bass recording questions

[eatthemushroomm]

My band's tracking our first full-length album right now. We did the drums in a professional studio using pro tools, but can't afford to do the rest of it there. One of our guitarists does home recording, and he's quite experienced with it. He's recorded all of our demos thus far. So he's going to finish up the tracking at his house.

Like I said, he's already recorded demos of us and has experience and such BUT since this is a full album we're taking it more seriously and want everything to sound as good as we possibly can with our limited resources. How would you suggest going about recording bass? I play a 60th Anniversary Fender Standard Jazz Bass, stock pick-ups. I'm thinking about having him use a kick mic to mic the speaker cabinet, and also running a DI out of the effects loop from my amp. We use a PreSonus Firepod and Sonar 6 Producer Edition. We'd probably run an Ampeg SVX amp sim on the DI and mix that signal with the mic'd cabinet track. Does this sound like a good plan? Anyone have suggestions?!

 

[rayc]

Record the mic'd amp & the DI split as dry as possible. You can add stuff later - computers are good for that but you really need a good dry take to work from..
I don't know about the bas drum mic. but someone will.
Blending the mic'd and DI tracks should get you a really good sound - you may not even need to play with it. Try it and see.
There are some good bass DIs out tere & the Behri BDI21 isn't too bad either.
Good luck!

 

[DrewPeterson7]

I'm no expert at recording bass tones, but I've been told this is the way to go, especially if you want a bit of grit in your bass tone. Record the DI clean, and overdrive your mic'd signal to taste at the amp. then, lop off some of the low end on the mic'd one, and let the DI come up to fill in the tone, so that you get some nice grit and crunch but you still have a clear, deep, articulate low end.

 

[drdlks]

That is how I am doing my bass recording now. Using a bass V AMP and then running a direct to the board signal. That way I have an AMP SIM and a dry direct sound.

I have found that when I want to back off one bass track I can and then come back in with a thicker bass sound when the sond takes off. The blend is very nice indeed.

Plus if I find the song only needs one track or the other I have it there with the same performance on both tracks.

 

[zed32]

yeah i've done that often, but lately it depends on my situation. if it's late at night and i'm recording, which is often the case, i can't really crank my bass amp up enough to mic the speaker so i just go DI from my amp into the firepod. i get great sounds that way, but i find that i prefer having that mic'd track whenever i can get it. it's a more edgy sound, since you get some of that speaker distortion.