# Making a Tight Bass sound



## Dwellingers (Jul 16, 2007)

Im Pretty new in bass playing, thou i have played guitar for several years. But i need something done with my sound - does any have some advice for getting a tight, meshuggah distorted lige tone? Stopboxes, comressors etc.??


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## Desecrated (Jul 16, 2007)

Compressor helps me a lot, But I found that a good rack-preamp (tube) like behringer can really give a nice round/warm tone with a lot of midrange. 
A tint of distortion is nice, but just a little. 
If you want more clarity in your sound try some lighter strings, and if you want more bass try some bigger gauge before reaching for the "bass"-knob on your amp. 

And play with a plectrum if you want tighter sound, if you want a rounder sound you play with your fingers. I use plectrum for metal and fingers for rap-music, music scores and other kind of music that just needs a sub-bass feeling. Slapping/popping works for metal and hardcore also.

And some sort of string dampening helps a lot to.


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## Dwellingers (Jul 17, 2007)

Thx - By string damping you meen with your left and right hand. My attack is pretty hard, så guess thats a start


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## Desecrated (Jul 17, 2007)

Nä då

By string dampener I mean an actual device like a sock or something more high tech, that you wrap around the strings up on the neck, that will iliminate a lot of string noise and make the signal more clear.


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## Variant (Jul 17, 2007)

Yeah a pick is a good way to tighten up the sound while adding the attack... experiment with some light palm-muting techniques as well. Done right it tightens up the boomyness but still lets the notes ring a bit.


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## Benzesp (Jul 18, 2007)

Get a good compressor in your rig and compress the fuk out of it. It will really even out everything. Your smaller strings will breathe finally and you'll tame that boomy ass low end. You will get a nice tight percussive bass tone.

Have you tried a compressor pedal as well? depending on your rig that could really clean things up too.


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## Rotten Deadite (Jul 25, 2007)

wish I'd read this before I made my new thread.

I'm having problems with my tone as well. The only way I can get a good tone behind my guitars is to EQ up a tone that sounds like ass whenever the bass becomes more prominent.

I don't have a bass cabinet to mic up, should I be using a cab simulator like Revalver? Works great for my guitars...


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## Naren (Jul 26, 2007)

The bass player in my band uses an "Ubermetal" pedal and plays with picks/plectrums for the songs where the guitars are distorted and the parts of our songs that are distorted. For the clean parts, he turns the pedal off and uses his fingers to pluck the strings. As a result, he gets a really nice rounded-out rich orgasmic tone for the clean parts and a vicious clear and tight sound for the parts where the guitar is distorted.

Sounds pretty slick.


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## DrSmaggs (Jul 26, 2007)

Here's my rig... Not the best pic.. send me your email addy and I can send you a full size photo with my EQ details.

As you might be able to see, I boost certain mid points to accent my tone and it gives me the snappiest overdrive that goes over smooth and mixes with the band greatly... just ask Vince!

[email protected]


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## TomAwesome (Jul 26, 2007)

^ Ohh, SVT-4! Nice. That's what our bassist has. The only problem is that he has no idea how to use it, so it sounds like poop until he gets frustrated and says, "Tom, fix it!" When it's set up right, though, I love it.

Anyway... Yeah, compression is almost a must with bass, especially with heavy rock and metal. Finding the right amount of gain is important, too. It's easy to overdo it. If you want a less than subtle distortion, a lot of people run a setup that lets them mix the distortion with the dry undistorted tone. Going with little or no distortion generally works better, though. Another big thing is the EQ. A lot of people try to EQ it like a guitar, with scooped mids and a huge low end. Nine times out of ten, this will sound like crap. In my experience (and opinion), it usually works best when you boost the mids and give it just enough bass and treble to sound good. If you boost mids around the same frequencies that the guitars are cutting theirs, it will sit great in the mix, and everything will be audible without getting muddy. DrSmaggs's EQ curve on his Ampeg is pretty much what I'm talking about.


