Ramirez Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 (edited) Does this cut your mustard? It's a cheap Harley Benton Beatbass fretless 😁! I fitted a very cheap piezo pickup (not a bass specific one) that I found in the shed, and ran it through an upright IR in Helix. Annoyingly, it sounds more convincing than a pickup on my real upright... Edited June 3 by Ramirez 13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paolo85 Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 I think it is very good. I personally have come to suspect that fretted basses may work better for an upright sound (with some tweaks such as a mute) as it is very difficult to avoid the mwah on the G string on a fretless. Still, you do lose some "upright elements" for the fact that they are fretted so I guess one has to chose the best of two evils 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 On iPhone/laptop yes, headphones no. In a mix it would probably work though 👍 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 (edited) 5 hours ago, Ramirez said: ................... Edited June 3 by Beedster Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 5 hours ago, Ramirez said: Annoyingly, it sounds more convincing than a pickup on my real upright... Mic is the only way to make an upright sound like a louder upright 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ramirez Posted June 3 Author Share Posted June 3 4 minutes ago, Beedster said: Mic is the only way to make an upright sound like a louder upright Quite. That holds true for any acoustic instrument. But sometimes a pickup is the practical solution if a mic causes other issues. And if I had an upright pickup that gave me that sound I posted, I'd be very happy! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 1 minute ago, Ramirez said: Quite. That holds true for any acoustic instrument. But sometimes a pickup is the practical solution if a mic causes other issues. And if I had an upright pickup that gave me that sound I posted, I'd be very happy! Agreed, so would I 👍 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burns-bass Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 52 minutes ago, Beedster said: Mic is the only way to make an upright sound like a louder upright 100% this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jd56hawk Posted June 3 Share Posted June 3 (edited) 1 hour ago, Paolo85 said: I think it is very good. I personally have come to suspect that fretted basses may work better for an upright sound (with some tweaks such as a mute) as it is very difficult to avoid the mwah on the G string on a fretless. Still, you do lose some "upright elements" for the fact that they are fretted so I guess one has to chose the best of two evils True, D'Addario black tapewounds over flatwounds...yes, including TI...with a string mute. The Aphex System electronics do a very good job, too...Aural Exciter and Big-Bottom Sound switched out of phase works for me. (The OP's bass sounds pretty good, though.) Edited June 3 by jd56hawk 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dclaassen Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 I think you are close enough. You can really chase your own tail trying to get an "upright" sound. Most folks would accept a thumpy, Middy, muted kind of tone. My belief is that most folks who want an upright sound really want the visual appeal of the double bass on the band stand. To me, this is going back about 300 years in technology. I don't see keyboardists hauling an acoustic piano (harpsichord?) around, nor do many guitarists bring along a lute. Leo had a really good idea...go with that, mute it, and you will be fine... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paolo85 Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 (edited) 1 hour ago, dclaassen said: I think you are close enough. You can really chase your own tail trying to get an "upright" sound. Most folks would accept a thumpy, Middy, muted kind of tone. My belief is that most folks who want an upright sound really want the visual appeal of the double bass on the band stand. To me, this is going back about 300 years in technology. I don't see keyboardists hauling an acoustic piano (harpsichord?) around, nor do many guitarists bring along a lute. Leo had a really good idea...go with that, mute it, and you will be fine... Well, the harpsichord arguably has taken a beat from acoustic piano. The problem with it was that technically you had no dynamics. But the acoustic piano is still going strong. Any time I have seen live a traditional jazz band playing with an electric bass, I was hopeful but then I was ultimately disappointed. Admittedly, those bass players were clearly not trying to get the upright sound, so I don't know how I would feel about somebody with a Mustang, a mute and tapes live. Maybe I would like it. But it is interesting that, after some 70 years since the first P bass, despite searching, I have personally yet to find a successful traditional jazz bass player that imitates the traditional sound with the electric. Maybe Anthony Jackson live with Michel Petrucciani, but only to an extent, and it is more of a case of him being already famous than him becoming famous by doing that. I may have missed one or some important example (would be glad to learn about them) but to me this suggests that an electric bass could maybe do a good imitation but cannot beat an upright at its own game. To my ears best examples of jazz with electric bass come from player that do embrace the difference of the electric sound and find a context where it fits in (eg Mark Egan with Joe Beck and Steve Swallow with Scofield) Edited June 4 by Paolo85 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dclaassen Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 1 hour ago, Paolo85 said: Well, the harpsichord arguably has taken a beat from acoustic piano. The problem with it was that technically you had no dynamics. But the acoustic piano is still going strong. Any time I have seen live a traditional jazz band playing with an electric bass, I was hopeful but then I was ultimately disappointed. Admittedly, those bass players were clearly not trying to get the upright sound, so I don't know how I would feel about somebody with a Mustang, a mute and tapes live. Maybe I would like it. But it is interesting that, after some 70 years since the first P bass, despite searching, I have personally yet to find a successful traditional jazz bass player that imitates the traditional sound with the electric. Maybe Anthony Jackson live with Michel Petrucciani, but only to an extent, and it is more of a case of him being already famous than him becoming famous by doing that. I may have missed one or some important example (would be glad to learn about them) but to me this suggests that an electric bass could maybe do a good imitation but cannot beat an upright at its own game. To my ears best examples of jazz with electric bass come from player that do embrace the difference of the electric sound and find a context where it fits in (eg Mark Egan with Joe Beck and Steve Swallow with Scofield) I think you make good points here. Jazz musicians are, IMO, some of the most conservative folks out there in regards to instrumentation. Try showing up for a big band gig with a Euphonium. Yes, there are exceptions, but they don't change the overall rule. Jazz players use upright bass, period...but why? I don't play upright because I think it's a lot of hard work just to uphold a sonic and technical tradition. If someone else wants to do that, great. I've played a lot of jazz sessions with a fretless 5 string....sounds pretty good to me. The folks I don't understand are Americana (whatever that means) people that want only an upright player. In that case, it is purely visual. Just my opinion..... