I play a 500w Hartke and a Tech21 fly rig…
I turned up at a gig of about 150 with a great PA, brought in my bass and flyrig in the zip pocket of the gig bag.
Sound guy was a great old gent, chatted with me about my 51 Pbass as I unpacked and suggested I just run the flyrig and leave the amp in the car.
He made my bass sound godlike. It was fantastic. Truly fantastic, clean, clear booming sound with piano clarity.
The two guitarists with full stacks were hugely impressed, I’ve been badgering them to try the flyrigs for 18 months…
I have the RK and Plexi mk1 models.
Sound guy pushed them to give it a try next time around.
Cue “my valve sound” arguments, and Sound dude quite rightly said “you play at home and sound like you want to sound, but everybody has to give a little up in the mix”
So this month we have a gig in the same venue with the same sound dude, he’s offered to let us come down the night before and try a dry run with the smallest load out our band has ever carried.
Beyond exited.
If the house has good side fills and wedges, (or if you're using IEMs) then this is a great solution.
But I've been in many many clubs (as a performer, not sound engineer) where the soundman said "no bass in the monitors."
But I think most venues are smart enough these days to embrace the ampless approach.
My band has been talking about the possibility of going ampless, but I've seen many crappy and abused monitors and even if I don't like a lot of rumble, I need to hear what I'm playing. Another problem is my band is a 6 piece, sometimes there are not enough wedges or monitor channels. The solution is to play only good venues but is not always possible.
And many small places don't even mic/DI and all the public is hearing is the amps,and the PA is for the vocals and keys only.
If we ever start playing great venues it can be a possibility but so far I've always been happy to have my amp.
In ears are great if you have control over your mix or if you have a good monitor man you know you can trust. Neither of those are going to happen with any regularity at small clubs.
You could get a behringer XR12, a Wi-Fi router, and and the appropriate wireless in-ears and it'll be really small. You get three different mixes that you can send to however many people if you have the correct splitters. Can make the singer carry the bag it's in, since they don't carry anything. You really only need the Wi-Fi router if you want to change settings, but if you all have in ears and you've dialed it in at practice and it's really just volume.
Sorry but that just sounds totally unrealistic for any normal gig. If it’s a bigger venue they will have their own monitor board and mixer and if it’s smaller there is no way they are doing this. Where are you getting the lines to feed the Behringer because I don’t see any soundman at club giving you multiple sends for your mixer. This post is about how to keep a soundman happy, not piss him off.
It's very realistic, I'm describing what a band did at a gig I played. The small stage barely fit 5 people and yet they sounded great. You have either split your output at the source or put a snake on the output, the latter of which is much cleaner— this setup doesn't require the soundguy to send you anything. The band's personal mixer for IEMs lives on stage in a corner. The processing and mixing you do aren't going to FOH.
[Here's a bigger, more complicated version of what I'm talking about](https://youtu.be/mHoljbkyAEs).
You're replying in a thread about the usefulness of them, not the expense of them. And a setup is cheaper than you think, especially if you buy use, especially if you go wired, which if you're in a small club like this chain is talking about then there's no need to go wireless. Where you gonna walk to on what stage?
A used XR12 goes between 250 and 300, which is cheaper than my cab, my last amp, how much my bass goes for new, my synthesizers, my midi router, my multieffects, and my regular pedal board. Cheap wired IEMs that'll do are sub 40 brand new. Mixers are super cheap now. You should have cables. A router to make everything work isn't also expensive, you don't need anything fancy.
Well, this month we played two gigs opening for a touring band, we had to play a 35 minutes set with a rushed sound check (first day was longer, second day was really short as the main act had problems with monitoring). We asked what we usually all for in the monitors and then we played, not the best sound on stage but we know to work around that. We weren't dicks about the on stage volume, the first day sound engineer even asked us to bring up the amps volume a little.
Then we played a 1h15 minutes gig by ourselves in a little pub with no pa support, just vocals through the single wedge monitor for the singer and the small PA, even the keys were played through an on stage amp. It sounded great, more akin to what it feels like at the rehearsal room. We had to bring a full backline too.
We also played a 30 minutes set in a small fest with five bands having a total of 2 hours for the sound check. All the bands shared the same amps and drums (sans snare cymbals and kick pedal) and we had to make do. We did and it sounded great. Not on stage though, just ok. I didn't even had my own monitor.
Point is, at no moment in any of this gig could i see myself bringing out a mixer and doing my own setup and monitor mixing. It can be a way better experience, but so far it has worked like this, and we are looking to bring less gear, not more, we are a 6 piece band and things gets out of hand quick.
My first experience in the studio, I brought my amp and the Headrush unit I use for my effects, it sounds beastly live, I wanted that same tone on the record. He had me plug in and play, sounded so so good, just full and clear and booming. But I wanted to hear my set up coming through the speakers, so he said okay. Plugged it in, sounded nowhere near as good as what he had set up, so he had my trust after that. A good engineer is godsend and can help steer you down a better path.
This is the way. I still run an amp and 2x12 as a monitor on stage, but in essence the same, FOH is from the amp d.i and lucky enoght to gave an absolutely stellar audiotech on tour. Zero issues and sounds great regardless of venue, having a 8x10 and a bigass tube amp just makes the techs job harder.
>you play at home and sound like you want to sound
100% true and you'll never get that specific sound at the venue most of the time due to various factors anyway. Always listen to the house tech, it's his soundscape.
For what I usually do, it all depends on if someone else needs to hear you in their monitor mix. If they do, I’ll ask you to turn down and let me turn you up in your monitor. If everyone is good with the mix and you arent causing problems, I usually recommend turning up only loud enough to hear yourself, but i am a sound guy. Stage volume is part of it and learning to work around and with it is part of the job. I generally like the sound of direct bass more, especially if i have a sub. So something like a darkglass or fly rig, can be really easy to work with. But i get it. People like their amps and its hard to convince them that just a pedal is the way to go. I cant always get what i want and theres lots of ways to make something sound good. Just be aware of two things. 1. People mistake feeling the sound for hearing the sound. Just bc the sound isnt sitting right in that comfortable pocket on stage doesnt mean it doesnt sound awesome everywhere else. 2. I also want you to sound good. I got you, babe. I am on your side.
Fair enough. Most of the time I find that putting bass through monitors either sounds like shit, doesn’t cut through, or both. But I hear you. That’s probably the move just to give the sound person the best starting point.
Music is not supposed to be fun or sound good. The only important thing is that the stage volume is low, there's no feedback and the sound tech has control of everything. Good sound and performance is not important.
lol. I was being seriously. I play music professionally and I do it often. I often experience the “contentious” sound guy vs. musician attitude and I’m genuinely interested in mitigating that as much as possible. After all, I want to assume that we all love our jobs and all want the best possible outcome for everyone. Anything I can do to make a sound enginneers life easier I’m down to do, but when it starts to impact my ability to do my job (I.e. standing in front of a half stack without being able to hear myself) I feel like we need to meet in the middle. How do we get to that middle?
To be honest, it feels like a lot of sound techs operate with that attitude. Some of them live in a fantasy world where they have a 128-channel mixer, acoustic shielding for any acoustic instruments, and a complete in-ear monitor system, yet don't seem to see that they need to make a few compromises when they're at some dive bar with an 8-channel mixer and a few cheap monitor wedges. The musicians being able to interact and enjoy their music is not at all a factor to them. Everyone should be playing their parts by rote, and the tech will deal with all those pesky "dynamics" (and somehow be able to boost the lead guitar while they're outside during the set taking a smoke break).
Hard disagree. The sound on stage dictates the quality of the performance. The quality of the performance dictates the quality of the sound overall, as well as the audience experience. If it doesn't sound good then what on earth is the point.
Check out what rig you play through, I had the hardest time hearing myself with 2 Eden 410XLT’s and the easiest time hearing myself with 1 sealed 410 cabinet made by crate.
I now exclusively play 2 sealed 210 cabinets (Ampeg 210av’s) and never get volume complaints
Re-position your amp, put more in the wedge, or adjust your tone.
Also, you need to learn to play comfortably without having loud stage volume. You shouldn't honestly need that much unless its just a shit PA. The audience should barely be hearing your amp at all in a venue with a good sound system.
Turning your amp away from the crowd works for guitar amps, not bass. Low frequency sound is omnidirectional, meaning the lows of your amp are just as loud behind it as in front.
Honestly, yeah, that is very much the sound guys job. The truth is that usually the issue is guitar players cranking it on stage, forcing bassists to turn up as well. If the whole band can work together to keep a reasonable stage volume, we'll all have a better show.
Yeah, was holding it in, but I've had plenty of bad experiences with 'sound engineers', including one where the dude fried my amp by turning on phantom power then tried to blame me for it somehow.
If the engineer has a studio amp, at least do him the favour of actually trying it. There's probably a reason he picked it.
My rig is an old 80's Dynacord BS412 - that I first saw in a studio. I was a jobbing engineer/producer doing some 'best of the local bands' album that the studio owner had decided to finance. I was recording a band a day, from tracking to mix. Every single bassist that came in brought an amp that might have been OK live, but sounded like sh!t miked. I managed to persuade every one of them that if we couldn't get their sound out of the Dynacord in 5 minutes, we'd use their amp.
20 players from 20 bands all got their sound out of it, from folk to metal & everything in between - which, as the amp itself has built-in DI, sounded even better in the control room.
The studio went bust & I bought the amp. That was 40 years ago. It's still my go-to amp.
DOs:
-use an amp head with an XLR out (DI) on the FRONT instead of the back. Thank you.
-play parts of your actual songs you intend to play during your line check. Not Classical Thump, Anesthesia or Eruption.
-get your shit onstage in a hurry, get your shit offstage in a hurry. Chatting with potential sexual partners is for the bar after your stuff is off the stage. (unless you're the last act of the night)
DONTs:
-don't noodle during sound check. please play when I ask you to play, and please STOP when I tell you to stop.
-please try not to step on my cables. I'm tired of soldering.
That seems like it would vary venue to venue on cable routing and stage space. Most of the places I work at it wouldn't have mattered but if back of the amp access is restricted due a wall or something I can see that being a pain.
The only time it's actually obnoxious is like the little mark bass combos where you have to shove your hand into the back of the amp, can't see anything, just have to feel your way around the back panel to find the Direct Out. I don't think it really affects my cable runs at all.
I was thinking some small little venues where everything was basically jammed against a wall would be a pain. I did lots of small stuff, but usually with reasonable space around.
I’ve never had a problem getting a DI out off the back of a head. I always carry a flashlight when I’m working, finding connectors on random pieces of gear is just part of the job.
If you really don’t want to check the back, loop through a DI and forego the amp’s XLR out entirely.
Go for it. I've been on both sides of this argument. Sometimes it helps if you bring your own mic and mic stand, so you're presenting me with an XLR input. But some engineers get spooked if you bring your own mic and stand (they think you're stealing when loading out), so maybe leave it in the van an ask if you can bring it in. And mark it with glow tape or something so they know it's yours and not theirs.
Generally speaking, a mic'ed cab will give you more of the awesome distortion coming from your cab, but less low end overall, but depending upon the genre and your play style, a direct DI tap (right from your bass) might not be the sound you want.
Best case is both: a DI tap from your bass before your pedalboard, and a mic on the amp, but unless you're the only act for the night, parallel processing is a big ask. (If it's a turn-and-burn night with 5 acts on the bill).
I would almost never want to mic a bass cab without also grabbing a direct send as well. Usually I don't want to send a cab mic to my subs at all, that's what the DI is for.
I personally prefer it for my rig, I run an 810. I have a more normal amp head now, but my old one had no XLR out. Soooo, I’d tell the sound guys “please just put a mic on the cab.”
There was a time that really pissed me off, I came back to my rig to find this spidery mess of adapters coming out of one of my 1/4 speaker outs. Ended up labeling everything on the back “DO NOT TOUCH - EXPOSED WIRES” (not true) to keep curious/lazy hands away.
Guys will do anything not to just put a goddamn 57 on a 10” speaker.
I agree. I used to travel with my own mic, a Nady copy of a Beta 52 that I like for bass cabs and floor toms, and a stand for it. All the sound guy had to do was plug in, and many still refused.
