Simulating a bass guitar with a guitar?

[vejichan]

What's the best way of simulation a bass guitar with a guitar in reaper using vsts?

[adaragray]

hi vejichan,
the best way is using reapitch
-12 semitones
and then use softube bass amp room or ampeg svx

you could as well set the item pitch adjust to -12

[vejichan]

cool. any other ways to make it sound more like bass after that?

[adaragray]

sorry i just editet my post while you where answering
it depends on what kind of bass sound you are looking for

[Ollie]

I do that too sometimes when I'm lazy (in other words pretty often). After recording the bass line I just pitch down the track -12, then put a compressor and a lowpass (pretty steep treble cutoff somewhere below 1kHz) on it, that's all.

Pickup selection plays a role there too - don't use the neck PU, the bass coming out of it doesn't help the fake bass whlle the harmonics of the middle/bridge PU help keeping "definition" and punch after pitching down and lowpassing, I think this is more important for the function of your fake bass than fancy processing chains.

Of course this works mostly only for "generic" bass accompaniment (where the actual sound of the bass is somewhat drowned in the mix), not so much when the bass sound is more vital and needs to meet a specific sound idea.

I uploaded some test track for other reasons last year where I coincidentally used a fake bass (but not very well): https://stash.reaper.fm/v/14458/Doodle.mp3

[vejichan]

thanks.. i tried using a bass amp sim and it always sounds like a pillow over your sound. I use TSE BOD amp sim with no cab impulses and its pretty good you get the attack and thump. also post a good compressor setting ?

[James HE]

you should look into triggering a bass VSTi with the notes you play on the guitar. Reatune can do an OK job of this....

sometimes I just hum into a mic to write basslines... and trigger bass samples with that. Needs a lot of cleanup afterwards, but it's a real quick way to get an idea down.

[zeekat]

Is buying a cheap used bass guitar out of the question? Those things are cool. And with present state of recording technology any shitty bass will be useful, as long as it stays in tune and works.

[vejichan]

here is what you gotta deal with when you buy a bass
1) need space for a bass guitar in my tiny room full of guitars and gear
2) spend time and money changing strings once or twice a month
3) money spend setting up the bass( yea i spend money on setting up my guitar..
gotta learn how to do it myself ,,any tutorial on this?)

is it worth it?i'm not a bass player.. a guitar player that needs to add bass to his recordings. As long as it gets the job done.. its fine. I just want to know how close i can get with a guitar simulating a bass

the closest i ever got was
1) reapitch to -12
2) using the bridge and neck pickup
3) tse bod
4) a compressor
5) low pass 9khz
how about you guys?

[OpIvy]

Originally Posted by vejichan

is it worth it?i'm not a bass player.. a guitar player that needs to add bass to his recordings. As long as it gets the job done.. its fine. I just want to know how close i can get with a guitar simulating a bass

Damn straight it's worth it.
I spent countless hours trying to get my guitar to sound like a bass that's reasonably convincing. What a waste!
I went and bought a very cheap bass guitar and with some adjustments to the recorded track (the DI sound is not great ie. I wouldn't want to play it live through an amp) it made ALL the difference.
Sure, strings cost a bit but even strings that have gone a bit flat will sound better than pissy little guitar strings pitched down.
...and it is relatively easy to set a bass up yourself- lots on info on the net.
So really it depends if your actually trying to produce a proper song that has genuine bass or just scratching around with some tracks.
Plus, it is so much fun playing bass as a guitar player- I found come up with so many new guitar riffs, whilst developing bass lines (and vice versa).
So I say buy the almost-the-cheapest-bass...

[zeekat]

Originally Posted by vejichan

here is what you gotta deal with when you buy a bass
1) need space for a bass guitar in my tiny room full of guitars and gear

Well, bass isn't THAT big. It's not that you're buying a grand piano. Hide it under your bed or something :>

Originally Posted by vejichan

2) spend time and money changing strings once or twice a month

IMO that's an overkill. Yeah, strings lose their twang after a while, but they're still allright for most bassy stuff after months. Like OpIvy said, even old dull ones are miles ahead of shitty pitchshifted guitar. Also - changing bass strings is much simpler and faster than changing guitar ones, bass tuners are really cool in that regard.

