How do I keep my DI bass track from being so...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rokket
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Rokket

Rokket

Trailing Behind Again
... in your face?

Recording bass has long been my biggest pain. It's especially hard on me because I am primarily a bassist.

I listen to the pro stuff for reference, and I know: better pre's, better gear, higher end sound... I've heard it all before.

My problem is getting the bass to sit in the mix, and not be so boomy or in your face due to the fact that it's DI'd.

I've tried all the tricks: Sansamp, Direct to the multracker, through the mixer... I can't mic an amp, so I haven't tried that one yet (mixing the DI track with the mic'd amp). I've even tried parametric e.q., tracking with the low e.q. dialed down on the mixer, nothing seems to get my bass to sound like I want it: present, but not overpowering the mix.

What can I do?
 
Rokket said:
I can't mic an amp, so I haven't tried that one yet (mixing the DI track with the mic'd amp).
Click to expand...

Sorry for peeking at this thread. I went through this too and thought I had a great answer for you: DI + mic. I just learned this one and it's made all the difference in the world. Sorry you can't do that one...

Other than that I assume you've worked with your compression settings? And you mentioned EQ, but I often find a thinner sound bass sits in the mix better. (The old adage keeps coming back--at least for me: What sounds great solo'd may not be what sounds great in the mix.)
 
The blend is the best way - honestly.
Mind you the last track I recorded (Sewersong/night out) was in a rush & without my usual gear so I just DI'd with a Behri Bass DI & the results were really very good - there's a lot of good tweaking to be had with the llittle Behri.
You can suss out the result - as I can't really say if it was any good to other folks' ears - if you go to soundclick & search pygmy beat then sewer song or the same on mspace.
Oh, I almost always put a peak of 1/2 doz dBs at 3Khz to give it some cut through in a mix. Some time a bottom end roll off depending on the guitar distortion and drum sounds.
 
I've done the roll off with the bottom end (-200), and I've also boosted the mids, and it's sounding better. I guess I really have to get some better mics and see what I can do with a Gallien Krueger RB1100... :(
 
I like to run the DI'd track (once recorded) back out to an amp and re-amp it and mic the cab. It adds "wool" that can help the track sit a little better in a mix. Also compression helps a lot too.
 
All very good responses. Just to add to the stone soup:

Turn down the volume on the bass track; you probably don't need as much as you think you do. If it disappears into the mix too fast when you turn it down, you probably have too much happening in the bass freqs from your other tracks. High pass everything except kick and bass at ~100Hz or so, and don't be afraid to start rolling off on those tracks ~200Hz - 250Hz or so, especially on your electric guitar, distortion return and reverb return tracks which are probably overdone all the way around.

G.
 
Here is my confession

In all the years I've been live mixing or recording, I have never miked a bass amp. I either take the signal from a DI or just plugged straight into the desk. While I have had difficulties with some instruments, I've not experienced any problems in getting a good bass sound, unless, of course, the guitar is lacking in a good quality output (and I've had a few of those). I mix or record flat. For recording, I sometimes use a bit of compression to smooth out gross uneveness in playing. For the most part, I leave it as it is. When recording bass myself, I have a couple of basses that I can choose from to get the sort of sound I want, and I switch from using fingers to using a pick depending on how much presence I want to give it.

I have miked up an upright bass, because I've not yet experienced a really nice sound coming from built-in pickups. Now here is another confession. DUring one session recording a jazz combo, I was not having much luck getting a good sound from the bass. I'd tried a number of mikes, but none were really exciting me. The Rode NT5 was gettig there, but I was getting so much spill from everythng else. In desperation I threw a $50 Behringer C2 on it. All of us looked at each other with that kind of wide-eyed 'wow' look. This sound was rich, crisp, wonderfully woody, and not a lot of spill from other instruments in the room . . . so that's what we used from then on!
 