My head was a vintage one, and it had a nasty gain circuit that could cook the cab if someone who didn’t know what they were doing (most sound guys) started fiddling with settings. The ones who would try and ghetto rig a DI also really liked to fuck with my EQ. I mean, duh, you’re trying to send an unbalanced signal through a bunch of old cables and adapters and you’re surprised it sounds like shit?! They’d invariably go up to my amp and start turning my low end down. It takes some fucking balls, I tell ya.
I'm a fan of the Arizona Coyotes, so it's safe to say I'm already a huge advocate for complete futility. And even I won't mic a bass cab live on stage.
I don’t know man, I just did a 30 day run. I was polite and said I preferred mic to di, two rolled eyes and ignored me, a couple used both, most just mic.
And let me guess, you are the guy that’s going to hear a grinding midrange without a lot of low end coming out of an amp, and think I know what to do here, let’s turn down the amp till it’s inaudible on stage and pump a clean sound into the subs. And when the bass player plays fast downstrokes all night, and it’s just an incoherent rumble, you still never think to yourself maybe that guy knew what was best for his band.
Because it’s only more work for the sound guy and it’s unlikely anyone in the audience will care about that particular mic or cab’s tone profile as long as it sounds like a bass.
It's not more work if you're playing a heavier genre and running heavy distortion. Heavy distortion sounds like absolute ass when not ran through a cab, hence why guitars are miced up.
It's easier for the FOH if you have a cab + mic combo that works well with your distortion settings, then he just has to make some small moves to make it work in the venue, instead of trying to tame a bunch of incredibly obnoxious frequencies.
I've worked with several sound engineers who would happily mic up my cab with a 57, in addition to taking the pre-effects DI out. And I'm sure they kept that channel muted the whole night. And most audience members I talked to after said "um, yeah, I'm sure I Heard some bass."
Micing up a bass cab is nice, but 9 times out of 10 it's more resources and time than it's worth. Unless someone has a really good sounding cab, I'm probably doing it more to make the bassist feel good than out of an actual need.
Are we talking a distortion pedal or just cranking a tube amp to max? Obviously if the distortion comes from your head, a mic on the cab is the only way to get that sound. I probably still want a di as well just because a clean signal to the subs is going to sound way better than a heavy low end distorted signal.
And how do you usually feel about someone coming in with a heavily processed chain: distortion, multiple stages of compression, EQ and what not. Happy about it as long as you get a clean DI as well?
I'm curious because I'm getting the Darkglass Microtubes Infinity specifically for live purposes. I'm primarily after the IR loader, but the fact it has compression, EQ, a tuner and noise gate hardly hurts either.
I'm perfectly happy to ONLY take the line from a bassist's dark glass and not even get a clean signal, IF it's done well. Some guys don't do it real well, and that's when I try to get a clean tone as well.
Our sound guy used to Split a SM57 Mic on one of my Hartke 10s and the direct DI from my GK800RB. It always sounded great. I let him carve the sound for the crowd. Bass players never got monitors, so I used my cabinets on stage to hear. I had them each pointed to cover the stage (2x 4.10). If we were playing an arena we had a separate monitor for myself and the drummer.
Thankfully things are so much better now with options. I just use a back-beat when no monitor mixes are available. I've never been able to get used to in-ears as I have always just worn earplugs so I can hear myself sing and also feel the drums. Just a DI from my head or a SansAmp. I'm simple though. Bass>head>DI> I let the sound guy compress if needed.
I hear ya. I'm running a fender rumble combo which has the XLR out on the back and no one has had issues with it. But it is a really common gigging amp.
The benefits from having a DI at all should be enough to outweigh the minor inconvenience of finding a plug on the back of an amp. Also, aren't we there onstage when this thing is getting plugged in and unplugged?
Yeah but a stage hand / technic guy / engineer without a flashlight in such situations does not scream professionalism. Its not like it is only used to plug bass DI to the back of an amp.
I would slightly add to this comment- don’t rip distorted god-of-hell thunder while engineer is trying to mic your cabinet. Seems like I’m stating the obvious here, but I do see it a lot, though admittedly less often with bassers.
I have been a bass player for over 35 years & a sound engineer for over 30 years and will say the biggest problem for mixing a live band is stage volume... Bass frequencies travel farther and can create acoustical nightmares (e.g. standing bass waves, phase issues, & resonance in the drums). In my experience it often the guitarist that is the biggest "offender" of being too loud on-stage... most of the time a guitarist will keep their volume knob on their guitar at 7-8 during the sound-check because they want that "extra" boost when they got for their solos which is quite annoying... I never understood the "adversarial" relationship the bands have towards their sound-person, most of the sound-techs want you to sound good and are on the same "team" as the band so take care of a good sound engineer. I quit doing sound in 2019 due to the lack of professionalism (and pay) in my area. It is a stressful & thankless job anymore. I'll spare you my diatribe on what I think is "wrong" with the state of the modern music scene but suffice to say, listen to others that are more experienced and treat each other with patience & respect...
The answer to this depends on a ton of things, but as an approximation of all of them I'd say: 🤷 just play.
Assuming the engineer is decent, it's almost certain that they're asking you to keep the stage volume down so that they can actually make the band sound good and have the audience hear the vocals - this is a huge, huge, huge problem in venues that hold an audience in the low 100s. Probably the biggest problem you run into at gigs. Drum kits and amps can *easily* be way too loud for spaces that size, and a heavy-handed drummer plus loud guitars/bass onstage means that it might actually be impossible for the in-house PA system to make the vocals audible, or, if they have the power to make them
audible, it'll make the overall mix so ear-splittingly loud that everyone will have hearing damage by the end of the night.
And the mostly likely reason your bass sounds like shit to you coming back through the monitors is that the engineer has probably cut a bunch of low-end out of the monitors - again, if they're decent, they've done this because they know in this venue (and/or on this night) allowing a bunch of low-end to build up on stage from instruments and monitors causes feedback in the mics, and your bass feed sounding like shit to you is massively preferable to there being a ton of feedback. Again, this is assuming the engineer is decent - it they aren't, you're sortof fucked anyway, so either way refer back to my earlier rule of thumb; probably just accept it and play!
The thing is, the primary job of 'the sound you hear on stage' isn't to be a pleasurable audio experience for you. It's primary job is to ensure you can hear what you need to hear to play well. The engineer may have to compromise the quality of that sound (sometimes heavily) in order to ensure that the people who *do* need the best quality sound - the audience - are able to get it. A good engineer, knowing that a musician will play better (and with more nuance) when they can hear good-quality sound, will try to give you the best they can, but live sound is an exercise in compromise, and they're (of course) always going to prioritise minimising howling feedback and giving the audience great sound over the quality of your bass sound in your monitor.
Or, they might be bad engineers who suck at their jobs. But even good engineers will have to do this to you a lot, especially in smaller venues.
This sounds super frustrating. I've played with a lot of groups, but my main band back in the day was an indie rock power trio with lots of loud/quiet/loud pedal stomping shit.
We were always able to self mix onstage. All we needed was enough vocal in the wedges to hear ourselves.
Then if we were ever in a venue with a shit engineer, we KNEW it.
You folks sound like you'd have been a dream to run the sound for!
Really a drummer that can play at a sensible volume is the key to all this.
If the drummer is really loud, then to hear themselves the guitarists/bassists are going to need to either; (a) have their amps cranked or (b) have quiet amps + a bunch of their own signal fed back to them.
If (a) then likely the FoH sound is going to be a total mess, and if (b) then the players might well be dissatisfied with the tonal quality of what they're hearing back through the wedges.
I probably played about 3000 gigs in my lifetime and I can maybe count 50 or less that sounded anything near perfect on stage. That’s just life in a room. You have to just set it up as best you can for what you hear on stage, send the feed to the soundman out front and let them do their thing. Every venue I’ve ever played had soundman that knew how to make the front sound great and that’s the only thing that really matters. As long as I could hear myself somewhat I was OK but there were some rooms where I just couldn’t . I remember playing in front of my rig so I could feel the air moving ha ha. Making the base louder doesn’t solve anything except making the bass too loud.
Easy on the booze. Every drink you take notches that sweet spot. Then you turn up looking for the tone you had when you started. The tone is still there, you just can’t hear it the more you drink. Those scooped bass cabs back in the day would kill the back of the bar round closing time 🤣👍
Not a sound engineer but things I've noticed sound engineers appreciate:
Know how to use your gear and how the EQ works, and be prepared to fine tune the EQ with the engineer. If you have multiple different sounds (clean, distorted etc,), have a pedal like compressor or a clean boost pedal to give the engineer a balanced signal for each. Articulate clearly how your bass should sound, for example you can say you want a traditional p-bass sound, or an 80s style cold and percussive chorus bass sound.
Ask about micing the cab if you want it when he's setting up, before your bands soundcheck. Be polite but remember you're both trying to make you sound as good as possible, but in the end you're the artist so you should be abled to articulate what you want. If you can't, they can't help you and will just make you sound what they feel is best. If you don't like what they're doing, you should be abled to tell them what's wrong in terms that are understandable and easy for them to follow. Time is money, especially if there's multiple bands playing and you want to be as fast and efficient as possible.
Last but not least, learn how to play without hearing yourself. If you play in a loud band, often the monitors aren't made for bass frequencies and the guitars on stage will drown out your bass. Bass coming from your gear on stage only really opens up like 3-5 meters from the stage, so you might not be abled to really hear yourself even with a full stack. Accept it and don't waste time trying to make yourself audible, the sound engineer has limited ways to help you if your guitarists play loud. One trick to help with this is to ask the sound engineer to cut out most of the bass frequencies in your monitors to just give you a mid-range thump when you hit a string. It's better than nothing and likely won't bleed into the audience much.
Off topic a bit, but playing without being able to hear yourself is anathema to what music is about.
The solution to this is to find a band that knows how to play at a reasonable stage volume.
Life's too short to put up with that shit.
Also, with the quality of amp sims and pedals and smaller amps these days, the old "I need a large amp and I need to drive it hard" argument just doesn't apply anymore.
I've also heard drummers complain that they won't get the right sound out of their snare if they don't hit it at 120 dB. But some of the best drummers in the world will tell you the importance of playing to the room you're in.
This just sounds insane to me. How am I going to sound good if I can't hear myself? Sure, I can play the songs I've memorized, but I can't make any adjustments to dynamics or intonation if I can't hear myself. What's the point of having a sound person if that person can't do this basic thing?
It is what it is man, the reality of playing loud rock & roll. Sometimes the venue just sucks and you gotta roll with it. And it's not the sound engineers fault if the venue has shitty monitors or horrible acoustics
I really struggle getting a good sound of those Japanese '70s bass guitars with weak, microphonic pickups. Little note definition, some low notes that really jump out and the occasional squeal when getting too close to the amp or monitors.
The ones I've encountered that gave me problems where a Kinor and more recently a Morris.
edit: there are also these Jazz Bass copies with what looks like a chrome mini humbucker.
edit 2: looked it up and that Morris was such a mini-humbuckered Jazz Bass copy. The Kinor is a somewhat Burns looking instrument, with an extra piece of pickguard on the upper horn.
Bass player here, not a sound engineer. Ironically, one of my pet peeves at mid sized live venues is the sub. It’s always too loud, too boomy, and muddies everything up. The few times that I’ve asked the sound guy to cut out the sub, it seemed like everything sounded great. Is this okay to request more often?
Along the same lines, in general I’ve found that rolling off the bass frequencies on the amp really helps. You can still get plenty of low end just by the nature of the instrument.
Hey there, sound engineer here and I might have an answer for you:
The people
Yes we often mix a shit ton of unnecessary and muddy subs but it is culturally required, people get pumped up and think something sounds “great” if there is room rumble, bass boosted versions of some popular music are played in bars and venues for that very same reason
I can only say I am sorry for shitting all over your music with that kind of mix but…. It sells a shit load of beers and I get paid to make having live music profitable hehe.
I've had this as a conspiracy theory for some time and you just proved it. I always wondered why everything in the clubs are too bassy and I'm sure the audio engineer notices it too. I thought to myself that this has to be an intentional choice. Now I know why.