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## Drew (Jul 26, 2007)

Tom/Dr Smaggs - could you maybe give me the approximite frequency ranges and boosts you're dialing in there? I'm also not really blown away with my bass tone and while I know how to dial up a guitar sound relatively well, I don't even know where to begin with a bass.


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## Durero (Jul 26, 2007)

DrSmaggs said:


> Here's my rig... Not the best pic.. send me your email addy and I can send you a full size photo with my EQ details.
> 
> As you might be able to see, I boost certain mid points to accent my tone and it gives me the snappiest overdrive that goes over smooth and mixes with the band greatly... just ask Vince!
> 
> [email protected]


How 'bout a more detailed rundown on your rig?

And a bigger pic?


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## TomAwesome (Jul 26, 2007)

Drew said:


> Tom/Dr Smaggs - could you maybe give me the approximite frequency ranges and boosts you're dialing in there? I'm also not really blown away with my bass tone and while I know how to dial up a guitar sound relatively well, I don't even know where to begin with a bass.



Unfortunately, my bassist's SVT-4 that's usually in my room has been off at Ampeg being repaired for about two months now, and I don't really remember the specifics of what I had dialed in on it. He's supposed to be getting it back soon, though, so if this thread is still fairly active then, I'll try to post something more useful. I think the main bump in my EQ was a fairly wide mid boost focused around somewhere between 300Hz and 900Hz. DrSmaggs's EQ boost seems to be focused around 900Hz with a little boost at 33Hz (I generally prefer to boost 80Hz instead because it gives it a percussive, almost "thunder" like quality, but in the studio that might mess with the kick) and a little cut at 8kHz.


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## DrSmaggs (Jul 26, 2007)

I don't know how to put a full size pic on the interweb...

I can tell you more about my settings, though.

I hardly use compression, I set my ratio at about 4:1 and knock it back about 4-6 db tops. I even out the compressors output with the knob at the end and I bring my SVT 4's gain up until it clips, then I bring it down below the clip point.

On my Sansamp preamp, I turn the drive usually all the way up and I sometimes blend it in with the original signal. This all depends on how I feel on a given day. Lately, I've been doing the blend so you can get lots of drive and have a nice fat clean signal with the gain, which isn't really distorted to begin with.

Another secret is to always use fresh strings... HUGE difference! I also play with a pick to get a consistent and good sound. I've noticed that lots of finger style bassists play that way because they're purists, but they don't play skillfully enough to maintain a steady sound. I started fingerstyle and went with a pick after lots of going back and forth with it and finally realizing my tone was much better with the pick.

Another thing I do with my sound. I roll the treble back and let the mids do the work.

If anyone knows how to put a huge pic on here, do let me know so I can share the big one with you guys


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## Drew (Jul 26, 2007)

Well, you can link the huge one, but it'll auto-resize within the thread. however, if we click at the little black bar at the top, it'll expand to full size. 

Either way, thanks for the tips so far - Vince raves about your bass tone and how it sits in a mix, and he and I generally agree on mixing and production related stuff.


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## Vince (Sep 4, 2007)

Drew said:


> Vince raves about your bass tone and how it sits in a mix, and he and I generally agree on mixing and production related stuff.



Yet we disagree so greatly on the preferred size of tits. 

BTW, here's another shot of Gerard's gear. This was his old rack, back before we put the bass & vocal equipment all in the same rack.






Here's the rundown on Gerard's signal:

Sadowsky basses --> Sennheiser wireless --> Alesis Compressor --> SansAmp preamp --> Ampeg SVT-4 --> Ampeg 8x10 cab

The SVT-4 would be badass enough, but the SansAmp & Alesis really add a lot to Gerard's tone. The compressor along with his pick attack give his bass quite a punch.

The linemixer & the in-ear unit in this pic are used by our vocalist. In the first pic Gerard posted, you can also see Jason's TC Helicon unit which sounds amazing for live vocals.


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