Oh and bass strings aren't that expensive - Warwick red labels cost about the same as your average guitar ones.

Originally Posted by vejichan

3) money spend setting up the bass( yea i spend money on setting up my guitar..
gotta learn how to do it myself ,,any tutorial on this?)

If you're getting an used one there's a chance it's set up already. Sometimes even factory setup is good enough. Just find one with proper action if you're scared of adjusting the neck arc. If the intonation's bad fixing it is a pretty simple and safe operation.

[vejichan]

good points...i'll consider it in the future but i suck bad at playing and recording and i'm never gonna be a pro..i am just happy to be making and recording my music. The real question is should a talentless busy family man guitar player who is financially strapped be considering buying a bass guitar or stick w/faking a bass guitar with his guitar.

[wavedrone]

Imo if you want to record bass record a real bass. The world is already too full of samples and tricks. Surely you can find someone who plays and would like to record. It's nice to have your own bass handy though. It gives you a different creative perspective for your songs. Elixir has a good series of videos on how to set up a bass. Here is the first one.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=te44eWXd9pc

[Vendetta V]

My take on this is... nothing will sound as good as a bass guitar itself!

I've tried a lot of ways to get bass on guitar and well it sounds meh. Might work for demos but nothing more nothing less.


If you can't afford a bass guitar or just don't wanna buy it etc. May be consider a nice bass VSTi? Bass VSTis now sound amazing pretty much!

[zeekat]

Originally Posted by vejichan

good points...i'll consider it in the future but i suck bad at playing and recording and i'm never gonna be a pro..

Neither do I, but it's just a fun addition to the hobby. If you can put together anything on guitar, you should quickly get hang of how to make a simple complimentary bassline.

Originally Posted by vejichan

i am just happy to be making and recording my music. The real question is should a talentless busy family man guitar player who is financially strapped be considering buying a bass guitar or stick w/faking a bass guitar with his guitar.

Yeah, having a passion and no money is quite a dilemma :/

[ashcat_lt]

If your music is slow enough, you can record your guitar at double time then slow it back down to normal with "preserve pitch" turned off. It can sound very convincing. Doesn't really work so well for speed metal maybe.

[Fabian]

I do this:
1. Record the bass line played on the guitar
2. Let ReaTune write the MIDI from the recorded track
3. Let EVM Bassline play the MIDI bass, adjust note lengths
4. Pitch down the guitar one octave using elastique Soloist
5. Experiment with preserving different formants until you find something that mixes together well with the sound you selected in EVM Bassline.
6. Re-amp, compress, etc, both tracks together to taste

This way, the pitched down guitar gives the "twang" while EVM Bassline gives the "oumph". I like the sound I get out of this.

But yes... I am seriously thinking of buying a real bass gtr

[matic]

Originally Posted by vejichan

2) spend time and money changing strings once or twice a month

Wow. I have a generic Pbass copy (branded Saturday Night Special) that I bought sometime in the early to mid nineties from my local music store. They got these things from this Indian guy who imported all sorts of junk from overseas, some of it legendarily had even been salvaged and had seawater damage. One of the sales guys at the store convinced me this thing played better than a Squire and I still think he was right. I paid $110 brand new in probably 1994. I HAVE NEVER CHANGED THE STRINGS!!!!

I posted this sloppy mess about a year ago to demo the linn drum vst: https://soundcloud.com/matic27/greatnews

Anyway - buy a bass

[Vendetta V]

I now wish I was back in the US guys. You can even grab a bass for around 200 which will suffice for recording.

Dang in the country I am in right now, basses start from around 500 I think. And making 200 is something that you can hardly achieve within a month even. While in the US you can do it in a week or something.

Please do me a favor and go buy Bass guitars! Make the music happen!

[Sinner]

Good advice above, but I'd add, it makes a big difference to try playing the part with your fingers versus a pick. And try on different parts of the neck.

