Old 07-22-2015, 05:39 AM   #1
beingmf
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Default Ideas/tricks for boomy bass guitar

In the EP recordings that I'm mixing at the moment I have one annoying problem: the bass guitar (DI) is just low end mud without any information above 800Hz. Funny enough this is the most expensive bass that I've ever recorded (cost around 5000€!).

Since the recording was kind of cheap-quick-and-dirty, I didn't really care as I usually can deal with bad sounding basses somehow. Now this is different. I *can* get an acceptable tone by splitting at 200Hz, but the top band is obviously so noisy that I would end up in automation overkill.

What I've tried so far (with and without splitting bands):
- high pass
- Pultec trick
- band limited distortion
- (virtual) reamping
- phase trickery

None of it really cured the problem. Distortion worked, but changed the sound so much that it wouldn't fit into the style anymore. Surprisingly my first idea - high pass filtering - didn't work AT ALL, since it seems that most of the sound is in the below 40Hz region*. What a mess!

How do you guys approach a boomy bass without any high end info? At the recording stage or, better, at mix stage? Thanks!

(It's not my room btw. )


* I wonder if this bass has some esoteric pickups that won't work with common DI impedance. Does such a thing exist???
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Last edited by beingmf; 07-22-2015 at 05:47 AM.
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Old 07-22-2015, 06:12 AM   #2
Firedance
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Have you tried bass landscapes?

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/bass...-by-syncersoft

This can work, combined with wide cut at 180 - 250 Hz and a corresponding boost at 80 - 110. I pretty much always low cut at 40 and roll off between 40 and 80 too. A boost around 400 can often help. Saturation can also help.
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Old 07-22-2015, 06:23 AM   #3
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Didn't know that one, thanks a lot - will definitely try!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Firedance View Post
This can work, combined with wide cut at 180 - 250 Hz and a corresponding boost at 80 - 110. I pretty much always low cut at 40 and roll off between 40 and 80 too. A boost around 400 can often help. Saturation can also help.
Yes, this would be quite the usual approach, but the result is just the contrary of what you'd expect. There's not much usable stuff going on between 90 and 500, cutting at 40 was just "what???".

What I came up with (whoever might be interested, haha):
Track 1:
SKNote SoundBrigade for taming below 400Hz only. Sounds much better already. Followed by a Nebula bass mix program called "NV tight". Much better again.
Track 2:
HP at 150, LP at 5500. Followed by a Nebula bass amp program called "GK Line out". Mixed in parallel and sent to ...
Track 3:
simply a bass amp/speaker combo (Neb again), not for the sound, but for getting rid of the noise. Phase rotation is your very good friend here. I found a setting where the overall sound isn't altered much, but the noise is virtually gone. Subtly mixed in until you (un)hear the effect. Cool!

It's not the best bass sound in recording history, but a usable and pretty organic tone that fits the context of the mix. Phew ...
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Old 07-22-2015, 06:40 AM   #4
Firedance
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Sounds strange that you're having such a problem with the tone/EQ, especially with as you say, a "fancy" bass.

Not sure how much help I can be other than what I've said and throwing more free plugs at you, like:

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/bassplus-by-wok
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Old 07-22-2015, 07:39 AM   #5
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Can we hear a sample so we can make suggestions in context?
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Old 07-22-2015, 07:50 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Fergler View Post
Can we hear a sample so we can make suggestions in context?
I have to ask if it's okay, but I guess so.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Firedance View Post
Sounds strange that you're having such a problem with the tone/EQ, especially with as you say, a "fancy" bass.
Definitely. Especially considering the fact that I recorded another bass player with exactly the same preamps etc. some weeks later, and the tone is just great.

I think the "problem" lies in the manufacturer's vision of sound. He's one of thee boutique jazz GUITAR builders and this is the first bass he ever built. Now if his conception of a classic jazz guitar sound (muffled, fat, dull, if you like) applies to the bass as well, then it's no wonder. Needless to say it's a hollow body bass. Although I assume that the guy has ears as well
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Old 07-22-2015, 10:01 AM   #7
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A small suggestion I think Mike Senior put out once about bass is to add some distortion that will bring some of the energy into the higher frequencies and give you more to work with..
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Old 07-22-2015, 10:31 AM   #8
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Although I'm not a fan of multiband-compression,
I'd try some here.
Like Nova-67P https://vladgsound.wordpress.com/plugins/nova67p/
(my goto for bassguitar)

