference I guess. 

 

Im one of those who does. Purely because I’m a lazy sloppy player. 

[Al Krow]

2 minutes ago, tonyquipment said:

Im one of those who does. Purely because I’m a lazy sloppy player. 

Tony interesting you put it in those terms, 'cos what you're implying is that if you're a sufficiently competent player you won't need to use a compressor?

I guess that is really what is underlying my Q about what is it that pro bass players are typically doing? Let's assume they don't have the benefit of sound engineers for a particular gig, would they all be saying 'ok best get my Cali 76 CB (or whatever their favourite 'squeeze' happens to be) on my board for this gig then?' or 'cos they are excellent bass players would they not really ever bother? 

[chris_b]

Compression was probably developed during the early days of the film industry and, I would have thought, would have been taken up by the recording studios pretty early on.

I have never used compression and none of the guys I see playing at a local level use it either. I can understand its use in the studio where uneven playing needs to be straightened out and maybe some body added to the sound but on a gig I prefer not to use anything that's going to eat into the dynamics of my playing.

[BigRedX]

Most bassists who claim not to need compression probably have something in their signal chain that is actually doing the job of a compressor. Where it is valves in the amp or something in the sound coming out of the PA.

The only way you guarantee not to have any compression in your bass sound is if you:

1. Don't go through the PA
2. Use a transistor amp (not class D) with the input gain well below the level at which the clip light comes on and still plenty of clean extra volume available on the master volume control.
3. Don't have any overdrive/distortion/fuzz effects.
4. Don't use any digital effects.
5. Don't use a wireless system.

[chris_b]

The OP was about compressor pedals.

[BigRedX]

1 minute ago, chris_b said:

The OP was about compressor pedals.

Yes but you don't need a compressor pedal if you've already got one or more devices in your signal chain compressing the sound as side effect of whatever else they do.

[Jack]

To specifically answer the OP's question: compressors as a separate device became more popular with the advent of good solid state amps that slowly started to replace tube amps and their natural compression. Many of the early SS greats like Trace and SWR included compressors in the amp for this very reason and for everyone else there were pedals.

[discreet]

3 minutes ago, Jack said:

...compressors as a separate device became more popular with the advent of good solid state amps that slowly started to replace tube amps and their natural compression. Many of the early SS greats like Trace and SWR included compressors in the amp for this very reason and for everyone else there were pedals.

Yes. The compression you get from all-valve amps could be part of the reason they're seen as sounding 'better' than SS amps. As you say, valve compression is natural whereas if you're using a pedal, lots of extra 'user available' parameters are introduced - which perhaps is why people get a bit hung up about them.