Slap bass mixing

  • Thread starter Thread starter jdavidb
  • Start date Start date
As a bass player, your post caught my eye.

Mixing slap bass doesn't have to be tricky. It is more a matter of getting a good up front sound. Perhaps that's what you meant. I saw the YouTube post (mp3 wouldn't download for me) and felt maybe a touch more presence allow the percussiveness to cut through. So many variables go into getting a good slap tone and I continue to struggle with it to this day. Technique, model bass, strings, EQ, (amp modeling in my case), effects and so on. I think you just have to find a sound you like and go with it.

I've done a couple of recordings with similar instrumentation as your post. Maybe you have some thought on them.
Bass Solo - This was the first thing I ever recorded on my own on a Zoom MRS-8. Its a funk slap demo with some drums, guitar and keys added. Decent slap tone though.
Life's Turmoil - An instrumental song featuring bass in lead melody with some slap accompanyment. I'm pleased with the tones I got on this one.

Recently I've been digging the tone Flea (at lease I'm about 95% sure it's Flea) got in "Hard Life Ease" from Perry Farrell's Satellite Party. I really like the mix of this song on many levels.

Anyway, your post was not specific so I'm mostly just chatting. ;)

Daren
MySpace
 
Last edited:
your bass tracks on both of those sound great. It's nice and even in the mix.

As I was mixing that latest one, I noticed too much range between the lows and the highs, only to be fixed (or probably 90% fixed) by finding the best threshold between the track's level and a limiter on the track. The recorded track wasn't ideal, but I did manage to get that done without using equalizer on the track. Only the limiter. The master track did still need a steep low shelf with the parametric eq though.

These are still the early days of me using a Sansamp RBI. I can tell that the RBI has it in there somewhere for a very even incoming slap bass range. I'll spend more time with it for bass tracks before I start thinking about getting some sort of multiband compressor/limiter to add to the bass chain.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top