Why aren't bass parts mixed louder?

[cross.bones]

Its interesting when you hear a song WITHOUT the bass part. Even if you can't "hear" it if that makes sense. Remove it and often the track doesn't sound right, or doesn't sound finished.

[csm]

When Prince cut When Doves Cry, he tried a variety of basslines on both bass guitar and keyboard, couldn't come up with one he liked and ended up releasing the song without any bass at all.

 

It worked, too.

 

Meanwhile ... whoa-oh, I heard it through the bassline ...

[bryvincent]

small speakers...

 

 

+1

get better speakers. get some floorstanders with some 12" woofers(or at least 10") if you really wanna hear the bass. and be sure you have a proper Hi-Fi system. or use good quality headphones. and use CDs instead of MP3s.

most of the time its not the mix, its the playback devices.

[Longhair]

I like to think of Metallica as my favorite example: More people than I can stand to count will say in a most ignorant manner, that Jason Newstead was a crappy bassist. And on an opposing note, I hear many give praise to the skills of Rob Trujillo. And even more so to the likes of Cliff Burton. What's my opinion on all of this might you ask? You probably didn't.. but I'll throw it out there for anyone curious enough to be reading this right now. Well, I don't have one. Why? Cause I can't ******* hear any of it. Thus I have nothing to base comparison on. This doesn't just apply to Metallica, but almost all the bands I listen to (with the exception of Limp Bizkit haha). All in all it really is a shame that bass players in general don't get more feature. Maybe all it would take is more volume for some bands, I don't know. Perhaps then some of the more underrated ones would get the credit they deserve.

 

 

Was Jason Newstead a crappy bass player? He must have done something right to be able to play in Metallica.

 

With that being said, the reason that the bass is completely lost on AJFA is not because the guitars and bass had the mids scooped out, it was because the bass was playing the same exact notes as the guitar 99% of the time.

 

Newstead wanted to be the 3rd guitar guitar player in Metallica.

[Prages]

I'm with the 'get better speakers' crowd. I find most albums have plenty of bass in them, but you can't hear it on puny little speakers.

[BydoEmpire]

When we mixed our album, we wanted the bass up front and full. It sounded great in the studio, we burned CDs and listened in the car and everything was good. When we got the pressed discs back the bass was a little too low on most songs, and way too low on one heavier song that really needed the driving bass line.

 

I'm guessing there was some ear fatigue (we mixed the whole album in 3 days) that maybe makes you think the bass is higher than it really is. Perhaps we were overrelying on the studio's high-quality monitors, and not giving enough due to how it sounds on crappy car or boombox speakers. Perhaps it was a mastering problem as well, since that was done remotely and we weren't involved.

 

Whatever it was, I'm with you - I want to hear the bass. I'd love remixed versions of Lightening, Puppets and Justice. Three of the worst offenders. I was just listening to Abbey Road yesterday (mp3s on my cheapy headphones at work) and the bass was fine. I never noticed the Beatles not having the bass mixed right.

[EADGBE]

Why aren't bass parts mixed louder?

It's to keep them from drowning out the guitar(s). Some bass players follow the melody so closely that they sound like an extension of the guitar. And it's only when the bass track is dropped out or the bassist stops playing do you notice how integral it is.

[PunkKitty]

Here's another explanation from NPR.

 

The Loudness Wars: Why Music Sounds Worse

[Fusion1]

 

Was Jason Newstead a crappy bass player? He must have done something right to be able to play in Metallica. With that being said, the reason that the bass is completely lost on AJFA is not because the guitars and bass had the mids scooped out, it was because the bass was playing the same exact notes as the guitar 99% of the time. Newstead wanted to be the 3rd guitar guitar player in Metallica.

 

 

It is more the mix though as Black Sabbath with Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler, you never NOT hear Geezer and he bassically is playing Tony Iommis riffs exactly.

[orourke]

I think the majority of records have the bass just right in the mix. What are you listening to music through?

Though I remember back when records were on vinyl going into a mastering studio to mix my bands album and having the mixing engineer EQ down the bass because he said if he left it to heavy in the mix it would make the neelde pop out of the goove.

Do you listen to a lot of pre-digital music?

[AlexMC]

I'm a guitarist trying to learn bass, and I often find it very difficult to focus on the right frequencies to hear exactly what is being played.

I have no idea how those who tab out basslines manage to do so!

[bryvincent]

 

I have no idea how those who tab out basslines manage to do so!

 

 

EQ or they probably have a software like the GuitarXtraction that comes with the JamVox.

and as i said a good playback equipment and medium can make a difference.

[Eddie]

I think the majority of records have the bass just right in the mix. What are you listening to music through? Though I remember back when records were on vinyl going into a mastering studio to mix my bands album and having the mixing engineer EQ down the bass because he said if he left it to heavy in the mix it would make the neelde pop out of the goove. Do you listen to a lot of pre-digital music?

