the day the bass went away

S

Simes

New member
Ok,

Now this is annoying! I have a recently finished track with a bass line I really dig that only has one frustrating problem.....on some systems, it comes thru fat and punchy and on others - non-existant.

When mixing this track, I adopted my standard reference checking technique of validating the mix on 4 or 5 different audio platforms. This technique has placed me in good stead in the past and has revealed any problems with too much/too little bass on track, and has yet to let me down until now. In this case the following checks were conducted on the track:

Reference check 1 - listen in mp3 format on winamp on PC that tune was recorded on. Audio playback via SB Live card into Boston Acoustic MMedia speakers w/subwoofer. The bass is as it should be Fat, Puncy & Loud

Reference check 2 - burn to audio cd and play on my mid-range hi-fi - same result of full rich bass. This system is usually murder on the low end, but even this track comes thru fine.

Reference check 3 - play same audio cd on cheap discman thru even cheaper ear-piece headphones - even on this thing with the bass boost in the "off" position I can still
hear my funky line!

Reference check 4 - play on PC again, this time directly out of the soundcard into a pair of closed-ear headphones. Result = we have bass baby - in abundance.

Reference check 5 - record to minidisc via line-out of the soundcard. Result= as above.

Problem - more than one punter who has heard the track has claimed the bass was non-existant on the track. One of those said punters, checked the track on 4 different systems to find it dissapeared on 2 of those systems but was fine on the other two and also via headphones.

How enfuriating! If anyone can offer any suggestions as to why this may be occurring, I'll be very grateful to almost the point of sexual favours....almost. The track can be found at http://mp3.com/ulcerate and is entitled "The Box". The bass line in question enters the picture at the 00:51 mark.

Appreciate some ideas any can convey.

Cheers

Simon

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Ulcerate - alternative/industrial music to inspire and conspire
http://mp3.com/ulcerate - streaming & downloadable mp3 evidence

MP3.com featured artist in Alternative, Industrial and Industrial Rock.
 
I heard the bassline until the other "instruments" came in.....cut some low end from those tracks to let the bass line come thru.....
 
But the surest way of nailing a mix is mixing thru good studio monitors......
 
amen to that....now if i just get someone to finance those nice studio monitors :)

planning to acquire some decent monitors in the coming months, until then, I'm stuck with what I have.

You're comments appreciated re: cutting low end on other tracks though...may play around with a sub mix or two prior to combining the entire elements.

Thanks again,

Simon
 
Well i heard the bass loud and clear.

Excellent track, I don't here much industrial stuff around here. You should get a REAL cd out on some small independant label, it sounds damn good definately some nin moments in there. I like the vocals, maybe a tad more verb at times. But yeah you go sounds cool.

ta
nick
 
Damn...thanks. Made my night right there. Positive feedback really makes the effort worth the while.

As to the indie label cd - I'm trying :)

In a couple of weeks I'm be distributing my second demo cd to some labels trying to see if there's any interest. Some accept mp3 submissions and the feedback from them has been favourable thus far (although one of them reported the bass problem)...so we'll see what happens.

In other news - an interview about my project got published today at tonos.com - the addy is: http://www.tonos.com/app1/getdis/discoveries/jsp/simon_kean_aka_ulcerate.jsp - 1 thing of note is that they screwed up my gear list with someone else's. I don't own any of the gear listed - although if someone donated it, I wouldn't say no :)

Thanks again for checking out the track - new tracks are always submitted here for review.

Simon
Ulcerate - http://mp3.com/ulcerate
 
Ha damn quick reply there, 11 minutes.

I've got my latest track posted here (new upload) if you'd care to have a listen. It's not where near as good as 'the box' but I'm getting there (ha you should listen to some of my first track, well maybe not!) I've got plenty of years left in me. Vocals are my main problem though, you'll probably notice the extremley under confident performance, its not very vocal bsaed though. The whole track isn't finished yet by far it's just an idea i've got down.

Ok cheers if you manage to have a listen. Cheers anyway!

Nick
 
The bass fell out a little after the other instruments came in but it wasn't abnormally low. On the other hand you're gonna probably want it strong to fit this song. Cool song BTW

Ray J
 
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