Bass Pre?

[seclusion]

Good evening folks.

 

Just working on a couple of tunes, currently I've been recording my bass through my TL Audio C-1 guitar input into my desk.

I find that I am always not satisfied with the bass sound and keep fiddling with it after. I have tried using my Pod X3 Live going direct with a couple of bass patches, but again I am tweaking constantly.

Does anyone recommend a Bass Preamp that I can go direct into my mixer, that sounds good and has , drive, lo,mid, hi and maybe one other dial?

Thanks

Brian

[UstadKhanAli]

I don't own anything like this, but I did a recording session at a studio where the guy had a bass POD of some kind, and all of us, including the bass player, were quite happy with the sound that the engineer was getting. Please bear in mind that I am not personally familiar with these products.

[nerol1st]

Yeah the fallowing:

 

I'm gasing for one of these really bad, they sound great driven or not:

 

Pretty much the big bro to the above:

 

Solid state (I recorded one of these last month, it's actually pretty good):

 

This costs 2x as much as the above unit (it's the tube pre version), never heard it in person though:

 

No idea if this sounds that good, but you asked for units that would enhance your bass tracks

 

[scarecrowbob]

I use the MXR bass DI (it is inexpensive and has the things you;d want), but really, the better sounds are almost all the sound of the player bass and strings.

 

Frankly, if you are very unsatisfied in the sound, I'd look at the bass itself.

[UstadKhanAli]

I have a Roland Bass Cube 30, which I use to mic up keyboards and, of course, bass. It has bass amp models. But it also has the ability to record direct, and if I'm lazy or can't make noise at the moment, I'll throw down some bass parts with the direct out. And you know what? It sounds surprisingly good. An amp for keyboards and bass with bass amp models and DI + compression and EQ and some effects for US$300? Not bad. Not bad at all.

[seclusion]

Thanks Folks

 

I see that SansAmp everywhere, I think I'll give that a listen.

For guitar I've been using my my Little Lanilei amp from Mahaffay Amps and find other then some fx's she's done going in, quick n dirty.

 

talk soon

Brian

[GZsound]

Another suggestion is the LR Baggs Para DI. I use it all the time on bass and acoustic instruments in the studio and it is a great sounding unit for not much money.

[UstadKhanAli]

 

Thanks Folks I see that SansAmp everywhere, I think I'll give that a listen.

 

 

Yeah, that could be good and simple to use. I can't remember whether someone's used that on a session I've done or not, so I forgot about it.

[WRGKMC]

I have a bunch of different preamps and rack units I can use and they all have their own flavors of sound. I sometimes use a compressor or tube amp, or even a boss rack preamp unit set clean. I also have a Morley JD1 that is very simular to the sans amp.

 

One of the cleanest and cheapest I've used cosistantly for a good sound is a Behringer Bass Limiter I picked up for $20. I dont normally recomend any of their stuff, but it works great recording bass direct. Besides a clean volume boost, you have a tone knob voiced for bass that adds or removes presence/trebble. Theres also a compression ratio knob and threshold. It helps to make the playing more consistant and punchy without sucking the dynamics out of the playing and adding all the mush and noise a compressor can add.

 

Like I said its an el cheapo box but It works good enough to recomend so you dont have to use a bunch of additional plugs. Of course it also depends on the bass itself and how you want it to fit into the mix but you can get some solid notes happening without a bunch of EQs and comp plugs running in the DAW.

[MrJoshua]

The SansAmp is OK. I have one. I normally use it as a regular DI, though, without the "tube emulation" circuit turned on. It makes a pretty good active DI.

 

Lately my favorite recorded bass sound has come from plugging straight into the instrument input on the front of a Groove Tubes SuPRE. Nice, fat sound without a lot of work. It particularly sounds good with a P-bass.

 

When it comes to recording distorted bass or bass with lots of effects, though, I'm a fan of the two-track method. I plus the bass into a DI (either the SansAmp or a Radial JDI) and an amp. Effects come after the DI and go to the amp. DI signal is recorded dry to one track; amp has a mic put in front of it (EV RE-20, Shure SM-7b, AKG D-112, a decent condensor, or even a regular old SM-57 can work here) and is recorded to a second track. Then I have a clean signal that I can use later if I want to re-amp, re-do some effects, or just to mix with the "wet" signal to fatten up the bottom end or provide some clarity.

