Recording Bass

[madborris]

OKay, I'm recording a rock band, and having good success with, Guitars, Drums, and Vocals, but struggling with bass. The noise level is way to high, and whenever a bass line kicks in you get a nice hissing noise.

The pre-amps on my mixer are okay, coz they handle the other stuff with no problems. I've tried a couple of DI Box's, out of the Bass Amp, on a couple of amps and even direct out of a couple of different basses, no success with anything, the only other thing I can think of is to mic up the bass cab, but I'm reluctant to do that coz we all know how noisey those things can be.

Suggestions welcome.

 

[chessrock]

try a different cord.

 

[littledog]

If you have the bread, try an Avalon U5.

If that doesn't work, I suggest a new bass player.

 

[PsyCoNo]

Its probably your mixer. You say that you have tried all this stuff, different basses, different ways coming from the amp. . .if you have already tried using a different cord try a different mixer.

 

[darnold]

i find this problem quite often in some places. it usually have when there is an electromagnetic current on the strings or the pickups. Does this happen when you are touching the strings or not touching the strings? I found more commonly this happens when the base player lets his fingers of and it makes a click sound.

However, the current may be on something besides the strings and the pickups also. Maybe somethings not grounding right. Try grounding your own body. Do some trouble shooting and found out exactly where the source is and we can go from there.

danny

 

[SS454]

First of all, I don't think there's anything wrong with micing a bass cab. In fact it's a fairly standard practice in studios to mic AND DI. As for the noise, I think you're already on the right track. I'd just suggest starting at the top of the chain and working your way to the source. Different bass-different cable-different DI-different channel. If all else fails you might just use a filter to get out that hiss. That kind of sucks, but you could probably make it work.

 

[t_chance]

MAKE SURE YOUR INTSRUMENT IS SET UP CORRECTLY

 

[PsyCoNo]

Another option, which might have been tried, is to use the ground lift on the direct box(es) you have tried. This has worked for me in the past.

 

[F_cksia]

some built-in di's can produce this hiss.
do you hear it too when listening to the bass through the cab itself?

 

[kid klash]

A simple, low-cost and foolproof way to get slammin' electric bass tracks is to use an ART Tube MP as a direct box. You'll get a nice, warm, round bass track with plenty of bottom. Regardless of what some people say about the ART Tube MPs, they're one of the best bass and synth direct boxes in the world.

If you insist on mic'ing the bass cab and going direct at the same time, you've got to be certain that the phase of the two signals is the same. Plus, the signal from the mic will be slower by a few miliseconds compared to the direct signal; after making sure the signals are in phase with one another, put a few miliseconds delay on the direct signal, or as much (or little) as it takes to make the two tracks sound cohesive.

 

[darnold]

kid klash - what would be the point of putting a few miliseconds of delay on the direct signal if youve already got them in phase with one another?????!! From my understanding, wouldnt that just make it out of phase again?

danny

 

[kid klash]

Well, the electrical phase of both signals may be the same, but the timing of the two signals will be off by a few mS, which will present itself as a smeared, somewhat "thin" signal because of the timing offset. Also, the phase of the speaker will change depending on the frequency of the note being played. The frequency response and sensitivity of most mics is different at lower frequencies too, which makes it even more complicated. Most people associate a "thin" sounding bass track with an out of phase track, so they flip the polarity and it just gets worse. anyway, try a little delay on the direct signal and you'll see what I mean.

 

[bleyrad]

technically, you should be moving back the mic'd track, and leaving the direct track alone - as it contains the information in the exact timing that the bass player played it. delay is sometimes easier, but with today's multitrack software, it's just as easy to pull back a track a few ms.

all just theoretical of course - no one's really going to notice a 1.5ms lag in the bass player's timing.

 

[darnold]

Ahh i see what your saying. It took me a little thinking to understand what your were getting at with that. But really the a couple of milliseconds in timing is not a very big issue, and infact that is probably what makes it thicker in the first place. The main thing that needs to be fixed is the phase if its out.

I dont understand what your saying about the different frequencies being different phase the mic is louder. Volume has very little to do with pitch and wave length. If you get 2.5khz in phase than 80hz should also be in the same phase ratio. A -10db 90hz wave is the same length as a -50 90hz. If the theory you present was true, their would be an impossible amount of phase shifting that would never be right.