Maybe a doubled track with HP/LP and distortion?
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Old 07-22-2015, 11:42 AM   #9
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Thanks, tgraph and ginormous - that's of course what I tried first, since it can sound cool even with "normal" basses. But there is not much (read: nothing) usable going on in the "upper" range. So I can either distort the 50 - 150 area, the wavelength of which is so huge, it sounds like a synth. Split band compressing is just boosting the mud. I mean, I want 3k in a bass, maybe even 5k, but there is nada, nichts, nothing. No air, no strings, nothing that defines the instrument. Pickup noise, yes.
400 - 600 is "wood", which is okay per se, but as long as it's not accompanied by a balanced string or fundamental tone, it's pretty clueless.
I just botch a usable context sound and focus on the rest
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Old 07-22-2015, 11:46 AM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by G-Sun View Post
Like Nova-67P https://vladgsound.wordpress.com/plugins/nova67p/
(my goto for bassguitar)
G-Sun: if I sent you a short snippet, do you have some time to return a setting for Nova? I must admit I don't really "get it" for some applications (e.g. for deessing it's great)!
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Old 07-22-2015, 11:49 AM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by beingmf View Post
Now if his conception of a classic jazz guitar sound (muffled, fat, dull, if you like) applies to the bass as well, then it's no wonder. Needless to say it's a hollow body bass. Although I assume that the guy has ears as well
LOL, I love that sound except I call it fat, round and puffy and is a stylistic choice only. Not hearing it, anything I say is complete assumption and conjecture but if it is a hollow body I would surely expect it to sound round and not like a Music Man for example. None of this would have much to do with the price vs sound either assuming I understand the details I don't yet know. The only other thought is a hand made hollow body bass guitar would require an awful lot of labor, care and luthier attention to details and I say that coming from a stance that the value of a guitar is more than just the clinical sound aka I support those who place great care in what they make meaning I don't equate 5k to sounding 10 times as good as a 500.00.
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Old 07-22-2015, 03:45 PM   #12
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OK - thankfully only that first song of the mixing session suffers from that muddy bass tone. Other tunes were better. What's the difference you might ask? It's in the playing! When A/Bing the performances of the different tunes, it's clear that the problem track isn't really articulate: it seems often empty strings aren't muted correctly which all adds up to a diffuse low end chaos.

Still not the greatest bass to record, but okay. I should suggest trying brighter strings (IIRC he played those black nylon flatwounds that are likely much too muffled from the start). No, I should suggest a better technique!
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Old 07-23-2015, 11:36 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by beingmf View Post
G-Sun: if I sent you a short snippet, do you have some time to return a setting for Nova? I must admit I don't really "get it" for some applications (e.g. for deessing it's great)!
Sure. Send me a zip-file or something,
and I'll try out a thing or two.
But, no guarantee it's better than what you've done,
or if it fit the style you're after.
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Old 03-21-2016, 10:35 AM   #14
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Highly recommend using a frequency analyser plugin so that you can pinpoint exactly which frequency is causing the boomy sound. Typically somewhere between 100Hz and 300Hz in my experience. Just make sure you only cut out that particular boomy frequency and not the whole dynamic range between 100 and 300Hz or you will lose a lot of low end.
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Old 03-21-2016, 01:43 PM   #15
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If you're missing high frequencies why not add it? Use ReaTune to record a MIDI track and then let that drive some bass VST (or even a synth), maybe raised one octave. Then mix in with the original. You don't even have to say anything to your client
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Old 03-21-2016, 03:09 PM   #16
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A big fat bandpass on the thing between 40Hz and about 500Hz. Season and compress to taste.
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Old 03-22-2016, 01:42 AM   #17
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Have you asked the player what HE was looking to get in the way of tone? You may well be fighting each other here.
Not everyone wants or even likes a brighter more articulate bass sound.
Also, what does the actual client think?

I have one active bass set up with oldish rotosound roundwounds and one fender precision USA 62 reissue set up with ground rounds, which are pretty much the equivalent of those tape wounds sound-wise.
I wind up using the precision a lot more than the active bass, simply because the sound IS really fat and thuddy.
If you are trying to get the recording to sound like a modern, clean, articulate bass from a semi-acoustic with tape wounds, you WILL struggle.

HAHA! I totally missed the part where you said his technique was somewhat lacking on that first track & the rest was OK.

Not much you can do about that really, is there?
But like I said before, what does the client think?
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Old 03-22-2016, 01:49 AM   #18
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if it's a fancy bass, it could have active circuitry. was the DI active or passive? I'd use a passive DI.

Once you record a cruddy sound, it's too late really.
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Old 03-31-2016, 06:54 AM   #19
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Scroll down for Bassprofessor
http://jsplugins.supermaailma.net/jsplugins.php

or MKII

http://jsplugins.supermaailma.net/vstplugins.php

Maybe these are not cure for all problems, but definitely worth to check out.
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Old 04-18-2016, 08:05 PM   #20
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I've used the Clarisonix enhancer on basses with no definition with pretty good results. Leave off the sub enhancer and crank the Clarity knob and adjust mix with the Reaper mix knob. Basically I'd take any soundly maligned Exciter or Enhancer plugins that was two steps forward and four back on anything else it was tried on and give it a shot.
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Old 04-19-2016, 10:13 AM   #21
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Quote:
Originally Posted by G-Sun View Post
Although I'm not a fan of multiband-compression,
I'd try some here.
Like Nova-67P https://vladgsound.wordpress.com/plugins/nova67p/
(my goto for bassguitar)

Maybe a doubled track with HP/LP and distortion?
the newer TDR Nova is even nicer! http://www.tokyodawn.net/tdr-nova/

I even sprang for the GE version after trying out the free one for a while.
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Old 04-20-2016, 07:00 PM   #22
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Glad you found something that works well enough : )

I wonder what an octave up would sound like, blended underneath.
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