In the past that was a BIG reason. These days I hear plenty of bass. In fact, too much bass in some cases.

[ItchyFingers]

Andy Rourke was a funk bassist before he joined the Smiths, so he's not your typical root-root-fifth bassist. Dude has chops, and is a super cool guy - we were lucky enough to play with him about a year ago.

When you consider that the Smiths were really only a 3-piece band (despite the studio versions' massive overlayed guitar tracks), you need to hear the bass as much as you need to hear Johnny's guitar tracks.

[V-man]

Being a bass player I've become "tuned in" to the sound of bass. So even if the bass is buried pretty deep I can hear it. I guess that's the difference between listening to a song and just hearing it. In terms of the first three Metallica albums I have no problem hearing the bass on those. On a good few songs Cliff is just playing in the groove and not doing anything too wild.

 

 

This is the answer.

 

I remember playing in HS and my buddy was explaining a part about how the drums come in and I had no idea what he was talking about. I can't hear drums! I can't hear bass. All I heard was guitar and vocals, which were all I was interested in. Listening more for Cliff, and suddenly I hear his lines... and to my surprise, drums didn't take much listening to hear... they just took less ignoring.

[Selsaral]

It not only depends on the song, it also depends on the genre. For example, Bob Marley and a lot of other old school reggae has extremely prominent and melodic bass parts in most of their songs. As does a lot of the 60s R&B that this reggae was influenced by.

[ExiledCrow]

Check some 70s reggae -- Black Uhuru, or anything with Robbie Shakespeare. Sly & Robbie's productions always put bass in yer face ...

Alright, there's some names I haven't heard for awhile ... good stuff!

[ExiledCrow]

It is more the mix though as Black Sabbath with Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler, you never NOT hear Geezer and he bassically is playing Tony Iommis riffs exactly.

And that's part of the genius and "heaviness" of Sabbath.

[fuzzymuffler]

Listen to some Iron Maiden.

[Alex_SF]

 

Here's another explanation from NPR. The Loudness Wars: Why Music Sounds Worse

 

 

The loudness wars is definitely the more recent trend -- and probably has something to do with (1) iPods and people listening through earbuds in noisy environments like city streets or buses, and (2) people listening in car stereos, with all the wind and tire noise to compete with. For those listeners, overcompression and loss of dynamics isn't necessarily a bad thing. But for listening in a home setting, it's pretty awful.

 

Actually, it's pretty awful even for listening in cars. I sometimes wish my car's CD changer had just a little more volume 'oomph' on tap from the amplifier -- when I listen to old hard rock CDs and am screaming along with them, all the way up just isn't always quite enough. But then one day I put in the CD of the Killers' Hot Fuss, which is a serious victim of the loudness/overcompression wars. That was painful to listen to even with the volume knob at about 11 o'clock.

[satannica]

I always record bass before guitars/synth. One simple reason. Your record will always sound better if you record a good bass guitar track. It will find its own place in the mix and the guitars will not only sit easily around it, you will have an easier time of mixing.

Anytime I've had a bass guitar track after guitars, it's always been harder to find it space in the mix and never sounds like it cuts through.

[TheFigurehead]

 

by what i mean loud is like the old cure records

 

 

Very few mortal men are Simon Gallup...

 

that's why.

 

Beyond that, this post made me think of "Homesick" off of Disintegration. The bass line doesn't come in until about 2:30, and it's huge. The bass coming in in that song is one of my all time favorite musical moments of all time.

[jpnyc]

I have wondered how many hard rock/metal songs are written to be played live, when bass is needed more because you can

[Super Bass]

I have wondered how many hard rock/metal songs are written to be played live, when bass is needed more because you can

[TheFigurehead]

Often times these super heavy guitar sounds that guitarists hear on albums actually have bass in there underneath. On a lot of metal and hard rock the bass would shadow the guitar a lot so as to keep the song tight and just the general hard rock feel. Take out that bass and the guitar sound alone would be noticeably thinner.

 

 

 

This is the ONE good thing I've seen come out of "Guitar Hero"... people taking the stems of the individual tracks and putting them out there for download. Hearing the bare tracks for the VH stuff tells you everything you need to know about mixing. The tracks, on their own, sound nowhere as impressive out of the mix, but obviously work perfectly as a part of the whole.

 

The point being that the guitar tone everyone is chasing is that of the guitar as it sits in the mix, not on it's own... which is why no one gets it right.

 

The rule of thumb should be, when recording, when your amp sounds just the way you want it... turn the gain and bass down 25% and the mids up to match. This would get you somewhere in the vicinity of what you think it's going to sound like.