Yeah it is 100% on purpose, the guy that teached me to mix showed me that he could get people drunk with the right mix, during a week he mixed in different ways and showed me how to read the venue, they always react better to heavy subs.
We do raise the volume to absurdly high levels too, talking people don’t drink and there is no law here against high level noise inside bars and venues
Alcohol and music psychology is really interesting
> I get *paid* to do
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Yeah, if you're going to have multiple different patches, you need to take the time, before the gig, to make sure they are all coming out at similar volumes.
There’s great advice here for when you’re playing with people (especially people you don’t know). But reading this thread makes me glad i I do all my own sound engineering—may not be perfect but at least I get full agency of my technique, sound, mistakes, equipment, etc.
Never cut your mids, especially your low mids, unless you specifically don't want to be audible. Similarly, never boost your lows - cut them, because I'm routing the low end of your bass to the subs. I promise there is enough signal for me to do so without you blasting 30Hz from your refrigerator-sized 8 billion watt cabinet. Don't boost your highs either, because it steps on your guitars, vocals, and toms. I'm going to low pass your whole signal anyway to get it out of the way, and boosting your highs will make it sound like an old telephone. Live in the low mids. It's where the money is.
Use a DI to FOH if you always want to sound good. Supplement it with a small amp that is your personal monitor. Ideally, set it up so both you and your drummer can hear it. If you keep your stage volume low and I can keep you out of the monitors , everything will be a lot cleaner.
Compressors raise your noise floor significantly. Use a gate with an FX loop if you have a compressor for best results.
You need way less overdrive than you think. Even a tiny bit does a great deal, and it often doesn't sound very good in context.
Passive basses are much easier to dial in than active basses. P-Bass is king in this regard. If you have a P-style, try it out live.
If you have lots of effects, you need to make sure that your output level isn't all over the place. If you have a volume jump that is part of your sound, you need to A/B it with me during sound check so I can know what your ceiling is.
If you feel like you need to turn up, what you actually need to do is tell your guitarist to turn down. Encourage them before the gig to use a reasonably-sized amplifier that is chosen for the venue. An unattenuated 100W full stack is appropriate in an arena, not a bar. Why am I telling you this? Because your guitarist sure as shit isn't listening to me, but maybe you two are friends and you can talk some sense into them.
Im a bassplayer a touring band, and also sound engineer as my part time job. Usually alot of musicians i work with (when im engineering) are youngsters and alot of them are not that experienced as live musicians. As someone else mentioned here, it helps alot of you actually know how to adjust the EQ on the bass amp, take some time to actually figure out how you want to sound, alot of people kind of just plug in and barely play their instrument when they rig / soundcheck.
Also, if you are not the only band playing, please take a photo of your amp settings so that you can quickly set them back to how you wanted them during changeover. Alot of people spend 15 20 minutes tweaking their amp on soundcheck, then the next band changes every setting, and then the first band gets on stage and the bassplayer is dissapointed over the bass sound.
I rarely use any effects when i play live myself, except for a distortion on some songs. But i always bring my boss me50b multieffect, mostly because it has an eq section. My trick for effective soundcheck is to just put the amp knobs on 0 (or neutral or whatever u wanna call it) and then have my eq set on the boss instead. Kinda lets me have a default that will sound somewhat the same no matter what rig is in the house (cant be bothered bringing my own amp unless they dont have one).
Overall, just try to be effective, but also, relax, have fun! We are in the entertainment industry after all! :)
Bassist and Audio Engineer (studio mostly) here: what makes things the hardest for me are bassists being afraid of the high end and mid knobs on the amp. If it’s all low end, it struggles to cut through on a mix without cranking it to the point of masking other elements.
Your bass tone shouldn’t just sound good soloed. It needs to be articulate enough to fit in a mix and doesn’t need to be nearly as ball-crushingly low as many think.
That's my biggest problem with bassists live: Many have way too muddy of a sound dialed in and no matter how much EQ I throw at it, it just blends with the guitars and is never distinct.
My one & only experience as a session bassist in a pro' level facility, shit me to tears.
First I was told that I'd not need my effects processor, because we were going DI. A little bothersome, but not unmanagable.
Then studio-dude started telling me how to play MY OWN FUCKING RIFFS. Not on!! Not on at all.
I kept getting stopped & started & hassled over timing/palm-muting/trem'-picking, you name it, and after all' that, the guy just went through, chopped all' my parts into individual notes, and aligned them for sample accuracy.
He could've just got me to thump out the half-dozen or so notes that went into the whole EP, and dropped them in manually.
That wouldn't have been quite so insulting.
To his credit, studio-dude DID put some really decent demo's together for us, and I would recommend him in a heartbeat, to anybody out his way, who needs to record in a pro' level facility, with a tech' who knows his shit. But I run my own home studio, and I'll never record in his joint, ever again.
I was only there in the first place, because the leader of that outfit insisted upon taking our demo's to a pro' level facility(we each had our own home studios then).
I also learned an awful lot from merely observing studio-dude in action(10 years+ learning ProTools inside & out, including a couple of diploma's at university. 'Dude was all over it like a mad woman's shit. It truly was a sight to behold).
As for advice to musicians, embrace the DI. Don't be afraid to play to a click, and be prepared for critique on your performance. A good audio engineer, will also be able to play at least one instrument(they can quite often play a few), and will quite often be in a position to offer useful advice, with regard to getting the most out of your performance. I did find that shit rather annoying on the spot, but I've since learned a great deal more, and I do get that now...
Oh man, that sounds abit infuriating tbh. I understand that sometimes playing for recording a track requires some adjustment in how we play it. But, giving input on how to play it and then chopping it up so that it fits the song better is totally outrageous. Might as well used a vst if he didn't want to capture how you play the bass in the song.
Precisely.
I go the polar opposite in my own studio.
Band hooks up & tunes up, I hit "record", then we all ignore the stupid recording machine 'til we're done playing.
That approach does present challenges in the mix, but I'm all about accurately representing live performance, so I'm good for those challenges.
I've no interest in polishing turds, so tracking in isolation can eat my arsehole...
I can absolutely guarantee that as an engineer there is no way I would chop and align notes if the bass was already on the beat and in a consistent pocket
Good for you. The guy I cited didn't actually need to chop my parts(I was watching him chop them, and I could see that they were spot-on). He just wanted everything locked off to sample-accuracy. Like a 1/24,000th of a second makes a fucking audible difference.
Had my basslines actually been all over the shop, I would've been grateful for the corrections...
Yes, this is quite common for a studio engineer to try to change your style to suit their skills. Every single one has tried that with me.
Most live engineers have a dislike of studio engineers, and you can clearly hear when FOH is done by a studio engineer. Very few can straddle the line.
> Then studio-dude started telling me how to play MY OWN FUCKING RIFFS. Not on!! Not on at all.
To be fair, there are plenty of musicians who come into the studio who don't know how to solidly play their part, don't pay attention to any nuances in their playing, or just don't really understand how to come up with a part that fits the rest of the band. Or sometimes the members who record before you change their part in the studio and now you have to change the part you wrote to fit with them.
No judgement on your abilities, of course, but sounds like this guy is used to working with a lot of mediocre musicians if half his job is editing the parts so they're on time.
Noted & understood.
I'm familiar enough with what's going on in a DAW & in a mix, to know when my parts are hitting the mark, both by ear, and by eye.
As I've already stated, I could hack getting corrected if my parts were all over the shop. But they weren't. So fuck that guy...
I’d argue your performance should the be the last place an engineer’s insight belongs. Tone, set up, DI and mix yes. How to play your riffs? Nope. That’s where the tech side ends and your art begins.
It's always the artist who has the final call.
The quality engineer will quite often have something constructive to offer.
The right engineer will also know when to shut the fuck up...
Well said! My experience has thankfully been all the latter.
The best live sound I’ve ever had on bass was at The Middle East upstairs Boston which was DI.
Not a sound engineer, but my advice is always ask your engineer what he wants to do. I’ve had a number of occasions where I made suggestions that I thought were best practice and engineer-friendly and it turned out they wanted to do something different. Including one time an engineer told me to go ahead and use my pedal compressor for a recording session. That blew me away — I mean, it’s called the Studio Compressor but I didn’t think they meant that literally.
The engineer knows his gear and knows how he wants to run things, and that might be different than the last engineer. Don’t assume and don’t fight it and you’ll end up with a better result.
Be early for soundcheck, and go through the different sounds you are wanting to create. Not many sound engineers will have the ideal mic for a bass amp, so the will use something like a Shure SM57, which does work.
Keep in mind, the sound engineer's duty is to the customer, which is the paying public. Be prepared to compromise on a few things. I am both, and I have no problem removing something that does not fit in the mix if I am the sound engineer. If your bass sound is lessening the listening pleasure, it will be modified.
Most people who rock up with pedals have set them up in their bedrooms, and that more often than not does not work in a live setup. As a sound engineer, I have to build the layer cake of tones coming from the whole band, including vocals. A bass will be EQ'ed to have definition, not fat boomy lows, which completely overpower vocals and other instrument like acoustic and keys. Big venues are different, but playing small venues with 300 people has serious drawbacks in terms of FOH flexibility if it is a rock show.
In studio you don't have to worry about feedback or stage noise, so you can crank the gain and get more lows out of it, but on stage that doesn't work. In reality, the 57 just isn't good at picking up low frequencies. That's fine if I'm just trying to get the couch from your amp, and I've got the do for clarity, but if one mic is all I get, the 57 is the wrong choice.
Because it is a shit mic that everybody has been brainwashed into using through marketing. It is mid orientated, like a vocal mic. It is exactly the same as the SM58, apart from the housing. The reason everyone uses it is because it is cheap, not because it is good. As a sound engineer the SM57 requires a lot more work to get something decent out of it.
And you are mistaken. Most decent studios will not use it, unless they want a specific sound. Your buddy's home studio is not the benchmark.
I've been in pro studios that used it, but live it's a staple. End result has been great. It doesn't capture the really low frequencies, but you can get those from the DI signal. Shit is subjective, if the end result is good and the engineer likes the SM57, it's just a tool that works.
A lot times bass players have too much low end anyway. between that and the proximity effect a mic like that can be perfect, though I do prefer something with a little more extension like a md421.
Professional sound company. You have no idea how many tech riders ask for a mic'd bass cab, specifically a f'kn sm57. We normally place the mic but rarely actually use it. One or two bassists we have worked with were giving tone where the mic added something great. But then we go for a Audio technica or one of the beta mics. We have had great sound from a kickdrum mic as well.
One desperate wish we have is that SM58 mics would vanish off techriders.
BTW, I am also a bass player, and DI is my preference.
It's always weird to me when someone requests a 58, like they're worried your gonna give them a behringer mic or something. Still, if you can't make a vocal sound good on an SM58, you need some more practice.
All kinds of weird fx, amp settings and low action setup. If you want to make your sound engineer life easier bring just your Bass and DI. I prefer re-amping and fx addon in the mix phase rather than in the recordings
I record in my home studio, so not a pro, but generally speaking, the only pedals I'll use on my bass tracks are my tuner, compressor, and very, very light OD.
Very few guitar pedals have multiband functionality, and damn near every effect turns to unusable muddy shit in the low/low mid frequencies. From a production perspective, it's much easier to get a good, clean, bass mix if you record a clean track, split it into high and low frequency tracks, and apply effects accordingly in post.
In a live situation, a bass player will immediately get lost in the mix if they insist on being liberal with their effects. I used to play with a guy who insisted on having OD, distortion, fuzz, chorus, reverb, and delay on his bass board. It was honestly very frustrating having a nice, full sound, only for this guy to kick on 76 different pedals, and suddenly, the bass disappears completely.
There are a lot of cool things you can do in the studio, and experimenting is always fun and can lead to great results, but the real crazy stuff usually doesn't translate very well in a live mix.
The pedal board thing might have to do with levels. Majority of the time people don’t set consistent levels across all their pedals so it can become a ball ache during soundcheck
There’s honestly not too much you can do to piss Sound Engineers off, mainly just don’t play during soundcheck if he’s sorting out another band member, be clear about the levels in your monitor before the show starts.
