Another bass recording question...

[Lomitus]

Greetings All,
I am new to this/these forums and will have many questions for the various forums as I go here, so thanks to all of you in advace for your advice, your patience, and for sharing your collective wisdoms with me.

I have been playing with recording for a few years now, but have only recently been taking it seriously...recently being about the last year or so. I am recording PC based thru Cakewalk Pro Audio 9 (and will have numerous questions for that forum as well) and use primarily a Behringer 2004A as my input source to the computer. At the moment I'm just running straight into a basic sound card...for most of the stuff I do at the moment, it works pretty well over all. I have also been a musician for 20 years...guitar, bass, drums, some keys, little blues harp, just bought my fisrt violin etc....thought a little back ground on myself would be helpful to you'll! Also anyone who knows me from other forums knows that I tend to be somewhat "long winded" when I post...so please forgive...its just the way I talk/write.

Ok...my first questions and most recent problem is...and this seems to be somewhat related to the post about "bass with balls", but is slightly different...how do I get more punch and attack from the bass without punching up the "string noise" as well? I've read that to get more bite out of the bass, that you should punch up the 2.5kh range a couple of dB, but when I do this, it also seems to accentuate the sound of (my) fingers sliding up and down the strings as well. Now I do realize that to some extent this is, in part, my playing style...I do tend to slide between notes allot. I also know that the strings themselves are somewhat to blame as well...the bass I'm using has some -very- old strings, but I am out of work right now and don't have the extra $30 to blow on strings (at the moment I'm having trouble coming up with $30 for groceries every week). Any suggestions on how to get more punch without adding more noise? I'm recording this thru a Peavy TKO 65 bass amp (very good tone) into a mic and into the afore mentioned Behringer board.

Also...I saw someone in the "balls/bass" thread mention something about a "waves renisaunce bass plugin"...is it a DX plug and where would one find this?

Thanks to all for your input!
Jim Walczak

[Shailat]

Boil the strings in water for 20 min. take them out and wipe them....rerecord and come back and ask.

[Lomitus]

Actually the whole point of the question was to -avoid- having to rerecord, but I ended up doing it anyway. I ended up cutting the problem frequency(s) at the amp/board (which turned out to be just over 1.5kH) and then just used a pick on that particular bass track to give it more attack.

I have seen the suggestion of boiling the strings before...one person recommended adding bleach to the boiling water too...I may try this at a later date.

Thanks anyways,
Jim

[shackrock]

seriouslty, boil your new bass strings?why? what does this accomplish?

[Shailat]

Not new...old strings. It's a great solution for the poor and for a fast face lift.
It cleans built up oil and dirt that takes away from the clarity of the sound.

After a good boil up ( I dont know about that bleach thing though......) they get almost a new life and clarity but it doesnt last as long as new strings.....

[Track Rat]

This is true. It works on guitar strings too. Once upon a time I would do this at least once per set. Now I toss 'em and put on a fresh set when tracking.

[Doug Quance]

I'll second the string boiling. It'll save you a ton of money on strings!

The reason why your strings get dull is because you leave oil, dirt and skin on them... not too evenly, I might add.

Strings when they're new tend to vibrate in a circular pattern. As they get dirty, the residues change the pattern (because the string is now 'unbalanced')

I boil mine for 30 mins, but that could be overkill.

I have been told that only the wound guitar strings need to be boiled... not the mono ones. Purely heresay.

[zer0sig]

it stands to reason that only wound guitar strings would need to be boiled, but unwound strings still accumulate some crud, and wiping them down with some kind of oil would help dissolve off any deposits on them fairly readily, and when you wipe them off, they should be close to new. for guitar string longevity, i apply ghs fastfret, wipe down the strings with the cloth, then reapply the fastfret. result: my strings stay a lot brighter for a lot longer. works for me.