[quote name='Moo' post='313500' date='Oct 24 2008, 05:06 AM']I divide my weekends between being a bassplayer, and "the semi-skilled monkey on the PA desk who can make a great bass and great bassist sound like mud! "
Bass mud can be avoided by not having your 50 year old "as many speakers as I could throw in one box" - (Quote from Jim Marshal) 'design' backline cab loud enough for the audience to hear, and letting some properly designed and operated P.A. speakers do the work of making the bass sound good.
To get a good tight bass sound in a venue, the bass needs to either come from the backline cab, [u]OR[/u] the P.A., but having equal levels coming out of both at the same time is a recipie for a muddy - phase cancellation disaster.
The bass end of a [u]GOOD[/u] P.A. system will be powered by a big amps with lots of headroom, and will be processed with: Limiters to avoid over excursion and distortion; RTA equalization to remove room nodes; delays to time align Subs with the mid/top cabs and or stage backline; High pass filers to remove subsonic 'Mud' and prevent the amps clipping; and low pass filters to stop the subs opperating above their linear passband and to stop phase cancelling with the mid/top cabs.
Does a bass rig have these things?
Unfortunately, many sound monkeys do not have the above tools either, or the knowlege to understand or use them.
Perhaps Warwick abduct all of the good sound engineers so they can sell more bases?[/quote]
Legend..
I'm a FOH tech too. Ive just finished my last show of the tour/year, i have a quick browse on here and see this..
BASS, SOUND, BASS, SOUND oh its all too much to take in!! I need to sit down...
Now everyone sell me ur 5-Strings Thumbs... Serious, all o dem!