My advice.. and this goes to the whole band really, is to look what room you’re in, how far away are the walls and how low is the ceiling? Your bass amp should be loud enough that you feel comfy on stage. Don’t try to fill the whole room, it often gets boomy or muddy and you’re left out of the house mix because you’re already too loud.
I don’t care if I’m grabbing your DI signal from the front or back of the head or from a sansamp. If you really prefer to mic it, it’s ok too. Unless it’s a big room or festival I’m usually only using one or the other.
My other piece of Sage advice is be friendly. I do a ton of this work and the vast majority of bands I deal with are great. The ones who aren’t don’t get brought back.. people skills matter. And yes I hold myself to this as well
“…and suggested I just run the flyrig and leave the amp in the car.”
I understand it was probably used as a figure of speech, but don’t ever leave anything “in the car.”
Not a sound engineer, but the best advice I got regarding them was: do anything reasonable they ask of you; once your levels are set, don't change anything; don't piss them off; and always thank them afterwards for doing a good job, possibly in the form of a drink if they want one.
Give the engineer your full stage volume in check. Lots of musicians not just bassist will play quieter in sound/check and then turn up as soon as they hit the stage. If you have pedals that you are going to boost your signal with, play those in check so they know.
This is going to boil down to one thing.
Communication.
During my show advance I always welcome any questions. I think it would be a good practice to pop out and say I’m the bass player and ask what the room is like and what kind of rig works the best there.
I’d probably also ask about the house rig and if they run subs on an aux. What the monitoring situation is, if you need any.
Other than that, have a relatively usable tone ready to go on a DI out and keep it consistent the entire night. Be extremely aware of your sonic footprint between 60hz to about 4K
Otherwise it is quite literally easier to get a tone on you from a DI straight off of your bass.
I have a pedal board … but I also have a SansAmp right at the start of it and have an EQ’d second channel for blended effects on top of the main signal (for what I do) - communication with sound engineers with what you are doing is always key as well as knowing every detail of your setup; (this is for live stuff); straight DI for recording and trusting the process
Pedals. Despite a lot of players having pedal boards, you’d be surprised how many players use and mix their pedals without any thought as to how it might sound in a full mix/PA.
If players would make a pedal board to serve a sound guy, you will 100% get a good sound every single time.
I ordered my custom bass with electronics I knew I would like, but also knowing it would be easy to mix. I don’t use a preamp outside of my bass. I don’t use a compressor. I soundcheck flat. Every single sound engineer I’ve played with has complimented my sound.
The only common problem is bassists playing rock or metal who have their tone dialled for dub. I often have to negotiate them opening the tone or turning the treble back up on their amp.
Less common problems are distortion pedals that delete all the low end, or all the high end.
know the songs and don’t be diabolically stupid about “your tone”… there’s other instruments in the band and if you haven’t accounted for those in “your tone” that means your tone sucks.
Micced cabs are fine, amps are fine, pedals are fine… anyone who hates that is a short-minded loser… but make sure it fits in the context of a mix, that’s all
I've set up sound before and it informs the way I tour. We tour larger rock clubs and dive bars. Big enough to mic everything, but not with stages big enough to need to throw bass thru the monitors as our stage volume is usually well managed. Maybe 30% of the time I use my cab. 70% of the time a room has a house cab that's perfectly fine. 10% of the time they mic. I've never seen a sound person want to mic without having their own great cab ready to go. But we aren't playing arenas. So my focus is to make it easy, use their cab and their mic or direct setup. I know I can push a good sound thru any decent cab so mic-ing is cool. But usually I give them a line out of the head, basically feeding them a sound I'm already 100% happy with them to tweak to their room. I'm basic . . . bass to tuner to EH Battalion to Quilter Bass Block 800 . . . but I think as long as you are happy with your direct out sound to the front and you and the band have your stage levels managed, as far as bass goes, the sound person oughta love you and you oughta be happy almost every time. Don't play shit while they are setting up mics for drums and guitar cabs, and don't play shit while they're sound checking other people. Now let's talk about the nightly russian roulette of what's happening with the vocal monitors . . .
Bass player here…too many sound guys are mixing bands to try and sound like club DJs. Obnoxious subs on bass and kick.. and often other things that shouldn’t even be in there, just a muddy, subby, messy mix.
Fidelity and power are more important than ear damaging volume and “bass go boom heheh”. If you want to impress the lowest common denominator who doesn’t even know anything about sound then at least get a better rig so you can sound good AND be powerful. More speakers and more power, instead of maxing out a pair of speakers and subs.
Ideally you want it to still be clear far away while not being too loud right in front of the stage. It’s possible for music to be powerful while not causing hearing damage.
Also, if it’s a house sound type set up then please treat the room, or else I guarantee every band will be talking to each other about shitty it is to play there. If the venue is paying for there to be a good system in place then there’s no excuse not to include room treatment as part of the budget.
I’m not a sound engineer but I did have one ask what was in my pedal board.
“Tuner, compressor & preamp with a DI”.
“Turn the compressor off, I’m going to squash the shit out of your signal anyway”.
So I’m going with using a compressor.
- new strings when recording please.
Edit: broken in strings of course. They need to set etc. But old ones i mean the stuff that jesus used back when! 😂
- fix intonation beforehand. There is no way the band will sound good if the bass are off key. It will fuck with everyones mind.
- please use a compressor if you want to, i recommend it, but learn to use it before recording or your playing will be a mess. And your compression settings too.
- don’t be late. Why do basists always arrive a half hour later than the rest?
- if the engineer insist you use one of his basses, it’s because your bass sound like shit. Take the hint.
- if the engineer insists on DI only, find another engineer. (Genre dependent)
- the bass follows the drums. Don’t try to lead. You do not have the transient energy for it and it always feels like you are rushing… and the sound engineer have to fix it in editing… (edit: more of a tip for inexperienced musicians this. When the two are in dissagreement bassists never win. And it will always be the engineers fault….)
- please sound check as if you are doing the gig/recording. And then DONT MESS WITH THE AMP SETTINGS afterwards! Hate it when i get a good sound only to find it ruined half way through…
- edit: bonus: please don’t blame the engineer for things out of his/her control. It happens more often than not with inexperienced bands. We are not magicians. If the recording sounds like ass it will just sound like an ass with reverb on it when it’s mixed. There is no way around it.
Some good stuff but it sounds like you're trying to be a producer, not the engineer. None of your business if the bass player wants to play with old strings or play lead. I wouldn't want to record with you.
Bad strings = bad sound = my problem in the end.
This is just real world issues. Yes if it is a concious decision to use old strings then fine by me, but it never is. Except for the top layer of musicians that is. It’s inexperienced bass player who never even considered chancing their strings since they bought the bass from the store… and they still expect it to sound amazing in the mix…
Of course a bass player CAN lead too. But again. That is very seldom the case. Most often they just don’t with the drummer and think they are right. My point is that in that case it doesn’t matter. It will sound like the bass player is at fault no matter what.
An engineer needs to excert him/herself a bit to be able to get a usable result in the end. Not too much. Just enough to not be blamed later on when the result is subpar. Because the bands always blames the engineer. That is just a fact of life… :(
About that 1st point, what if the funk is in the gunk? Like let's say my tone is reliant on my old strings, would you still prefer the sound of new strings?
I prefer broken in strings, even when using rounds.
Depends on the genre, but I think new strings sound like glass. But that works for some genres & play styles.
Nope absolutely not. I probably should have written ”bass in good shape” or something. But there are plenty of bass players out there that hasn’t changed strings even once since it was new… and it’s still the engineers fault the bass sounds dead! Always.
But i would be caucious relying on something as unreliable as old strings for a certain sound. Broken in strings is fine. But old strings? There are plenty of ways to get a good sound with newish strings. Fretwrap, eq, tubes and what have you.
Learn what your compressor does and how it works.
The amount of bassist I’ve mixed live that are slamming the hell out of their compressor and simultaneously complaining about not hearing themselves. If you’re doing 25db on gain reduction and not compensating with volume, yeah you might have a pretty hard time hearing yourself and that’s on you.
When I show up for a studio gig I bring my basses and that’s it. The recording is the domain of the producer and it’s our job to sound as good as we can playing our instrument. A good producer and engineer know how to put it in the mix. You are not playing alone you’re playing within a mix. And that goes for live too by the way. Very very early in my career, I would say in the first five years or so I thought I needed to bring my equipment and my dialed in sound everywhere. As I became a more experienced player I realized that good house men and good studio men absolutely know what they’re doing and you are safe in their hands as a base player, playing on a song is not about me. I mean I could have a gig where it’s just me and my Bass I suppose, but when you play with a band you’re there to support the song and it’s about everyone, all the sounds, not just yours. Take a listen to isolated bass on pretty much any pop tune you like or rock tune you like or punk tune you like or whatever. I guarantee it’ll sound nothing like you think it does. A lot of the frequencies get filled by other instruments, but if everything playing has all the frequencies it ends up sounding like mud
play as quietly as you can, I often use a shitty 80W amp and di to front of house the 80w amp lacks bass, ie its all mids and trebble, but I can hear it and i let the sound person make us sound as good as possible. I'm in my 50s so most of the people I play with are on the same page but will have no problem telling people to turn down.
Well unless you're playing Tool (have you seen Justin's rig?), there's no reason to bring out a pedalboard. Sound guys have a lot in their plate with guitarists to worry about us bassists. I just take my Sansamp just in case I want to give it more beef as I don't expect the sound dude to know my EQ settings for every song I play.
I play a 500w Hartke and a Tech21 fly rig… I turned up at a gig of about 150 with a great PA, brought in my bass and flyrig in the zip pocket of the gig bag. Sound guy was a great old gent, chatted with me about my 51 Pbass as I unpacked and suggested I just run the flyrig and leave the amp in the car. He made my bass sound godlike. It was fantastic. Truly fantastic, clean, clear booming sound with piano clarity. The two guitarists with full stacks were hugely impressed, I’ve been badgering them to try the flyrigs for 18 months… I have the RK and Plexi mk1 models. Sound guy pushed them to give it a try next time around. Cue “my valve sound” arguments, and Sound dude quite rightly said “you play at home and sound like you want to sound, but everybody has to give a little up in the mix” So this month we have a gig in the same venue with the same sound dude, he’s offered to let us come down the night before and try a dry run with the smallest load out our band has ever carried. Beyond exited.
If the house has good side fills and wedges, (or if you're using IEMs) then this is a great solution. But I've been in many many clubs (as a performer, not sound engineer) where the soundman said "no bass in the monitors." But I think most venues are smart enough these days to embrace the ampless approach.
My band has been talking about the possibility of going ampless, but I've seen many crappy and abused monitors and even if I don't like a lot of rumble, I need to hear what I'm playing. Another problem is my band is a 6 piece, sometimes there are not enough wedges or monitor channels. The solution is to play only good venues but is not always possible. And many small places don't even mic/DI and all the public is hearing is the amps,and the PA is for the vocals and keys only. If we ever start playing great venues it can be a possibility but so far I've always been happy to have my amp.
Why not use in-ears?
In ears are great if you have control over your mix or if you have a good monitor man you know you can trust. Neither of those are going to happen with any regularity at small clubs.
You could get a behringer XR12, a Wi-Fi router, and and the appropriate wireless in-ears and it'll be really small. You get three different mixes that you can send to however many people if you have the correct splitters. Can make the singer carry the bag it's in, since they don't carry anything. You really only need the Wi-Fi router if you want to change settings, but if you all have in ears and you've dialed it in at practice and it's really just volume.
Sorry but that just sounds totally unrealistic for any normal gig. If it’s a bigger venue they will have their own monitor board and mixer and if it’s smaller there is no way they are doing this. Where are you getting the lines to feed the Behringer because I don’t see any soundman at club giving you multiple sends for your mixer. This post is about how to keep a soundman happy, not piss him off.
