Searching for dat bass tone.

[Flemmigan]

Hey y'all. I've been playing bass for quite a while now, but I only recently decided to get more serious about getting a great tone for the mix. Most recently I've been recording a DI once and then getting 3 tracks from that: a) DI through my tube preamp, b) slightly driven Ampeg amp in Guitar Rig, and c) Boss Overdrive pedal into a heavily driven 5150 amp in Guitar Rig. (all via reamping the DI).

I decided to record a quick clip with the three tracks and drums. I haven't done any EQ just yet and wanted to see what kind of techniques you all use when engineering bass for the mix. How do you usually EQ your separate bass tracks? Any thoughts or critiques with my tone? In the past I recorded a pretty scooped tone, which I like, but I'm trying out using the tube pre to bring a little mid content in so it doesn't sound so... clangy.

https://soundcloud.com/thecounciltx/drum-n-bass

 

[Fretless]

For my bass tone I use two sansamps in parallel. Each one is set to handle a range that I cut out of the other which helps them blend. My rbi is pretty much highpassed, and my rpm is lowpassed. I then sampled them together into my kemper. I then set up parallel processing to mix the DI with the effected. The DI has a compressor followed by a soft fuzz. The sansamp chain has a comp with a mid boost set after the comp. Works great. You can here it here really well The Path by dnkzz on SoundCloud - Hear the world

 

[Flemmigan]

For my bass tone I use two sansamps in parallel. Each one is set to handle a range that I cut out of the other which helps them blend. My rbi is pretty much highpassed, and my rpm is lowpassed. I then sampled them together into my kemper. I then set up parallel processing to mix the DI with the effected. The DI has a compressor followed by a soft fuzz. The sansamp chain has a comp with a mid boost set after the comp. Works great. You can here it here really well The Path by dnkzz on SoundCloud - Hear the world

Ah, very nice. I'm actually using the SansAmp VT Bass on both the non-DI chains right now and I love that thing. I was considering getting the Bass Driver at some point in the future. Are you using the DI to enunciate any specific frequency range, or just to "hold things together" with the effected chain?

 

[Fretless]

Ah, very nice. I'm actually using the SansAmp VT Bass on both the non-DI chains right now and I love that thing. I was considering getting the Bass Driver at some point in the future. Are you using the DI to enunciate any specific frequency range, or just to "hold things together" with the effected chain?

I mainly use it to provide some simple grit that is not very obstructive and blends well with the affected tone. My main bass has a nice EQ on it I use that to shape my tone a lot too.