Mixing/EQing slap bass.

S

SeanDuross

New member
I am a bassist who has recently started dabbling in home digital recording (I'm currently using a trial copy of Adobe Audition - the bastard stepchild of Cool Edit). Of course I would love for one of you to just put the rest of your life on hold and explain everything I need to know about mixing and mastering, but in the event that doesn't happen a distant second would be some pointers on bringing the slap bass out in the mix. Apparently, just cranking it up isn't the panacea I'd hoped (okay, I was looking for an excuse to use the word "panacea" in a sentence) - yeah I can hear it then but it sounds like crap! How's about some real-world nuts and bolts: Effects (Audition has a nice preset "Tighter Bass" on its compression, and I usually put a light Bass Chorus (about 30% wet) on it too, stereo positioning and expanding and, perhaps most importantly, parametric EQing (I'm talking real numbers here: freq's, Q's, amt of boost/cut). Please grant a pearl of wisdom to a noob - who knows? You might get me to lay some bass lines down for you. You can check out some of my recent abominations, er, I mean attempts at recording at http://www.myspace.com/seanduross.

Thanks fellow music-makers!
 
Hey.

The importance of getting your sound EXACTLY how you want it BEFORE you record cannot be overstated. Start there. Once you get your ideal sound from your bass and amp, work on mic placement. I suggest an MD421 since slap bass is most dependant on snappy highs and detailed mids. once you get placement down (you hear in your headphones EXACTLY what you want to hear), then record and screw around with effects.

Good luck. :)
 
what type of music? rockabilly-type stuff?

I would ditch the chorus and stereo expander stuff. Typically, its best to put bass right down the middle. You should probably concentrate more on EQ and tone. Compression will probably help if you set it correctly...

How are you recording the upright? (It is an upright, correct?) DI? mic'ing the bass? mic'ing the bass amp? multiple sources and combining them in the mix?

How is the playing? Zed is right on about the getting the sound right before you record, but I think upright can also be VERY difficult to capture, even when you have a decent tone to begin with. It might take some time for you get some good sounds.

I'm not an expert and sorry that I can't be any more specific... But I'll say one thing I've noticed about upright bass is that you get alot of really low frequency content. you need to control it. I'm talking boomy sub-bass below 80 Hz. So you might want to try cutting some of that first...
 
I'm sorry - I should have been more specific. It is electric bass in a sort of rock/funk style. To give you an idea how bad it is, at present, I don't have my amp - I don't even have a direct box! - I'm plugging into a little pocket headphone amp into the soundcard (Creative Audigy). The raw sound is surprisingly good, it's just when I start laying down melodies, harmonies, inst. breaks, etc., it starts to get lost. Again, you can get an idea where I'm coming from at www.myspace.com/seanduross. Thanks again for any and all tips.
 
Sean, I just gave your "Sneaky Pepe" a download and listen. Cool stuff and nice work. But I do understand what you mean about the bass. The mix is clean, very clean and the bass is there and not covered, but it does sound like it's in a hole. There's a couple of things happening, I think...

First of all it sounds like it's in a "hole" much because the lead guitars on the sides are extremely up front in the mix. Having those two so "close" to the listener and hard panned at the same time instantly creates a 3D "frame" around the mix that automatically is going to make anything in the middle of the picture sound more distant. I'd look at decreasing the dynamic range between the guitar tracks and the bass track; not thorugh compression, but just by pulling back on the guitar levels a taste (just 2 or 3dB maybe, though that's a guess), and simultaneously bringing the bass level up just a bit by about the same small amount.

After doing that, I might also consider softening the pan on the lead guitars, bringing them inside just a couple of degrees, so they are not quite so obvious a frame but still give you that mice stereo effect. Then I'd fill the side with a little wet reverb return on those same guitars to fill in the edges but with a softer edge than there is now. This should help integrate the guitars with the rest of the mix, putting them on a bit more equal front-to-back footing without losing the guitar's prominance in the mix.

And third, the guitars sound really good...and that's actually part of the problem in a way ;). The guitars have a nice warm rounded bottom end to them. That is actually making your bass with it's surrently comprimised signal path sound a bit thin in comparison. I wouldn't touch the guitars EQ-wise if I didn't have to, but you might do well to accentuate the slap of the bass a liitle at somewhere around 3-4kHz to give it a little more definition. That is, if there's anything there work with. It could be that your jerry-rigged signal path for the bass is just sucking too much life out of it too, and if you try boosting that stuff you'll just get mud. You can only try it to see if it helps or not. But get yourself a SansAmp bass DI or something along those lines and you'll be much happier, I'm sure :)

A small non-related note: There sure is no lack of bass on your web page! :D Your bass cleff backgorund graphic is so prominant that one cant read most of the text ;). Just a friendly surregtion that maybe you might want to lighten up that background image to a ligher shade or gray or something so that it does not camoflague the text. Just an idea... :)

G.
 
Alright, now. For starters, could you please do something about that myspace site? It's completely obnoxious, and my eyes hurt. Get rid of all that crap; I can't even read anything. You're a bassists, and you're in to music. Yea, yea, I get it already. :D (although I am really impressed that you're friends with Roger Waters -- right on).

Secondly ... you're recording with what? A freakin' pocket headphone amp, and you're plugging it in to your audigy. OOOOOOkkkaaaayyyy Jaco.

Seriously, a bassist as freakin' good as yourself -- and I mean that sincerely -- should really be a lot more selective in how you go about getting your tone. I'm not even going to get in to this. You should know better than to plug it in to your portable headphone amp or your vaccum cleaner or blender or whatever the hell it is you're plugging your guitar in to.

I'm serious! :D :D It's insulting to our collective intelligence to come on here and say; "Why doesn't my bass sound good. I'm plugging it in to my pocket dildo, and it should sound slammin' by God ! ! "

I'm so outa' here. :D :D You call me after you get that Countryman ... Avalon M5 ... hell, I'll even settle for an ART Tube MP or a Sansamp bassdriver. Until then, I don't even want to admit I took part in this thread. Your thread is all that is wrong with America. :D May God have mercy on your soul.


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