 

Lately I've been working with a band whose bass player uses a TON of effects. I've been recording them with this method and the dry track is coming in really handy. There are quite a few times where he uses effects like a sub-octave generator that really robs a lot of clarity from what he's playing. The dry track helps clean it up quite a bit.

[rsadasiv]

 

Lately my favorite recorded bass sound has come from plugging straight into the instrument input on the front of a Groove Tubes SuPRE. Nice, fat sound without a lot of work. It particularly sounds good with a P-bass.

 

 

I use a Groove Tubes Brick with similar results. Just sounds good - I no longer spend a bunch of time tweaking my bass sound - plug in and go.

[WRGKMC]

The last recording I did I used an ART preamp I had lying around and rarely use. I didnt feel like unpacking all my stuff after gigging so I just grabbed this to complete some original recordings I had done. Its a starved tube design so its not anything like a brick but it boosted the gain and got things up to line level.

 

With a littel tweaking it was more than sufficiant to record bass with, in fact its about the only thing it is good for. It did have a bit too much beef in the low end in comparison to a limiter. I will have to roll a littel low end off to match the drums. Again its another EBay $20 special I have around that gets used occasionally.

[Lee Knight]

You know what has a great sound for bass and shouldn't? A total sleeper? The Alesis Micro Limiter.

 

Out of production. Look on eBay and they're cheap. They have a sound that rocks. You can slam the thing for some very cool sounds or just use it mildly for an almost DBX 160 like vibe.

 

Edit: Oh, and you can drive up the output to get to line level. It's not pretty or pristine but sounds great. It'll accept instrument level without issue. Cool little piece that I'll never get rid of.

[Dthraco]

 

I have tried using my Pod X3 Live going direct with a couple of bass patches, but again I am tweaking constantly.

 

 

I use the X3 Live for my live bass tone. And a UX2 for recording. The trick to the Line6 stuff is to go basic. Use just an amp model that gives you the tone you like, and then EQ the track in your DAW to make it fit the mix.

[Phil O'Keefe]

Bass -> Catalinbread SFT -> Groove Tubes Brick -> FMR RNLA -> Pro Tools = killer bass tones. :phil:

 

Feel free to add a second channel (miked amp recorded to a second channel) to the equation if you want.

[WRGKMC]

Yea those mini half rack Alesis stuff is getting harder to find. I grabbed one of those Alesis enhancers that work great on boosting drum shine on the overheads. It synthasizes the high frequencies vs just boosting like an EQ.

 

I've used my DBX and Yamaha rack unit compressor limiters on bass. The DBX is a low end model DBX 1 or 2 or something like that. Its got a bit of hiss on the high frequency end cranked but you'd chop those frequencies anyway. I've heard they work better when you run the two channels in series but I havent tried it. I have a consistant playing technique so I dont need that kind of compression, just need a littel boost and limiting. The Yamaha does work very well. It tends to push the mid frequencies a bit more. Find it works best on my Precision bass.

 

Like anything having several options for variety is a great thing.

 

I often limit bass a second time recording with a simple plugin limiter. It acts more like a booster than a limiter with the plugin. Then it may get it again when mastering the overall mix.

 

Using mild settings is key. You dont want to completely flatten the signal. leave some dynamics just flaten the hard peaks at breaks or endings. Unless the output kicks above the threshold, its remains fairly dynamic. Then when a plugin is used it will sound pretty rock hard and consistant. You wont have notes dissapearing in the mix one minuite and booming through with others. I tried to get the same effect using compressors only. It was alot harder to do because the comps have littel to trigger off of after the first pass.

 

 

I think McCartney passed his bass through several limiter/compressors to get his sound. He'd pass it through being taped, again when mixing and a third time mastering. It figures it would be needed with the low output/ highly dynamic Hofner Bass (with tape wrapped strings). The amazing thing is how well the mids were preserved. Analize their recordings and the slope below 100hz was pretty steep. Most of the bass was between 100~2k max but the midrange tones that can be gotten out of that instrument are really amazing.