We've done this intending only for scratch tracks to remember parts and sometimes ended up keeping it cause no one could tell. ha

[Bezmotivnik]

Originally Posted by vejichan

here is what you gotta deal with when you buy a bass
1) need space for a bass guitar in my tiny room full of guitars and gear

This is indeed a problem, especially for the chronically sloppy and disorganized. There's gear (lots of it) in every room of my house except the kitchen and bathroom.

2) spend time and money changing strings once or twice a month

That's nuts. Get flats and be done with it forever. I've never changed flats in my life. Jamerson went forty years on a set, though that's extreme.

The whole concept of bass with rounds played in the guitar register seems totally wrong (and probably immoral) to me except as an effect.

3) money spend setting up the bass( yea i spend money on setting up my guitar..

Setup is everything, and virtually every instrument made needs some to a lot right out of the box -- at any price point.

gotta learn how to do it myself ,,
any tutorial on this?)

Lots, but they're virtually all wrong about the stuff that matters.

a guitar player that needs to add bass to his recordings. As long as it gets the job done.. its fine. I just want to know how close i can get with a guitar simulating a bass

Personally, I think that's a dumb call if you have a way of keying a synth instead.

If it's only getting the job done, there are about a thousand softsynths that will sound better than a guitar faking it.

[zeekat]

Originally Posted by Vendetta V

I now wish I was back in the US guys. You can even grab a bass for around 200 which will suffice for recording.

Those on rondomusic.com start from $115+shipping (with gig bag), which for the residents of US of A shouldn't be that pricey. Apparently they're pretty okay, folks at talkbass seem to like them.

And imagine how cheap used ones have to be :>

[Reno.thestraws]

http://www.thomann.de/be/harley_benton_mb222t.htm

100 bucks.

[Bezmotivnik]

Originally Posted by Vendetta V

I now wish I was back in the US guys. You can even grab a bass for around 200 which will suffice for recording.

Stuff's going up, but in the past few years, I've bought amazing new gear in the ~$200 range, and not junk -- but name-brands on closeout and promotional deals at as much as 85% off, just because I couldn't pass it up.

I think the longest bass deal I got was a brand new Dean Q4 Bartolini for $132 from Amazon. That's for a truly beautiful Cor-Tek build with a tiger-eye top, five-piece set neck, US Bartolini pickups, EMG active controls, Grovers... I think MSRP was around $1100. I'm not into modern actives, much less gaudy furniture basses, but for what it is it's a flawless example, and that's at less than half the price of the electrics and Barts alone.

[lpcrispo]

Originally Posted by Bezmotivnik

Stuff's going up, but in the past few years, I've bought amazing new gear in the ~$200 range, and not junk -- but name-brands on closeout and promotional deals at as much as 85% off, just because I couldn't pass it up.

I think the longest bass deal I got was a brand new Dean Q4 Bartolini for $132 from Amazon. That's for a truly beautiful Cor-Tek build with a tiger-eye top, five-piece set neck, US Bartolini pickups, EMG active controls, Grovers... I think MSRP was around $1100. I'm not into modern actives, much less gaudy furniture basses, but for what it is it's a flawless example, and that's at less than half the price of the electrics and Barts alone.

me want :P

[morgon]

Simulating a guitar with a guitar is hard enough. I agree with the above posters, just about any other option is better. Play Bassline on gtr, convert audio to MIDI and use vst such as 4front Bass [free] which is CPU light bc no parameter tweaks but good default sound, eq to taste.

[Bezmotivnik]

Originally Posted by morgon

Simulating a guitar with a guitar is hard enough.

I've noticed that. I offer no solutions.

[Schlyder]

Get a bass. Or find a bassist. or borrow a bass

Strings will last a long time. I have had sets last years and years with fretless bass. (12 years was the longest I have had a set on one of my basses.)
And dead rounds or flats will record better for you than new rounds.
New rounds are too zingy, and you will get lots of finger noise.


A Squier VM Jazz Bass or P Bass is your best bang for your buck in a sub$400 bass.

But any bass will be better than trying to MacGuyver a sound.

Quit neglecting/halfassing your bass tracks. Respect the bass element of the music. Being a bassist, nothing is more irritating than listening to crappy recorded bass.

Don't bury it in the mix.

Don't turn it into mud.

Don't compress the crap out of it.

Don't scoop the mids.