Unless again im misunderstanding what you are saying?

danny

 

[bleyrad]

i think you're misunderstanding something here. timing IS phase.

the mic and DI could be WIRED out of phase, in which case + would be -, and you'd just hit your phase reverse button.
but timing is also phasing - by moving a copy of a waveform so that the positive crest in one waveform is aligned with the negative crest in the other, it is 180 degrees out of phase - the same as if it was wired backwards.
you get varying degrees of smearing and thinness leading up to this, if the second waveform is either less than 180 degrees or greater than 180 degrees out of phase, but not perfectly in phase (time aligned.)
does this make sense now?


speakers have different phase response at different frequencies (i believe) because it takes different amounts of time to physically move the speaker cone at different frequencies, and the range of movement is different as well (bass notes will move the cone a greater distance than the upper harmonics of the note will)
someone correct me if i'm wrong about that - pretty much just a stab in the dark.

but, let's be perfectly clear on the first point - PHASE AND TIMING ARE THE SAME THING. ok?

 

[kid klash]

This is a good post.

And bleyrad - you will hear 1.5 - 3ms... it's not theoretical... depending on the frequency. It'll sound like coloration, because it's combfiltering the bass note frequency because of the time/phase shift.

Assuming the person is using a digital setup, you're right about moving the mic'ed signal forward. But, if the tracks are on analog tape, and the recordist wants to keep it in the analog domain, the defacto method for restoring most of the punch is by delaying the direct signal.

Regarding the phase response of speakers, you're right again... low frequency speaker cones have so much mass involved that it takes a while to get the cone moving, and it takes a while to make it change resonating at a different frequency. The damping factor of the amp also effects the "tightness" of the sound; the lower the damping factor, the longer it takes to stop the speaker cone from moving.

 

[darnold]

ummm. if the electrical current is in phase the waveform would be inphase. Why wouldnt it be? And phase and timing is not necessarily the same thing . You can be 1 beat off and still be in phase. The electrical current is transfered into waves, thus if the electrical current is in phase then so will the wave?

Maybe im totally wrong here. Lead me to a good page or something that discribes this and maybe ill understand better. Give me some references. I thought before you were talking about timing as in tempo would be different which yes of course it would be by a few milliseconds. If the + and - are aligned in the electrical current, when it is converted to wave out of the speaker the + and - will still be aligned? If you take 2 exact signals and pan them hard left and right. Considering that the monitoring is in phase you will hear both signals in phase, which creates a phantom center stereo imaging. And then when they are a little out of phase it brings them left and right accordingly.

Am i not correct on this? Maybe not?

Danny

 

[iwanarock]

Madborris have you tried a Line 6 Bass Pod .... I love mine and it works great and is real quite with lots tonal options, tons of real nice Bass direct capabilities. Also have you tried playing a different Bass Guitar maybe the Hiss is coming from the Bass electronics?

 

[maestro_dmc]

Where's Mr Bear when you need him? I'm not even going to touch the whole in phase thing. . .

But back to the original post: Didn't you say there was a "hiss" when the bass comes in, not a buzz or a hum? You described it as "noise".

If you get this hiss no matter what kind of preamp or direct box you use, then check the bass. If it's an active bass, make sure the battery is fresh.

Are you using a lot of compression? Although that should add noise to the quiet parts more than the active passages, it can add noise to the overall signal.

When you monitor the signal, does it have the hiss, or is it only on playback? Is something possibly in line with the signal going in(EQ) that is hyping the high end?( or coming out for that matter)

BTW is the noise noticable when mixing the song, with all the instuments together? Or are you noticing the noise only when the bass is soloed? Like someone else said, try a low pass filter on the signal, and see if you can fix it that way.

With as many ways as you described trying, I wonder if you aren't doing something that's a no-no that is causing the hiss. Something a little less obvious?

 

[kid klash]

My two cents is that phase and time are related to one another, but they're not the same thing.

Danny - you wrote :

"ummm. if the electrical current is in phase the waveform would be inphase. Why wouldnt it be?"

This is true if you're talking about one signal.

But when you combine a mic'ed signal (which is delayed by the time that it takes the signal from the amp to move the speaker cone, and the delay caused by the distance from the speaker cone to the mic) with a direct signal, the direct signal is ahead of the mic'ed signal. Even though both signals may be in phase when looked at individually, the timing difference will cause the start of the mic'ed signal to begin somewhere after the start of the direct signal, which more times than not will be somewhere other than the beginning of the "positive crest" of the direct signal, which results in an out-of-phase situation. The least that you'll hear is a smearing of the bass track; more than likely, you'll hear a comb-filtering or random "flanging" effect; you might even notice a fluctuation in the volume or presence of the bass track.