EBS_freak

You better play alongside the sound guy as he/she can put a pitch shift or delay on your channel and make you sound like a right wally. A band's biggest ally is the sound guy, unless there's a monitor engineer... and then it's them. Your job? To play for the audience and play your instrument to the highest ability that you can in the situation that you are in. Their job? To work with the player to deliver the best sound to the venue for the audience to hear. Who's the person that sits in the middle and is the key link between you and your audiences ears? Yeah, your best friend.

Which is why touring bands of note use their own sound man - and the bass players rig comprises of both of what is on stage and off it. With modern tech, you can get any bass sound you want and take away a lot of the problems that come with traditional amps - it's just that there's a few dinosaurs out there that are still stuck in the mindset of yesteryear. That's OK - but that in itself is compromising one of two things, the player, or the audience, or both. They'll always be the people that want tubes. That want mics. That want wedges to put their feet on. But it's all a compromise. Again, player, or audience. Choose one, or compromise.

Agreed. But the PA that is available now - and certainly the processing, is not akin to those available in the 50s, 60s, 70s. The comment you make about being inspired to play the best - and I see that a lot. But really, are you playing for yourself, or for your audience. Who has the best sound? The audience, or the player? You can't have both. Chose one. Best sound is subjective, of course - but likewise, the recorded shows from the analogue era, will still have been processed in a studio, subject to analogue outboard and through a mastering stage for delivery to vinyl and cassette. I would wager the release is night and day from the source material. In fact, I don't wager, I know that it will be.

I suppose one mans sterile, is another mans clean mix. I guess somebody who mixes the same venue night in, night out, has a good idea of what works in the window that has been allocated for sound check. In other cases, the sound man may give the bass just 10 seconds of attention. So many variables, but if you start making the output from the stage bigger, the worse any problematic elements within the venue are going to get.

We're not very good at being friends with Europe, it would seem.

You've spelled cawfee wrong.

Well, theres always going to be those that hate on Fender.

Be careful now, in the states, that's also rule number one in some pickup joints. ....so I've heard.

What? Again? Oh last time it was your spectacles wasn't it? That's how you ended up with the monocle in the first place. Next time, you'll have to put a chain on it, to match your pocket watch.

Totally agreed with all of this... in a recording sense - but does it really matter to get it 100% right live? With live mixing, there is always compromises. With a sound engineering hat on here, if that was the reasoning behind micing a cab live, it would be straight into the DI for you.

I hope you're not on the tube, cos that would be just weird.

Spiffing hat, sir. What, what, what.

You see? All good stuff. To be honest, there's nothing wrong with Talkbass. It's just the one or two people that reside in it. Maybe a bit like here? But thats the community. I haven't visited Talkbass in years personally, I could never get on with the interface. I probably would have been banned by now anyway, for post posting inappropriate pictures.

That sound that you have spent hours crafting in your bedroom....? You know, that room that is in no way acoustically representative of the environment in which that sound is going to be heard when you play out live?

I personally think you should open up a new part of the forum. "Talkbass refugees"

Pretty much. Just don't mention the toilet rolls.

So much harmonic content lost. All the sobs.

Not at all, we love Yankees. Apart from that bit in Independence Day where they take the Brit cliche too far. After all, we have that "special relationship" with the USA. (note, Brit sarcasm). No passive aggressiveness. It's the Brit Banter (I hate that word). There's probably a few things lost in translation - we don't all say "spiffing", "what ho", "good chap", wear three piece suits... and sport a monocle. Do me a favour though, promise me that you'll never look up Frankie Boyle. Stick around, you'll pick it up! And once you've imported some British chocolate, you'll realise how far off the mark the US is with their chocolate.

Every desk should have one. Usually labelled guitarist (running a 4x12 that's usually already overpowering the singers vocal only PA - but you know, not enough guitar still)

Just a comment of bass cabs, for onstage use, I still reckon the sweet spot for actually hearing yourself on stage with a cab, is a rolloff starting maybe as high as 100hz. I know that will be a contentious comment to some! All that sub on stage makes life more difficult for both yourself and the sound guy. If you are micing up all this low-end too, chances are theres more work to be done by the sound guy to clear it up from all the other mics. Hence, DI - clean, and all the information from the bass is in there. If you can, let the full range be taken care of by the PA, use your bass amp (if you must), for monitoring and try and keep all those sub frequencies (at least on stage), low.

a SM57 isn't actually that bad a mic to use live. Yes, there's a pronounced roll off, but a lot of the time its really mushy down there isn sub bass and infra sub world. A lot of what you are hearing when listening to the bass are 1st and 2nd harmonics and psychoacoustics... and not the fundamental. But if you are worried about the audience not feeling the thud of your bass, a sub harmonic synthesiser to put that low-end hit in at the desk may actually give you a better sounding bass through the subs. I wasn't there so can't comment on the company... but there is (admittedly maybe a fringe case!) a chance they were well on top of their game... and they also have the option of boosting the bass on the EQ. Admittedly, if they weren't running a separate monitor desk for processing your IEM, the SM57 may have sounded a bit naff in your ears, especially ones like yours where it can cope with the fatter low end frequencies.

Im surprised theres even space on stage for a bass amp. Clearly the solution is no amp, and just a tiny DI box to the PA. The ironic thing is, it would probably sound better than most amp setups.

And in some cases the sound guy will put up a mic just to keep a bass player happy and not even plug it into the console, or if they do, send it foh. The less open mics on stage, the more gain before feedback. And losing headroom for a bass where a DI will do the job, isn't worth it, or the additional subby frequencies that bleed brings. It doesn't matter what a soloed channel sounds like. It's what it sounds like in the mix that counts. I hate the sound of an isolated P bass. In the mix however, it's glorious.

DI mixes to a desk are cleaner - speakers tend to not capture all the top end - including all that lovely harmonic content that comes from the unmiced tweeter (assuming there is one - people! make sure you use tweeters!). It's better to have all the source content to process (and take away if necessary) at the desk. If the cab is a key part of the sound (e.g. capturing the drive from the amp), then its best to DI and mic and blend at the desk.That way, you get the best of both worlds. (You can get DIs that tap off the power amp but they aren't that common place on stage) In smaller venues, the majority of the time, the bass is DIed because it's one less mic stand on stage and one less mic to get nicked... and a lot less hassle. Plug in. Done. And above all, if you put DI first, if the bass amp goes down, the bass can still be heard and nobody looks around at the person on the desk and starts giving them evils. Why not DI amps you say? Because the colouration that the amps give is a significant part of a guitar sound. A DI guitar without processing sounds awful. And don't send your DI post EQ. You ears are on stage, not in the audience. Let somebody else take care of that for you otherwise you could sound like a complete shower out there.

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