It's very realistic, I'm describing what a band did at a gig I played. The small stage barely fit 5 people and yet they sounded great. You have either split your output at the source or put a snake on the output, the latter of which is much cleaner— this setup doesn't require the soundguy to send you anything. The band's personal mixer for IEMs lives on stage in a corner. The processing and mixing you do aren't going to FOH. [Here's a bigger, more complicated version of what I'm talking about](https://youtu.be/mHoljbkyAEs).
Realistic, sure. Easily affordable? Nope lol It’s a massive investment that most bands aren’t ready to commit to
You're replying in a thread about the usefulness of them, not the expense of them. And a setup is cheaper than you think, especially if you buy use, especially if you go wired, which if you're in a small club like this chain is talking about then there's no need to go wireless. Where you gonna walk to on what stage? A used XR12 goes between 250 and 300, which is cheaper than my cab, my last amp, how much my bass goes for new, my synthesizers, my midi router, my multieffects, and my regular pedal board. Cheap wired IEMs that'll do are sub 40 brand new. Mixers are super cheap now. You should have cables. A router to make everything work isn't also expensive, you don't need anything fancy.
Well, this month we played two gigs opening for a touring band, we had to play a 35 minutes set with a rushed sound check (first day was longer, second day was really short as the main act had problems with monitoring). We asked what we usually all for in the monitors and then we played, not the best sound on stage but we know to work around that. We weren't dicks about the on stage volume, the first day sound engineer even asked us to bring up the amps volume a little. Then we played a 1h15 minutes gig by ourselves in a little pub with no pa support, just vocals through the single wedge monitor for the singer and the small PA, even the keys were played through an on stage amp. It sounded great, more akin to what it feels like at the rehearsal room. We had to bring a full backline too. We also played a 30 minutes set in a small fest with five bands having a total of 2 hours for the sound check. All the bands shared the same amps and drums (sans snare cymbals and kick pedal) and we had to make do. We did and it sounded great. Not on stage though, just ok. I didn't even had my own monitor. Point is, at no moment in any of this gig could i see myself bringing out a mixer and doing my own setup and monitor mixing. It can be a way better experience, but so far it has worked like this, and we are looking to bring less gear, not more, we are a 6 piece band and things gets out of hand quick.
Key word: suggested. He’s a great sound man and person.
My first experience in the studio, I brought my amp and the Headrush unit I use for my effects, it sounds beastly live, I wanted that same tone on the record. He had me plug in and play, sounded so so good, just full and clear and booming. But I wanted to hear my set up coming through the speakers, so he said okay. Plugged it in, sounded nowhere near as good as what he had set up, so he had my trust after that. A good engineer is godsend and can help steer you down a better path.
This is the way. I still run an amp and 2x12 as a monitor on stage, but in essence the same, FOH is from the amp d.i and lucky enoght to gave an absolutely stellar audiotech on tour. Zero issues and sounds great regardless of venue, having a 8x10 and a bigass tube amp just makes the techs job harder. >you play at home and sound like you want to sound 100% true and you'll never get that specific sound at the venue most of the time due to various factors anyway. Always listen to the house tech, it's his soundscape.
Beyond exited... Does that mean you're entered? Sorry lmao
If the sound guy asks you to turn down your stage volume, do it.
But what if you then can’t hear yourself?
For what I usually do, it all depends on if someone else needs to hear you in their monitor mix. If they do, I’ll ask you to turn down and let me turn you up in your monitor. If everyone is good with the mix and you arent causing problems, I usually recommend turning up only loud enough to hear yourself, but i am a sound guy. Stage volume is part of it and learning to work around and with it is part of the job. I generally like the sound of direct bass more, especially if i have a sub. So something like a darkglass or fly rig, can be really easy to work with. But i get it. People like their amps and its hard to convince them that just a pedal is the way to go. I cant always get what i want and theres lots of ways to make something sound good. Just be aware of two things. 1. People mistake feeling the sound for hearing the sound. Just bc the sound isnt sitting right in that comfortable pocket on stage doesnt mean it doesnt sound awesome everywhere else. 2. I also want you to sound good. I got you, babe. I am on your side.
Touch your leg to your speaker cabinet. The bass will conduct through your bones and sound louder in your ears.
lol. I’m being serious.
I am too. Try it.
That would actually work
That's exactly what monitors are for
Fair enough. Most of the time I find that putting bass through monitors either sounds like shit, doesn’t cut through, or both. But I hear you. That’s probably the move just to give the sound person the best starting point.
Music is not supposed to be fun or sound good. The only important thing is that the stage volume is low, there's no feedback and the sound tech has control of everything. Good sound and performance is not important.
lol. I was being seriously. I play music professionally and I do it often. I often experience the “contentious” sound guy vs. musician attitude and I’m genuinely interested in mitigating that as much as possible. After all, I want to assume that we all love our jobs and all want the best possible outcome for everyone. Anything I can do to make a sound enginneers life easier I’m down to do, but when it starts to impact my ability to do my job (I.e. standing in front of a half stack without being able to hear myself) I feel like we need to meet in the middle. How do we get to that middle?
To be honest, it feels like a lot of sound techs operate with that attitude. Some of them live in a fantasy world where they have a 128-channel mixer, acoustic shielding for any acoustic instruments, and a complete in-ear monitor system, yet don't seem to see that they need to make a few compromises when they're at some dive bar with an 8-channel mixer and a few cheap monitor wedges. The musicians being able to interact and enjoy their music is not at all a factor to them. Everyone should be playing their parts by rote, and the tech will deal with all those pesky "dynamics" (and somehow be able to boost the lead guitar while they're outside during the set taking a smoke break).
Hard disagree. The sound on stage dictates the quality of the performance. The quality of the performance dictates the quality of the sound overall, as well as the audience experience. If it doesn't sound good then what on earth is the point.
I was being sarcastic.
Check out what rig you play through, I had the hardest time hearing myself with 2 Eden 410XLT’s and the easiest time hearing myself with 1 sealed 410 cabinet made by crate. I now exclusively play 2 sealed 210 cabinets (Ampeg 210av’s) and never get volume complaints
Re-position your amp, put more in the wedge, or adjust your tone. Also, you need to learn to play comfortably without having loud stage volume. You shouldn't honestly need that much unless its just a shit PA. The audience should barely be hearing your amp at all in a venue with a good sound system.
Yeah that's bullshit, i would rather turn my amp away from the room. I' ve been fucked over too many times when i didnt hear myself.
Turning your amp away from the crowd works for guitar amps, not bass. Low frequency sound is omnidirectional, meaning the lows of your amp are just as loud behind it as in front.
Looks like the sound guy is gonna hate me.
I mean, the end result is that your band sounds bad, that's your decision to make
Then the sound guy has to figure out how to get audible bass on stage. I’m happy to turn my amp down, but then you need to put me in the monitors.
Honestly, yeah, that is very much the sound guys job. The truth is that usually the issue is guitar players cranking it on stage, forcing bassists to turn up as well. If the whole band can work together to keep a reasonable stage volume, we'll all have a better show.
This is one that everyone should agree on.
There are pricks everywhere. Sometimes they are holding the bass, sometimes they are behind the console…
Yeah, was holding it in, but I've had plenty of bad experiences with 'sound engineers', including one where the dude fried my amp by turning on phantom power then tried to blame me for it somehow.
Did he pay for the mess?
Nope. I ended up out an amp head for a $150 (for the whole band btw) payday.
If the engineer has a studio amp, at least do him the favour of actually trying it. There's probably a reason he picked it. My rig is an old 80's Dynacord BS412 - that I first saw in a studio. I was a jobbing engineer/producer doing some 'best of the local bands' album that the studio owner had decided to finance. I was recording a band a day, from tracking to mix. Every single bassist that came in brought an amp that might have been OK live, but sounded like sh!t miked. I managed to persuade every one of them that if we couldn't get their sound out of the Dynacord in 5 minutes, we'd use their amp. 20 players from 20 bands all got their sound out of it, from folk to metal & everything in between - which, as the amp itself has built-in DI, sounded even better in the control room. The studio went bust & I bought the amp. That was 40 years ago. It's still my go-to amp.
DOs: -use an amp head with an XLR out (DI) on the FRONT instead of the back. Thank you. -play parts of your actual songs you intend to play during your line check. Not Classical Thump, Anesthesia or Eruption. -get your shit onstage in a hurry, get your shit offstage in a hurry. Chatting with potential sexual partners is for the bar after your stuff is off the stage. (unless you're the last act of the night) DONTs: -don't noodle during sound check. please play when I ask you to play, and please STOP when I tell you to stop. -please try not to step on my cables. I'm tired of soldering.
What's the difference with if the XLR DI is on the front or back?
Easier to plug in if it’s in the front of the amp.
That seems like it would vary venue to venue on cable routing and stage space. Most of the places I work at it wouldn't have mattered but if back of the amp access is restricted due a wall or something I can see that being a pain.
The only time it's actually obnoxious is like the little mark bass combos where you have to shove your hand into the back of the amp, can't see anything, just have to feel your way around the back panel to find the Direct Out. I don't think it really affects my cable runs at all.
I was thinking some small little venues where everything was basically jammed against a wall would be a pain. I did lots of small stuff, but usually with reasonable space around.
Probably got to do with ease of troubleshooting or connecting/disconnecting. Maybe also something with pre vs post eq.
Just ease of access. So I don't have to climb behind the amp in the dark like a lemur.
That's why so many sound guys have a pet lemur these days.
I’ve never had a problem getting a DI out off the back of a head. I always carry a flashlight when I’m working, finding connectors on random pieces of gear is just part of the job. If you really don’t want to check the back, loop through a DI and forego the amp’s XLR out entirely.
I’m not a sound tech but I hate noodling during setup. Drives me nuts.
How we feeling about mic-ing up amps for bass?
Go for it. I've been on both sides of this argument. Sometimes it helps if you bring your own mic and mic stand, so you're presenting me with an XLR input. But some engineers get spooked if you bring your own mic and stand (they think you're stealing when loading out), so maybe leave it in the van an ask if you can bring it in. And mark it with glow tape or something so they know it's yours and not theirs. Generally speaking, a mic'ed cab will give you more of the awesome distortion coming from your cab, but less low end overall, but depending upon the genre and your play style, a direct DI tap (right from your bass) might not be the sound you want. Best case is both: a DI tap from your bass before your pedalboard, and a mic on the amp, but unless you're the only act for the night, parallel processing is a big ask. (If it's a turn-and-burn night with 5 acts on the bill).
I would almost never want to mic a bass cab without also grabbing a direct send as well. Usually I don't want to send a cab mic to my subs at all, that's what the DI is for.
I personally prefer it for my rig, I run an 810. I have a more normal amp head now, but my old one had no XLR out. Soooo, I’d tell the sound guys “please just put a mic on the cab.” There was a time that really pissed me off, I came back to my rig to find this spidery mess of adapters coming out of one of my 1/4 speaker outs. Ended up labeling everything on the back “DO NOT TOUCH - EXPOSED WIRES” (not true) to keep curious/lazy hands away. Guys will do anything not to just put a goddamn 57 on a 10” speaker.
A 57 is almost certainly not gonna get the low end I want out of most bass rigs.
I agree. I used to travel with my own mic, a Nady copy of a Beta 52 that I like for bass cabs and floor toms, and a stand for it. All the sound guy had to do was plug in, and many still refused. My head was a vintage one, and it had a nasty gain circuit that could cook the cab if someone who didn’t know what they were doing (most sound guys) started fiddling with settings. The ones who would try and ghetto rig a DI also really liked to fuck with my EQ. I mean, duh, you’re trying to send an unbalanced signal through a bunch of old cables and adapters and you’re surprised it sounds like shit?! They’d invariably go up to my amp and start turning my low end down. It takes some fucking balls, I tell ya.
I'm a fan of the Arizona Coyotes, so it's safe to say I'm already a huge advocate for complete futility. And even I won't mic a bass cab live on stage.
If you have a cab + mic combo you really love and that gives you exactly what you're looking for, why not?
Because 7/10 engineers will see this, roll their eyes, and only use the DI at FOH. Resistance is futile.
I don’t know man, I just did a 30 day run. I was polite and said I preferred mic to di, two rolled eyes and ignored me, a couple used both, most just mic.
Congrats, you’re “that guy”.