Track Rat said:
I like to run the DI'd track (once recorded) back out to an amp and re-amp it and mic the cab. It adds "wool" that can help the track sit a little better in a mix. Also compression helps a lot too.
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The biggest problem with that is that I am really lacking in the mic department. I have yet to start really buying mics because I am away from home so much, I don't want to spend that money and have them sit and get ruined in the humid climate I live in. So I am waiting until I can quit sailing and move to a good home stateside. So all I can do is DI right now.
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
All very good responses. Just to add to the stone soup:

Turn down the volume on the bass track; you probably don't need as much as you think you do. If it disappears into the mix too fast when you turn it down, you probably have too much happening in the bass freqs from your other tracks. High pass everything except kick and bass at ~100Hz or so, and don't be afraid to start rolling off on those tracks ~200Hz - 250Hz or so, especially on your electric guitar, distortion return and reverb return tracks which are probably overdone all the way around.

G.
Click to expand...

I'll give this a try. I can see where I am getting muddy in the lower ranges, so it's probably the culprit. I don't use a lot of reverb on my instrument tracks. I usually don't use any on the bass, and just kiss the drums and guitar a bit to liven them up. Now vocals.... :o

I used Reaper's high pass plugins in other applications with good results. I also tried a 3-band eq and it started to sound closer to what I am looking for. Let me see what I can do with the guitar tracks.

How about the vocals? Would I need to shave anything off them? I don't think they are low enough in the freq range to affect the 200Hz are they?

Thanks, Glen!
 
I find that using a good multiband compressor (spending good time tweaking), matched up to a serious limiter gives me a bass that stays solid in the mix without eating up too much of the mix.

So at the end of it, I have this going on:

Limiter->EQ->Multiband->very light stereo synthesis of some kind for added "3D" effect.
 
assuming you're sticking it into some rock/metal sort of tracks, try compressing the ever living crap out of the bass with a fast-ish attack

or, even better, use a multi-band comp and squish the crap out of the low end, and put just a dash of compression on the rest.

or, even better, split the bass into 2 tracks. roll of the all the lows on one, and roll off everything but the lows on the other. compress the snot out of the low track, and toss some distortion onto the other. there's a million ways of tackling this problem, but in my experience, finding the proper compression technique is key.
 
Rokket said:
How about the vocals? Would I need to shave anything off them? I don't think they are low enough in the freq range to affect the 200Hz are they?
Click to expand...
The vocals themselves probably aren't getting in the way (though no one can say for sure without hearing everything.) But it doesn't hurt to high pass the extraneous lows out of any track that doesn't need them, including vocals. Sometimes you might be getting LF rumble that may not be noticable on any single track, but when you add all the racks together it can build up into enough mud to mess with some of the bass. This is the main diea behind the 100Hz high pass mentioned earlier.

Yeah, check out your gits. If you got a wall of sustained and distorted guitar that extends far enough into the lows, you might want to look into carving out some room for the bass (as well as maybe even carving out some of the bass to leave room for the gits; they scratch each other's backs.) I sound like a broken record, but use the ol' parametric sweep method to find real honker freqs in the gits and surgically remove them. Then high pass them, starting around 100Hz. Slowly drag up the threshold freq on the high pass untill you hear it start to affect the sound of the git, then back ot off a few Hz.

After the gits are tightened up, the others here have some good ideas of what to do bass-wise, including some tightening compression and some key EQ freqs depending on how much attack vs. body you want in the bass.

G.
 
Didn't read the rest of the thread, but for DI bass I usually heavily compress it, makes it sit much better. Basses can be very dynamic.
 
I will try to post a song in a day or so, that way you all can hear what I am trying to get done, and offer better suggestions. Most of what you are telling me I have already heard and put into practice. I believe my problem lies in my gear (and lack of) as well as not haivng enough experience to make what I have work for me. I am probably pulling a newbie trend and expecting too much from a polished turd....

Watch for the song...
 
The best thing I've been able to do with bass is ignore how it sounds on it's own. I'll never solo it, but I will solo the other instruments to find out which frequencies are getting masked. I'll cut the bass out quite a bit to make room for the guitars, or vice versa. It depends on what frequencies on which instruments I feel are necessary for the song. I know it's kind of mickey mouse to think of it that way, but sometimes it helps to bring things into perspective.
 
i don't know why i didn't mention it earlier, but if you have a bass track that goes from sticking out way too much to disappearing when you turn it down, it can also be helpful to set up a sidechain comp. to squish it when the kick, vocal, or whatever else is kicking, but let it pop out when other stuff isn't present
 
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