bass recording

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Vurt

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Everyone always says recording bass direct is just as good if not better than micing the cabinet. I've been doing it both ways for a while now, and think that idea is horseshit, especially for loud, dirty rock. It's sounds way too canned.
 
I'm not a fan of Direct bass either. The bass player I record (my brother) is a percussive player and will slap the strings between beats. This sounds like complete ass direct, and it's a smoother sound miked I feel.

Peace, love, and chicken
Mike
 
all direct bass doesn't sound like ass...you need to expierment.
 
For better definition and clarity, direct is the better way to go.
Defining a amped bass is much harder.

Room ambience isnt equal in the freq's and will tend to make an amped sound boomy

Recording through an amp you will need a good mic ( many dont own ), a good amp ( many dont own), A good room (many .....).

True that in some rock contexts, amped may be a better choice.
also if your technique is weak then amped will cover it up more
then direct.
 
Shailat put it well. A common say we bass players have: "it's all in the hands". ;) Yet it's easy to blame the gear if you sound like crap, I have to admit.

Blending miced cabs and direct signal is the ultimate way, but if I had to choose, I'd go direct (through a good preamp of course) any day (being more of a fusion kind of player, I appreciate clarity).
 
I would think a blend of the two (mic and direct) would be ideal.....
 
Go Direct

Buy a Bass POD!... numerous "cabinet" sounds and It's a direct box.... (I have heard one, and I challenged anyone to tell me that what I heard wasn't a big Gallien- Kruger rig......., cause it sure sounded like one)

Personally, I just do bass direct, and I have never heard any complaints about the recordings..

Joe
 
I use anything that will achieve the bass tonality I'm looking for in
a particular song.
I use the direct approach for a close-up feel when I play jazz tunes, a J-station or Pod for a particular bottom feel on jazz/funk/fusion songs, mic'd amp AND direct when I use the percussive thumb-slap technique on some of my heavily- syncopated R&B/Jazz/Phunk-grooves, and when using an Uprite
acoustic, I direct the mic to the cleft holes of the Uprite and plug the mic direct into board!
The whole key here is truly what others said, "EXPERIMENTATION!!"
I also record 2-3 different bass tracks to see what sound I like the best for whatever the song calls for using diff eq settings,efx and the like on each track.
Peace
Mr.Q
 
I agree that direct is much clearer, but more times than not, that's not the sound I want at all. I actually spend more time playing with bass mic placement than I do on any other mics, whether they're other guitar mics or even drums sometimes. I usually like a bass that sounds like it's coming from a far-off corner of a parking garage, which I don't think is possible direct. Depends on what you're looking for, I guess...
 
I love to record bass. I play bass and I really enjoy recording it. Every band I record the bassist leaves very very happy.


Problem every cab and bass is different. So record three tracks at the same time doing the following :

- Mike the cab with a Sennheisser E602 (nice bass mike)
- places a AT4033 in front of the cab about a foot or two out
- Run a sansamp bassdriver DI as well with a nice present sound dialed in



on playback you have so many options. You can choose and keep the best sounding track or mix a few tracks. That setup with alittle EQing will cover just about any bass sound you want. Of course you need preamps in the chain before your recording unit as well


( I dont like the akg D112 on bass cabs. too much high end)
 
If you're unhappy with your direct bass sound, you can always run a direct out of your recorded track to a mic'ed bass amp. It works to go direct for the sake of convenience and to maintain focus on performance. Once you've got it, you have all the time in the world to screw with it.
 
hey enemyofthesun

dude, you use an AT4033 mic to record bass? i never considered that mic to be strong enough to take that kind of pounding. is that why you place it 1 foot away from the amp?

you learn something new everyday.
 
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