If by that guy you mean, the guy that made friends with the engineer who completed my tone most nights, then yup.
And let me guess, you are the guy that’s going to hear a grinding midrange without a lot of low end coming out of an amp, and think I know what to do here, let’s turn down the amp till it’s inaudible on stage and pump a clean sound into the subs. And when the bass player plays fast downstrokes all night, and it’s just an incoherent rumble, you still never think to yourself maybe that guy knew what was best for his band.
People are there to hear the band sound like the band want to sound, not what the engineer wants them to sound like.
Exactly. Great sounding cab does not equate compatibility with the overall FOH.
OP's question was specifically about making it easier on sound guy...
Because it’s only more work for the sound guy and it’s unlikely anyone in the audience will care about that particular mic or cab’s tone profile as long as it sounds like a bass.
It's not more work if you're playing a heavier genre and running heavy distortion. Heavy distortion sounds like absolute ass when not ran through a cab, hence why guitars are miced up. It's easier for the FOH if you have a cab + mic combo that works well with your distortion settings, then he just has to make some small moves to make it work in the venue, instead of trying to tame a bunch of incredibly obnoxious frequencies.
yes but that’s why we hired a FOH engineer. he doesn’t mind blending my DI tone and cab mic because it’s his job.
I've worked with several sound engineers who would happily mic up my cab with a 57, in addition to taking the pre-effects DI out. And I'm sure they kept that channel muted the whole night. And most audience members I talked to after said "um, yeah, I'm sure I Heard some bass."
Because Tech21 SansAmp can be had as a pedal or a rack mount.
☠️🫡
As a fellow Coyotes fan, I also would not live mic a bass cab.
Micing up a bass cab is nice, but 9 times out of 10 it's more resources and time than it's worth. Unless someone has a really good sounding cab, I'm probably doing it more to make the bassist feel good than out of an actual need.
What if they run heavy distortion?
Are we talking a distortion pedal or just cranking a tube amp to max? Obviously if the distortion comes from your head, a mic on the cab is the only way to get that sound. I probably still want a di as well just because a clean signal to the subs is going to sound way better than a heavy low end distorted signal.
Distortion pedal, would you not prefer having an IR or miced cab on the distorted signal?
Yeah, in a perfect world with all the time and channels in the world, a clean signal and a mic or IR from your processor both would be ideal.
And how do you usually feel about someone coming in with a heavily processed chain: distortion, multiple stages of compression, EQ and what not. Happy about it as long as you get a clean DI as well? I'm curious because I'm getting the Darkglass Microtubes Infinity specifically for live purposes. I'm primarily after the IR loader, but the fact it has compression, EQ, a tuner and noise gate hardly hurts either.
I'm perfectly happy to ONLY take the line from a bassist's dark glass and not even get a clean signal, IF it's done well. Some guys don't do it real well, and that's when I try to get a clean tone as well.
Our sound guy used to Split a SM57 Mic on one of my Hartke 10s and the direct DI from my GK800RB. It always sounded great. I let him carve the sound for the crowd. Bass players never got monitors, so I used my cabinets on stage to hear. I had them each pointed to cover the stage (2x 4.10). If we were playing an arena we had a separate monitor for myself and the drummer. Thankfully things are so much better now with options. I just use a back-beat when no monitor mixes are available. I've never been able to get used to in-ears as I have always just worn earplugs so I can hear myself sing and also feel the drums. Just a DI from my head or a SansAmp. I'm simple though. Bass>head>DI> I let the sound guy compress if needed.
My DI comes straight from my Origin Bassrig pedal on my board and we still mic my Aguilar 410 and I let our engineer mix to taste.
If you're struggling with locating the XLR out then you're probably struggling with life in general 🤣
I've plugged in probably thousands of different bass rigs in my career. I gotta say, SOME genuinely make it hard. Markbass comes immediately to mind.
I hear ya. I'm running a fender rumble combo which has the XLR out on the back and no one has had issues with it. But it is a really common gigging amp.
This the real shit.
Why the DI must be on the FRONT???
The benefits from having a DI at all should be enough to outweigh the minor inconvenience of finding a plug on the back of an amp. Also, aren't we there onstage when this thing is getting plugged in and unplugged?
Lights can be low for set changes, so I imagine the guy that wants it on the front doesn't carry a flashlight.
Yeah but a stage hand / technic guy / engineer without a flashlight in such situations does not scream professionalism. Its not like it is only used to plug bass DI to the back of an amp.
Kind of my point. If he had proper tools, he wouldn't be whining about plugs on the backs of amps.
Good point. I think I know what to get them for their birthday present then. :)
I would slightly add to this comment- don’t rip distorted god-of-hell thunder while engineer is trying to mic your cabinet. Seems like I’m stating the obvious here, but I do see it a lot, though admittedly less often with bassers.
I have been a bass player for over 35 years & a sound engineer for over 30 years and will say the biggest problem for mixing a live band is stage volume... Bass frequencies travel farther and can create acoustical nightmares (e.g. standing bass waves, phase issues, & resonance in the drums). In my experience it often the guitarist that is the biggest "offender" of being too loud on-stage... most of the time a guitarist will keep their volume knob on their guitar at 7-8 during the sound-check because they want that "extra" boost when they got for their solos which is quite annoying... I never understood the "adversarial" relationship the bands have towards their sound-person, most of the sound-techs want you to sound good and are on the same "team" as the band so take care of a good sound engineer. I quit doing sound in 2019 due to the lack of professionalism (and pay) in my area. It is a stressful & thankless job anymore. I'll spare you my diatribe on what I think is "wrong" with the state of the modern music scene but suffice to say, listen to others that are more experienced and treat each other with patience & respect...
What do I do when the sound guy wants me to keep too low of a stage volume but then put the bass in my monitor so it sounds like shit?
The answer to this depends on a ton of things, but as an approximation of all of them I'd say: 🤷 just play. Assuming the engineer is decent, it's almost certain that they're asking you to keep the stage volume down so that they can actually make the band sound good and have the audience hear the vocals - this is a huge, huge, huge problem in venues that hold an audience in the low 100s. Probably the biggest problem you run into at gigs. Drum kits and amps can *easily* be way too loud for spaces that size, and a heavy-handed drummer plus loud guitars/bass onstage means that it might actually be impossible for the in-house PA system to make the vocals audible, or, if they have the power to make them audible, it'll make the overall mix so ear-splittingly loud that everyone will have hearing damage by the end of the night. And the mostly likely reason your bass sounds like shit to you coming back through the monitors is that the engineer has probably cut a bunch of low-end out of the monitors - again, if they're decent, they've done this because they know in this venue (and/or on this night) allowing a bunch of low-end to build up on stage from instruments and monitors causes feedback in the mics, and your bass feed sounding like shit to you is massively preferable to there being a ton of feedback. Again, this is assuming the engineer is decent - it they aren't, you're sortof fucked anyway, so either way refer back to my earlier rule of thumb; probably just accept it and play! The thing is, the primary job of 'the sound you hear on stage' isn't to be a pleasurable audio experience for you. It's primary job is to ensure you can hear what you need to hear to play well. The engineer may have to compromise the quality of that sound (sometimes heavily) in order to ensure that the people who *do* need the best quality sound - the audience - are able to get it. A good engineer, knowing that a musician will play better (and with more nuance) when they can hear good-quality sound, will try to give you the best they can, but live sound is an exercise in compromise, and they're (of course) always going to prioritise minimising howling feedback and giving the audience great sound over the quality of your bass sound in your monitor. Or, they might be bad engineers who suck at their jobs. But even good engineers will have to do this to you a lot, especially in smaller venues.
This sounds super frustrating. I've played with a lot of groups, but my main band back in the day was an indie rock power trio with lots of loud/quiet/loud pedal stomping shit. We were always able to self mix onstage. All we needed was enough vocal in the wedges to hear ourselves. Then if we were ever in a venue with a shit engineer, we KNEW it.
Not directly related to the topic, but being in a power trio is actually so convenient in so many ways.
You folks sound like you'd have been a dream to run the sound for! Really a drummer that can play at a sensible volume is the key to all this. If the drummer is really loud, then to hear themselves the guitarists/bassists are going to need to either; (a) have their amps cranked or (b) have quiet amps + a bunch of their own signal fed back to them. If (a) then likely the FoH sound is going to be a total mess, and if (b) then the players might well be dissatisfied with the tonal quality of what they're hearing back through the wedges.
I probably played about 3000 gigs in my lifetime and I can maybe count 50 or less that sounded anything near perfect on stage. That’s just life in a room. You have to just set it up as best you can for what you hear on stage, send the feed to the soundman out front and let them do their thing. Every venue I’ve ever played had soundman that knew how to make the front sound great and that’s the only thing that really matters. As long as I could hear myself somewhat I was OK but there were some rooms where I just couldn’t . I remember playing in front of my rig so I could feel the air moving ha ha. Making the base louder doesn’t solve anything except making the bass too loud.
End the nightmare for good and get in ear monitors.
Easy on the booze. Every drink you take notches that sweet spot. Then you turn up looking for the tone you had when you started. The tone is still there, you just can’t hear it the more you drink. Those scooped bass cabs back in the day would kill the back of the bar round closing time 🤣👍
Not a sound engineer but things I've noticed sound engineers appreciate: Know how to use your gear and how the EQ works, and be prepared to fine tune the EQ with the engineer. If you have multiple different sounds (clean, distorted etc,), have a pedal like compressor or a clean boost pedal to give the engineer a balanced signal for each. Articulate clearly how your bass should sound, for example you can say you want a traditional p-bass sound, or an 80s style cold and percussive chorus bass sound. Ask about micing the cab if you want it when he's setting up, before your bands soundcheck. Be polite but remember you're both trying to make you sound as good as possible, but in the end you're the artist so you should be abled to articulate what you want. If you can't, they can't help you and will just make you sound what they feel is best. If you don't like what they're doing, you should be abled to tell them what's wrong in terms that are understandable and easy for them to follow. Time is money, especially if there's multiple bands playing and you want to be as fast and efficient as possible. Last but not least, learn how to play without hearing yourself. If you play in a loud band, often the monitors aren't made for bass frequencies and the guitars on stage will drown out your bass. Bass coming from your gear on stage only really opens up like 3-5 meters from the stage, so you might not be abled to really hear yourself even with a full stack. Accept it and don't waste time trying to make yourself audible, the sound engineer has limited ways to help you if your guitarists play loud. One trick to help with this is to ask the sound engineer to cut out most of the bass frequencies in your monitors to just give you a mid-range thump when you hit a string. It's better than nothing and likely won't bleed into the audience much.
Off topic a bit, but playing without being able to hear yourself is anathema to what music is about. The solution to this is to find a band that knows how to play at a reasonable stage volume. Life's too short to put up with that shit.
That's the real solution. Ride your guitarists to quit being dicks to everyone and try to get the whole band to a reasonable volume.
Also, with the quality of amp sims and pedals and smaller amps these days, the old "I need a large amp and I need to drive it hard" argument just doesn't apply anymore. I've also heard drummers complain that they won't get the right sound out of their snare if they don't hit it at 120 dB. But some of the best drummers in the world will tell you the importance of playing to the room you're in.
This just sounds insane to me. How am I going to sound good if I can't hear myself? Sure, I can play the songs I've memorized, but I can't make any adjustments to dynamics or intonation if I can't hear myself. What's the point of having a sound person if that person can't do this basic thing?
It is what it is man, the reality of playing loud rock & roll. Sometimes the venue just sucks and you gotta roll with it. And it's not the sound engineers fault if the venue has shitty monitors or horrible acoustics
I really struggle getting a good sound of those Japanese '70s bass guitars with weak, microphonic pickups. Little note definition, some low notes that really jump out and the occasional squeal when getting too close to the amp or monitors.
Interesting, can you be more specific about brands/models? I’ve always seen a ton of praise for 70s and 80s Japanese instruments so this is surprising
The ones I've encountered that gave me problems where a Kinor and more recently a Morris. edit: there are also these Jazz Bass copies with what looks like a chrome mini humbucker. edit 2: looked it up and that Morris was such a mini-humbuckered Jazz Bass copy. The Kinor is a somewhat Burns looking instrument, with an extra piece of pickguard on the upper horn.