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JPJ Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 Just listened using Mk1 Apple AirPods. Close, very close, but lacks a bit of ‘thump’. I’ve spent many happy hours trying to make an NS EUB sound like an upright (I’m as close as I think I’ll ever be) and that just has a bit more heft about the E & A strings, and there is the little bit of metallic zing on your higher notes that you don’t get with a db. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete.young Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 What do you make of this? Demo using an IR loader and an IR file of a German double bass from 3 Sigma Audio, comes in at about 30 seconds in. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JPJ Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 Maybe I’m being picky but that still lacks something, as good as it is. One thing I’ve learned with the NS is the way the low notes decay. It’s very pronounced compared to a fretless bass guitar where they tend to ring longer and I think that’s what I’m hearing here even with the IR loaded. That said, it’s the type of sound that would confuse your average audience member. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paolo85 Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 @pete.young I think it makes a very credibile tone. Very good. But I agree with JPJ, the attack/sustain combination is very different from that of a DB so it gives a different vibe. You can hear quite a bit of fretless mwah on the high register, with the notes blossoming instead of decaying. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 8 hours ago, dclaassen said: I think you are close enough. You can really chase your own tail trying to get an "upright" sound. Most folks would accept a thumpy, Middy, muted kind of tone. My belief is that most folks who want an upright sound really want the visual appeal of the double bass on the band stand. To me, this is going back about 300 years in technology. I don't see keyboardists hauling an acoustic piano (harpsichord?) around, nor do many guitarists bring along a lute. Leo had a really good idea...go with that, mute it, and you will be fine... Yes. And no. If only life were so simple Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beedster Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 For me this comes down to something more than tone. The upright bass requires (forces) the player to adopt a different style in terms of structure and timing of the parts by comparison with electric. It's less tone and more 'I can tell that's not upright because that's not how you'd play that part on an upright'. I played in a Jazz combo a few years back and the composer/keyboard player had recorded all the original demos using software (keyboard triggered) for the upright parts, he was a very competent composer and musician. He understood the limitations of the instrument he was emulating and you could hear this in what he chose to play even though he was using a keyboard to record them. It's not about sounding like an upright, but playing whatever instrument you're using as you'd play an upright. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baloney Balderdash Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 (edited) 10 hours ago, dclaassen said: I think you are close enough. You can really chase your own tail trying to get an "upright" sound. Most folks would accept a thumpy, Middy, muted kind of tone. My belief is that most folks who want an upright sound really want the visual appeal of the double bass on the band stand. To me, this is going back about 300 years in technology. I don't see keyboardists hauling an acoustic piano (harpsichord?) around, nor do many guitarists bring along a lute. Leo had a really good idea...go with that, mute it, and you will be fine... By that logic we should all play digital samples via a midi keyboards hooked up to an iPad and we should throw all other instruments out with the garbage and never play them again. I honestly don't get your point at all. They are all tools, all with some unique sounds and timbres that opens up for different unique possibilities and options of tonal expression and broadens the tonal palette when creating music. Edited June 4 by Baloney Balderdash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dclaassen Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 Kind of an overreaction I think. It is true that many groups wanting an upright player are after the image, not the sound or the style. Usually, people adopt tools as they are modernized. Upright and electric basses share a common tuning and quite a lot of technique. Why don’t folks universally use tube or A/B amps with huge, heavy cabinets anymore? Why don’t keyboardists still haul big drawbar organs around? We have moved toward more efficient ways of playing our instruments. Not the same as your suggestion at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bremen Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 (edited) Somewhere in the World Wild Web there's a description of a rig that uses a digital loudspeaker crossover's time alignment function to make an eb sound like a dB. Something like, the sound of the body resonance hits the ear later than the direct sound from the strings. I'll try and dig it out, might take a while though as I'm really not sure what search terms to use. (Later) As Adolf Hitler once said: -opinions are like testicles; everyone's got one. Most of the opinions I've found on the www are "turn the tone down and use tapewounds". Not good enough. Others say "it can't be done lol you loser" or "get a db" Closest I got was from holding the bass vertical so the side of my index finger pulled -"plucked" isn't the right word - the string, over the 12th fret. Still didn't have that blossom that Paolo describes though. Edited June 4 by bremen 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tauzero Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 Putting a reverb with a quite rapid decay on it helps, especially if you start out with an Ashbory. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bremen Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 1 minute ago, tauzero said: Putting a reverb with a quite rapid decay on it helps, especially if you start out with an Ashbory. Makes sense, maybe low-pass the signal to the reverb, and mix the output of the reverb with the direct bass? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickA Posted June 4 Share Posted June 4 5 hours ago, pete.young said: What do you make of this? I like this one. But there is no "upright bass sound". Someone playing rockabilly on a laminate bass sounds quite different from Charlie Haden or Eddie Gomez playing jazz on something ancient. Personally I'm going for a softer high-mwah sound whereas others are after a well damped solid thud. 3 hours ago, Beedster said: different style in terms of structure and timing Too right, who plays the same lines on electric and upright? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paolo85 Posted June 5 Share Posted June 5 10 hours ago, bremen said: Closest I got was from holding the bass vertical so the side of my index finger pulled -"plucked" isn't the right word - the string, over the 12th fret. Still didn't have that blossom that Paolo describes though. Tried that. Combined with a high action it really gets you very close! But it is from my point of view not very practicable Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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