Old 80s' Tune "Ah! Leah!" - Struggling with bass sound

Listened to first and latest mix. In my opinion bass is hard to get just right. I can spend days on experimenting with the sounds to get it to sound decent. I bought a VST plugin from StudioDevil called something like Bass Amp Pro. It has two channels(bi-amp) so you can taylor in your lows and your mids/highs on two separate channels. It has helped me tremendously. I have found that I don't need as much low end as I would think. I almost always roll off anything around 80hz and below. Maybe higher if it is mudding up my mix.

In your latest mix, dropping the guitars down helped a lot. I am still hearing a lot of bass fret slapping/noise that gets distracting. When you do the little bass runs they are audible but not very clear. If your compressing the bass(which you should be), play around with the attack and release. If you have some attack it may bring those little notes out clearer.

Regardless, your doing a fine job on this. One of my favorite songs from that era. Good job
 
How many tracks of guitar? They got a bit thinner. Maybe if you have four (sounds close) you could high pass a pair and leave a pair running full. If it's just the pair, maybe move the high pass down a bit...

This is really shaping up. That dual channel bass amp bit is what I used through the 80s to make the sounds these songs had. Running bi-amped with an 18" on the 80 and under and 4x10 on the upper end. Really sparkled. Tone from a Yamaha B100, power from Crown.
Try hitting about a 3dB gain with a 1.5-1.8 Q at around 250-350 Hz on the bass and see if somewhere in that range punches it through better...(you may have to hit it harder (dB) to "hear" it and then back down.)
 
Thanks guys. It seems when I tried to bring up some of eq's of the bass it makes the pick noise more apparent. I guess I was trying to find the happy medium between making the picking noise less apparent but keep the note definition, which seems hard to do.

I just have the two rhythm guitar tracks, one on each side. I could duplicate them both and leave the copied two with the high pass off, but then wouldn't I be defeating the purpose of taking it out the other two to begin with?
 
Like I said, if it's only two tracks just push the high pass back down a bit to get the guitars fatter. See if that helps. Pick noise shouldn't be in the range (250-350) I was shooting at, but if it hurts, it hurts. Did you try doing the bass line with a felt pick or fingers? Or are we beyond retracking..?
 
BroKen_H said:
Like I said, if it's only two tracks just push the high pass back down a bit to get the guitars fatter. See if that helps. Pick noise shouldn't be in the range (250-350) I was shooting at, but if it hurts, it hurts. Did you try doing the bass line with a felt pick or fingers? Or are we beyond retracking..?
Click to expand...

Ok I also took the high mids up a bit and maybe that thinned them out as well. I think I put the high pass at about the 100K range.

Let me mess with the compressor attack and the eq at the range you suggested tonight and see what happens. I'm not a bass player I'm a guitar player, so for me I really have to play bass with a pick, I can't play well enough with my fingers. So re-tracking the bass isn't going to do much unless I use a different pick, and honestly I am a creature of habit and have only one kind of pick. I use my normal Nylon EVH picks so they're not that hard really.
 
Guitars sound real good.

Cymbals are a bit phasey/hissy. Might be SC. Snare is a bit loud and heavily compressed.

No vocal? I remember this song, and I was waiting for it. Donny Iris or something like that right? Too lazy to gooogle.
 
Soundcloud makes a mess of cymbals. They don't sound like that normally.

I don't even know if I'm making strides to getting right, I feel like I'm trying anything at this point. So frustrating, almost like I'm going backwards. New mix but I don't even know at this point if I'm on the right track. I re-tracked the chorus and tried to tone down the pick noise but this is the best I can do it, it's still an issue...maybe it's a little less annoying I'm not sure. I do think I fixed the guitars a bit.

https://soundcloud.com/ban5150/ah-leah-donnie-iris-covermix-4-no-vocals
 
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Last version is pretty cool. I wouldnt sweat it too much. Take a break and come back with fresh ears.

I cant wait to hear it with vocals.
:thumbs up:
 
Been gone for a week. Just got to listen again.

DUDE! The bass sounds perfect for the song. Just the right amount of fret growl, etc. Just perfect.
Love this mix!!!:)
 
BroKen_H said:
Been gone for a week. Just got to listen again.

DUDE! The bass sounds perfect for the song. Just the right amount of fret growl, etc. Just perfect.
Love this mix!!!:)
Click to expand...

Really? Cool, finally a breakthrough.

Vocally, I gotta find a better singer for it. I'm a backup singer and I sound fine doing that, but singing lead, it's just not good enough for all the work I've done haha. I'll have to see if I can find someone who can do it justice vocally and then I'll repost it.

Thanks for all the great advice guys!
 
If the comments were helpful, consider paying it forward by listening and commenting on tracks others have posted.
 
Try turning up the mids on the bass - all the "highs" are hiding in that area. Anything higher is just string noise and rattle.
Right now it sounds better than all the previous mixes.
 
ido1957 said:
Try turning up the mids on the bass - all the "highs" are hiding in that area. Anything higher is just string noise and rattle.
Right now it sounds better than all the previous mixes.
Click to expand...

Yeah once I get the vocals on there I'll mess with it some more. I can still hear it's a little muffled the higher end.
 
What a great job! I am from Erie, Pa and Donnie Iris is from Pittsburgh. Donnie Iris and the Cruisers got a lot of air play in Erie. His guitar player, Marty Lee Hoenes, is from Erie and sold me my first electric guitar when I was 15:) You are doing a fantastic job with this song.

I am new to the forum and to recording, so take my advice for what it is worth, but but I am a bass player. You are starting to get a good growl coming out of the bass. I agree with the advice of boosting the mids a bit on the bass. That is where the highs actually are. The bulk of the bass sound is coming through nicely but the little runs are still getting lost a bit I think. You are sooo close though!
 
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