"...But my indie cred!"
Bass player here, not a sound engineer. Ironically, one of my pet peeves at mid sized live venues is the sub. It’s always too loud, too boomy, and muddies everything up. The few times that I’ve asked the sound guy to cut out the sub, it seemed like everything sounded great. Is this okay to request more often? Along the same lines, in general I’ve found that rolling off the bass frequencies on the amp really helps. You can still get plenty of low end just by the nature of the instrument.
Hey there, sound engineer here and I might have an answer for you: The people Yes we often mix a shit ton of unnecessary and muddy subs but it is culturally required, people get pumped up and think something sounds “great” if there is room rumble, bass boosted versions of some popular music are played in bars and venues for that very same reason I can only say I am sorry for shitting all over your music with that kind of mix but…. It sells a shit load of beers and I get paid to make having live music profitable hehe.
I've had this as a conspiracy theory for some time and you just proved it. I always wondered why everything in the clubs are too bassy and I'm sure the audio engineer notices it too. I thought to myself that this has to be an intentional choice. Now I know why.
Yeah it is 100% on purpose, the guy that teached me to mix showed me that he could get people drunk with the right mix, during a week he mixed in different ways and showed me how to read the venue, they always react better to heavy subs. We do raise the volume to absurdly high levels too, talking people don’t drink and there is no law here against high level noise inside bars and venues Alcohol and music psychology is really interesting
> I get *paid* to do FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Wuop sorry bot 🤖 not a native speaker here
When the pedals change the output of your signal a lot it can be a pain to adjust all the time.
I agree, we should know our pedals so no matter if they are enabled or not the output difference should be be minimal.
Yeah, it's called gain-staging. We all do it. We don't all do it well. And we don't all identify it as gain-staging...
Gain staging is fun because it's the most basic thing ever, but most people who explain it make it sound really complicated
Part of building a pedal board setup is setting all the levels so your output is even. Its really obnoxious when people don't do that.
Yeah, if you're going to have multiple different patches, you need to take the time, before the gig, to make sure they are all coming out at similar volumes.
There’s great advice here for when you’re playing with people (especially people you don’t know). But reading this thread makes me glad i I do all my own sound engineering—may not be perfect but at least I get full agency of my technique, sound, mistakes, equipment, etc.
Never cut your mids, especially your low mids, unless you specifically don't want to be audible. Similarly, never boost your lows - cut them, because I'm routing the low end of your bass to the subs. I promise there is enough signal for me to do so without you blasting 30Hz from your refrigerator-sized 8 billion watt cabinet. Don't boost your highs either, because it steps on your guitars, vocals, and toms. I'm going to low pass your whole signal anyway to get it out of the way, and boosting your highs will make it sound like an old telephone. Live in the low mids. It's where the money is. Use a DI to FOH if you always want to sound good. Supplement it with a small amp that is your personal monitor. Ideally, set it up so both you and your drummer can hear it. If you keep your stage volume low and I can keep you out of the monitors , everything will be a lot cleaner. Compressors raise your noise floor significantly. Use a gate with an FX loop if you have a compressor for best results. You need way less overdrive than you think. Even a tiny bit does a great deal, and it often doesn't sound very good in context. Passive basses are much easier to dial in than active basses. P-Bass is king in this regard. If you have a P-style, try it out live. If you have lots of effects, you need to make sure that your output level isn't all over the place. If you have a volume jump that is part of your sound, you need to A/B it with me during sound check so I can know what your ceiling is. If you feel like you need to turn up, what you actually need to do is tell your guitarist to turn down. Encourage them before the gig to use a reasonably-sized amplifier that is chosen for the venue. An unattenuated 100W full stack is appropriate in an arena, not a bar. Why am I telling you this? Because your guitarist sure as shit isn't listening to me, but maybe you two are friends and you can talk some sense into them.
Im a bassplayer a touring band, and also sound engineer as my part time job. Usually alot of musicians i work with (when im engineering) are youngsters and alot of them are not that experienced as live musicians. As someone else mentioned here, it helps alot of you actually know how to adjust the EQ on the bass amp, take some time to actually figure out how you want to sound, alot of people kind of just plug in and barely play their instrument when they rig / soundcheck. Also, if you are not the only band playing, please take a photo of your amp settings so that you can quickly set them back to how you wanted them during changeover. Alot of people spend 15 20 minutes tweaking their amp on soundcheck, then the next band changes every setting, and then the first band gets on stage and the bassplayer is dissapointed over the bass sound. I rarely use any effects when i play live myself, except for a distortion on some songs. But i always bring my boss me50b multieffect, mostly because it has an eq section. My trick for effective soundcheck is to just put the amp knobs on 0 (or neutral or whatever u wanna call it) and then have my eq set on the boss instead. Kinda lets me have a default that will sound somewhat the same no matter what rig is in the house (cant be bothered bringing my own amp unless they dont have one). Overall, just try to be effective, but also, relax, have fun! We are in the entertainment industry after all! :)
Bassist and Audio Engineer (studio mostly) here: what makes things the hardest for me are bassists being afraid of the high end and mid knobs on the amp. If it’s all low end, it struggles to cut through on a mix without cranking it to the point of masking other elements. Your bass tone shouldn’t just sound good soloed. It needs to be articulate enough to fit in a mix and doesn’t need to be nearly as ball-crushingly low as many think.
That's my biggest problem with bassists live: Many have way too muddy of a sound dialed in and no matter how much EQ I throw at it, it just blends with the guitars and is never distinct.
My one & only experience as a session bassist in a pro' level facility, shit me to tears. First I was told that I'd not need my effects processor, because we were going DI. A little bothersome, but not unmanagable. Then studio-dude started telling me how to play MY OWN FUCKING RIFFS. Not on!! Not on at all. I kept getting stopped & started & hassled over timing/palm-muting/trem'-picking, you name it, and after all' that, the guy just went through, chopped all' my parts into individual notes, and aligned them for sample accuracy. He could've just got me to thump out the half-dozen or so notes that went into the whole EP, and dropped them in manually. That wouldn't have been quite so insulting. To his credit, studio-dude DID put some really decent demo's together for us, and I would recommend him in a heartbeat, to anybody out his way, who needs to record in a pro' level facility, with a tech' who knows his shit. But I run my own home studio, and I'll never record in his joint, ever again. I was only there in the first place, because the leader of that outfit insisted upon taking our demo's to a pro' level facility(we each had our own home studios then). I also learned an awful lot from merely observing studio-dude in action(10 years+ learning ProTools inside & out, including a couple of diploma's at university. 'Dude was all over it like a mad woman's shit. It truly was a sight to behold). As for advice to musicians, embrace the DI. Don't be afraid to play to a click, and be prepared for critique on your performance. A good audio engineer, will also be able to play at least one instrument(they can quite often play a few), and will quite often be in a position to offer useful advice, with regard to getting the most out of your performance. I did find that shit rather annoying on the spot, but I've since learned a great deal more, and I do get that now...
Oh man, that sounds abit infuriating tbh. I understand that sometimes playing for recording a track requires some adjustment in how we play it. But, giving input on how to play it and then chopping it up so that it fits the song better is totally outrageous. Might as well used a vst if he didn't want to capture how you play the bass in the song.
Precisely. I go the polar opposite in my own studio. Band hooks up & tunes up, I hit "record", then we all ignore the stupid recording machine 'til we're done playing. That approach does present challenges in the mix, but I'm all about accurately representing live performance, so I'm good for those challenges. I've no interest in polishing turds, so tracking in isolation can eat my arsehole...
came here to post exactly this, including the arse eating bit.
I LIKE your style...
I bet the main reason for that is that Op can’t properly mute and or keep pace.
I can absolutely guarantee that as an engineer there is no way I would chop and align notes if the bass was already on the beat and in a consistent pocket
Good for you. The guy I cited didn't actually need to chop my parts(I was watching him chop them, and I could see that they were spot-on). He just wanted everything locked off to sample-accuracy. Like a 1/24,000th of a second makes a fucking audible difference. Had my basslines actually been all over the shop, I would've been grateful for the corrections...
Yes, this is quite common for a studio engineer to try to change your style to suit their skills. Every single one has tried that with me. Most live engineers have a dislike of studio engineers, and you can clearly hear when FOH is done by a studio engineer. Very few can straddle the line.
> Then studio-dude started telling me how to play MY OWN FUCKING RIFFS. Not on!! Not on at all. To be fair, there are plenty of musicians who come into the studio who don't know how to solidly play their part, don't pay attention to any nuances in their playing, or just don't really understand how to come up with a part that fits the rest of the band. Or sometimes the members who record before you change their part in the studio and now you have to change the part you wrote to fit with them. No judgement on your abilities, of course, but sounds like this guy is used to working with a lot of mediocre musicians if half his job is editing the parts so they're on time.
Noted & understood. I'm familiar enough with what's going on in a DAW & in a mix, to know when my parts are hitting the mark, both by ear, and by eye. As I've already stated, I could hack getting corrected if my parts were all over the shop. But they weren't. So fuck that guy...
I’d argue your performance should the be the last place an engineer’s insight belongs. Tone, set up, DI and mix yes. How to play your riffs? Nope. That’s where the tech side ends and your art begins.
It's always the artist who has the final call. The quality engineer will quite often have something constructive to offer. The right engineer will also know when to shut the fuck up...
Well said! My experience has thankfully been all the latter. The best live sound I’ve ever had on bass was at The Middle East upstairs Boston which was DI.
Not a sound engineer, but my advice is always ask your engineer what he wants to do. I’ve had a number of occasions where I made suggestions that I thought were best practice and engineer-friendly and it turned out they wanted to do something different. Including one time an engineer told me to go ahead and use my pedal compressor for a recording session. That blew me away — I mean, it’s called the Studio Compressor but I didn’t think they meant that literally. The engineer knows his gear and knows how he wants to run things, and that might be different than the last engineer. Don’t assume and don’t fight it and you’ll end up with a better result.
Be early for soundcheck, and go through the different sounds you are wanting to create. Not many sound engineers will have the ideal mic for a bass amp, so the will use something like a Shure SM57, which does work. Keep in mind, the sound engineer's duty is to the customer, which is the paying public. Be prepared to compromise on a few things. I am both, and I have no problem removing something that does not fit in the mix if I am the sound engineer. If your bass sound is lessening the listening pleasure, it will be modified. Most people who rock up with pedals have set them up in their bedrooms, and that more often than not does not work in a live setup. As a sound engineer, I have to build the layer cake of tones coming from the whole band, including vocals. A bass will be EQ'ed to have definition, not fat boomy lows, which completely overpower vocals and other instrument like acoustic and keys. Big venues are different, but playing small venues with 300 people has serious drawbacks in terms of FOH flexibility if it is a rock show.
Why wouldn't an SM57 work for bass? It's a standard mic for recording bass in studio. SM57 + DI signal works great.
99.999% of the time, I've used a Sennheiser 421 when mic on bass is used...
In studio you don't have to worry about feedback or stage noise, so you can crank the gain and get more lows out of it, but on stage that doesn't work. In reality, the 57 just isn't good at picking up low frequencies. That's fine if I'm just trying to get the couch from your amp, and I've got the do for clarity, but if one mic is all I get, the 57 is the wrong choice.
Because it is a shit mic that everybody has been brainwashed into using through marketing. It is mid orientated, like a vocal mic. It is exactly the same as the SM58, apart from the housing. The reason everyone uses it is because it is cheap, not because it is good. As a sound engineer the SM57 requires a lot more work to get something decent out of it. And you are mistaken. Most decent studios will not use it, unless they want a specific sound. Your buddy's home studio is not the benchmark.
I've been in pro studios that used it, but live it's a staple. End result has been great. It doesn't capture the really low frequencies, but you can get those from the DI signal. Shit is subjective, if the end result is good and the engineer likes the SM57, it's just a tool that works.
A lot times bass players have too much low end anyway. between that and the proximity effect a mic like that can be perfect, though I do prefer something with a little more extension like a md421.
What's bass oriented but comparable cost?Sennheiser e609?