 

One of those must have instruments in my near future. I found an ancient Les Paul shaped Hofner hollobody bass back in the 70s in the trash. The thing was in terrible shape but even warped up and falling appart it had the great tone.

[AluminumNeck]

I usually just run a good compressor and limiter. EQ in the mix. The key to getting good bass tones is having a good sounding bass.

[AluminumNeck]

 

Lately I've been working with a band whose bass player uses a TON of effects. I've been recording them with this method and the dry track is coming in really handy. There are quite a few times where he uses effects like a sub-octave generator that really robs a lot of clarity from what he's playing. The dry track helps clean it up quite a bit.

 

 

There are so few moments in music where bass and effects work hand in hand in a positive way. Ussually I find it muddys up the instrument in such a negative way that the music sounds better sans the effects.

[MrJoshua]

There are so few moments in music where bass and effects work hand in hand in a positive way. Ussually I find it muddys up the instrument in such a negative way that the music sounds better sans the effects.

 

I think a lot of his effects use came about from playing in a three-piece band. He uses it to take up more room behind guitar solos and such, and that eventually just turned into using them most of the time. It's not unusual for him to be using a chorus, distortion, and octaver all at once.

 

My bass rig consists of an amp with a compressor in the effects loop, and I only use the compressor so I can be a little more active on stage (jumping around tends to lead to poor control of my dynamics sometimes). I'm not much of a bass effects fan. But I must admit that what he does works well with their live show. I'm just not sure it's the exact way to go for the record. But that's OK because I'm capturing the DI track as well.

[WRGKMC]

With distortion on bass I'd be worried about not capturing enough sub lows and would want to capture some clean signal from the bass.

[Lee Knight]

 

With distortion on bass I'd be worried about not capturing enough sub lows and would want to capture some clean signal from the bass.

 

 

It depends on what you're going for, doesn't it? I was listening to the Jet album the other day. There are some really cool vintage rock textures on that. Anyway, one of tunes had an obvious bass amp sound with a lot of room. Distorted, speaker farting a little... and no low end. The kick was the low end.

 

It was perfect for the tune.

 

Depends on what you need at the moment for that tune.

[jackcheez]

Yeah the fallowing: I'm gasing for one of these really bad, they sound great driven or not:

Somebody brought one of those over to my place once and it was very noisy. I like The Brick. Also, I've got good results from the dbx 386 of all things. Either of those have any EQ, so use the channel on your board if needed or some such.

[Rimmer]

 

Thanks Folks I see that SansAmp everywhere, I think I'll give that a listen. For guitar I've been using my my Little Lanilei amp from Mahaffay Amps and find other then some fx's she's done going in, quick n dirty. talk soon Brian

 

 

I've used a Sansamp from Tech21 for around three years now and it's excellent. It was a bit of an outlay in some ways but the money went to a very good home. Great tone adjustment with very clean and realistic straight DI.

 

I have a Markbass CMD 121P which is amazing as a bass amp so I tend not to use the Sansamp that much when playing although when it comes to recording the Sansamp gives me that straight tone if I want it with some very usable tonal adjustments. A real no brainer.

 

I've heard good things about the Countryman Type 85 FET DI as well but I have never had a chance to use it. It's more a straight DI with no tonal adjustments..

[Rimmer]

 

Somebody brought one of those over to my place once and it was very noisy.

 

 

Low battery?

 

Mine is silent..

[WRGKMC]

 

It depends on what you're going for, doesn't it? I was listening to the Jet album the other day. There are some really cool vintage rock textures on that. Anyway, one of tunes had an obvious bass amp sound with a lot of room. Distorted, speaker farting a little... and no low end. The kick was the low end. It was perfect for the tune. Depends on what you need at the moment for that tune.

 

 

Sure thing, exactly. I'd just want a clean track recorded just in case its needed because you dont always know untill you're actually mixing what you may need. By then its often too late or at least a major hassel to go back and redo a part because it was lacking something. Better to be safe then sorry in other words. You could layer plugins or reamp the clean signal if you had to get an alternate if the mix needs it. Or just discard it if the main track is what works best.