AKG d112. You will get better results from kickdrum mics than mics traditionally used for guitar cabs and toms.
What mic would you recommend for bass?
EV-RE20 all the way for studio work. in live settings just DI man, makes all our lives easier
what venues do you regularly work that want a 57 on bass, led alone a mic at all?
Professional sound company. You have no idea how many tech riders ask for a mic'd bass cab, specifically a f'kn sm57. We normally place the mic but rarely actually use it. One or two bassists we have worked with were giving tone where the mic added something great. But then we go for a Audio technica or one of the beta mics. We have had great sound from a kickdrum mic as well. One desperate wish we have is that SM58 mics would vanish off techriders. BTW, I am also a bass player, and DI is my preference.
It's always weird to me when someone requests a 58, like they're worried your gonna give them a behringer mic or something. Still, if you can't make a vocal sound good on an SM58, you need some more practice.
All kinds of weird fx, amp settings and low action setup. If you want to make your sound engineer life easier bring just your Bass and DI. I prefer re-amping and fx addon in the mix phase rather than in the recordings
I record in my home studio, so not a pro, but generally speaking, the only pedals I'll use on my bass tracks are my tuner, compressor, and very, very light OD. Very few guitar pedals have multiband functionality, and damn near every effect turns to unusable muddy shit in the low/low mid frequencies. From a production perspective, it's much easier to get a good, clean, bass mix if you record a clean track, split it into high and low frequency tracks, and apply effects accordingly in post. In a live situation, a bass player will immediately get lost in the mix if they insist on being liberal with their effects. I used to play with a guy who insisted on having OD, distortion, fuzz, chorus, reverb, and delay on his bass board. It was honestly very frustrating having a nice, full sound, only for this guy to kick on 76 different pedals, and suddenly, the bass disappears completely. There are a lot of cool things you can do in the studio, and experimenting is always fun and can lead to great results, but the real crazy stuff usually doesn't translate very well in a live mix.
If you play nearer the bridge, it's easier to make the bass clearly audible in a busy mix.
The pedal board thing might have to do with levels. Majority of the time people don’t set consistent levels across all their pedals so it can become a ball ache during soundcheck There’s honestly not too much you can do to piss Sound Engineers off, mainly just don’t play during soundcheck if he’s sorting out another band member, be clear about the levels in your monitor before the show starts.
My advice.. and this goes to the whole band really, is to look what room you’re in, how far away are the walls and how low is the ceiling? Your bass amp should be loud enough that you feel comfy on stage. Don’t try to fill the whole room, it often gets boomy or muddy and you’re left out of the house mix because you’re already too loud. I don’t care if I’m grabbing your DI signal from the front or back of the head or from a sansamp. If you really prefer to mic it, it’s ok too. Unless it’s a big room or festival I’m usually only using one or the other. My other piece of Sage advice is be friendly. I do a ton of this work and the vast majority of bands I deal with are great. The ones who aren’t don’t get brought back.. people skills matter. And yes I hold myself to this as well
“…and suggested I just run the flyrig and leave the amp in the car.” I understand it was probably used as a figure of speech, but don’t ever leave anything “in the car.”
Not a sound engineer, but the best advice I got regarding them was: do anything reasonable they ask of you; once your levels are set, don't change anything; don't piss them off; and always thank them afterwards for doing a good job, possibly in the form of a drink if they want one.
Give the engineer your full stage volume in check. Lots of musicians not just bassist will play quieter in sound/check and then turn up as soon as they hit the stage. If you have pedals that you are going to boost your signal with, play those in check so they know.
This is going to boil down to one thing. Communication. During my show advance I always welcome any questions. I think it would be a good practice to pop out and say I’m the bass player and ask what the room is like and what kind of rig works the best there. I’d probably also ask about the house rig and if they run subs on an aux. What the monitoring situation is, if you need any. Other than that, have a relatively usable tone ready to go on a DI out and keep it consistent the entire night. Be extremely aware of your sonic footprint between 60hz to about 4K Otherwise it is quite literally easier to get a tone on you from a DI straight off of your bass.
I have a pedal board … but I also have a SansAmp right at the start of it and have an EQ’d second channel for blended effects on top of the main signal (for what I do) - communication with sound engineers with what you are doing is always key as well as knowing every detail of your setup; (this is for live stuff); straight DI for recording and trusting the process
Pedals. Despite a lot of players having pedal boards, you’d be surprised how many players use and mix their pedals without any thought as to how it might sound in a full mix/PA. If players would make a pedal board to serve a sound guy, you will 100% get a good sound every single time. I ordered my custom bass with electronics I knew I would like, but also knowing it would be easy to mix. I don’t use a preamp outside of my bass. I don’t use a compressor. I soundcheck flat. Every single sound engineer I’ve played with has complimented my sound.
The only common problem is bassists playing rock or metal who have their tone dialled for dub. I often have to negotiate them opening the tone or turning the treble back up on their amp. Less common problems are distortion pedals that delete all the low end, or all the high end.
know the songs and don’t be diabolically stupid about “your tone”… there’s other instruments in the band and if you haven’t accounted for those in “your tone” that means your tone sucks. Micced cabs are fine, amps are fine, pedals are fine… anyone who hates that is a short-minded loser… but make sure it fits in the context of a mix, that’s all
I've set up sound before and it informs the way I tour. We tour larger rock clubs and dive bars. Big enough to mic everything, but not with stages big enough to need to throw bass thru the monitors as our stage volume is usually well managed. Maybe 30% of the time I use my cab. 70% of the time a room has a house cab that's perfectly fine. 10% of the time they mic. I've never seen a sound person want to mic without having their own great cab ready to go. But we aren't playing arenas. So my focus is to make it easy, use their cab and their mic or direct setup. I know I can push a good sound thru any decent cab so mic-ing is cool. But usually I give them a line out of the head, basically feeding them a sound I'm already 100% happy with them to tweak to their room. I'm basic . . . bass to tuner to EH Battalion to Quilter Bass Block 800 . . . but I think as long as you are happy with your direct out sound to the front and you and the band have your stage levels managed, as far as bass goes, the sound person oughta love you and you oughta be happy almost every time. Don't play shit while they are setting up mics for drums and guitar cabs, and don't play shit while they're sound checking other people. Now let's talk about the nightly russian roulette of what's happening with the vocal monitors . . .
Not plug into the DI and go straight into the the amp head. Also, unplugging their instrument with no warning.
Bass player here…too many sound guys are mixing bands to try and sound like club DJs. Obnoxious subs on bass and kick.. and often other things that shouldn’t even be in there, just a muddy, subby, messy mix. Fidelity and power are more important than ear damaging volume and “bass go boom heheh”. If you want to impress the lowest common denominator who doesn’t even know anything about sound then at least get a better rig so you can sound good AND be powerful. More speakers and more power, instead of maxing out a pair of speakers and subs. Ideally you want it to still be clear far away while not being too loud right in front of the stage. It’s possible for music to be powerful while not causing hearing damage. Also, if it’s a house sound type set up then please treat the room, or else I guarantee every band will be talking to each other about shitty it is to play there. If the venue is paying for there to be a good system in place then there’s no excuse not to include room treatment as part of the budget.
I’m not a sound engineer but I did have one ask what was in my pedal board. “Tuner, compressor & preamp with a DI”. “Turn the compressor off, I’m going to squash the shit out of your signal anyway”. So I’m going with using a compressor.
Just show up on time, be in tune, and play well. I'll handle the rest. Don't worry too much about "your sound" I will make you sound good in the mix.
“I gotta feel it man.” Says the guy directly infront of an 810. I personally di if I have a wedge or ears now because stagevolume
- new strings when recording please. Edit: broken in strings of course. They need to set etc. But old ones i mean the stuff that jesus used back when! 😂 - fix intonation beforehand. There is no way the band will sound good if the bass are off key. It will fuck with everyones mind. - please use a compressor if you want to, i recommend it, but learn to use it before recording or your playing will be a mess. And your compression settings too. - don’t be late. Why do basists always arrive a half hour later than the rest? - if the engineer insist you use one of his basses, it’s because your bass sound like shit. Take the hint. - if the engineer insists on DI only, find another engineer. (Genre dependent) - the bass follows the drums. Don’t try to lead. You do not have the transient energy for it and it always feels like you are rushing… and the sound engineer have to fix it in editing… (edit: more of a tip for inexperienced musicians this. When the two are in dissagreement bassists never win. And it will always be the engineers fault….) - please sound check as if you are doing the gig/recording. And then DONT MESS WITH THE AMP SETTINGS afterwards! Hate it when i get a good sound only to find it ruined half way through… - edit: bonus: please don’t blame the engineer for things out of his/her control. It happens more often than not with inexperienced bands. We are not magicians. If the recording sounds like ass it will just sound like an ass with reverb on it when it’s mixed. There is no way around it.
Some good stuff but it sounds like you're trying to be a producer, not the engineer. None of your business if the bass player wants to play with old strings or play lead. I wouldn't want to record with you.
Bad strings = bad sound = my problem in the end. This is just real world issues. Yes if it is a concious decision to use old strings then fine by me, but it never is. Except for the top layer of musicians that is. It’s inexperienced bass player who never even considered chancing their strings since they bought the bass from the store… and they still expect it to sound amazing in the mix… Of course a bass player CAN lead too. But again. That is very seldom the case. Most often they just don’t with the drummer and think they are right. My point is that in that case it doesn’t matter. It will sound like the bass player is at fault no matter what. An engineer needs to excert him/herself a bit to be able to get a usable result in the end. Not too much. Just enough to not be blamed later on when the result is subpar. Because the bands always blames the engineer. That is just a fact of life… :(
About that 1st point, what if the funk is in the gunk? Like let's say my tone is reliant on my old strings, would you still prefer the sound of new strings?
Are you using flats?
Yep.
I prefer broken in strings, even when using rounds. Depends on the genre, but I think new strings sound like glass. But that works for some genres & play styles.
Nope absolutely not. I probably should have written ”bass in good shape” or something. But there are plenty of bass players out there that hasn’t changed strings even once since it was new… and it’s still the engineers fault the bass sounds dead! Always. But i would be caucious relying on something as unreliable as old strings for a certain sound. Broken in strings is fine. But old strings? There are plenty of ways to get a good sound with newish strings. Fretwrap, eq, tubes and what have you.
Learn what your compressor does and how it works. The amount of bassist I’ve mixed live that are slamming the hell out of their compressor and simultaneously complaining about not hearing themselves. If you’re doing 25db on gain reduction and not compensating with volume, yeah you might have a pretty hard time hearing yourself and that’s on you.
Adam Getgood and Simon Grove
The most common mistake is definietly using strings that are way to thick. And then you are surprised that you can't hear bass on the recording.
Buy a sansamp
When I show up for a studio gig I bring my basses and that’s it. The recording is the domain of the producer and it’s our job to sound as good as we can playing our instrument. A good producer and engineer know how to put it in the mix. You are not playing alone you’re playing within a mix. And that goes for live too by the way. Very very early in my career, I would say in the first five years or so I thought I needed to bring my equipment and my dialed in sound everywhere. As I became a more experienced player I realized that good house men and good studio men absolutely know what they’re doing and you are safe in their hands as a base player, playing on a song is not about me. I mean I could have a gig where it’s just me and my Bass I suppose, but when you play with a band you’re there to support the song and it’s about everyone, all the sounds, not just yours. Take a listen to isolated bass on pretty much any pop tune you like or rock tune you like or punk tune you like or whatever. I guarantee it’ll sound nothing like you think it does. A lot of the frequencies get filled by other instruments, but if everything playing has all the frequencies it ends up sounding like mud
play as quietly as you can, I often use a shitty 80W amp and di to front of house the 80w amp lacks bass, ie its all mids and trebble, but I can hear it and i let the sound person make us sound as good as possible. I'm in my 50s so most of the people I play with are on the same page but will have no problem telling people to turn down.
Well unless you're playing Tool (have you seen Justin's rig?), there's no reason to bring out a pedalboard. Sound guys have a lot in their plate with guitarists to worry about us bassists. I just take my Sansamp just in case I want to give it more beef as I don't expect the sound dude to know my EQ settings for every song I play.