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Elements of good slap bass


unclespats
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[quote name='bubinga5' post='972239' date='Sep 29 2010, 11:46 PM']this is a great example of a musical slap groove from ole MM...wonderful playing...[/quote]

And another one... this is my personal favourite of MM's work - beautifully tight with the kick/snare:

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG5jYC7hh98&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG5jYC7hh98...feature=related[/url]

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[quote name='JTUK' post='972466' date='Sep 30 2010, 10:47 AM']LIke it. I would have it live and more expansive, wouldn't see the need for a compressor.
But the composition of the bass is a very good mix and it did kind of take over the song for me...but in a good way.[/quote]

Well given that that is the tone they wanted, fitting the genre perfectly, how would you get the sound of a compressed bass without a compressor????

It really does a different thing to just 'squishing the dynamics' on this track, it is changing the envelope of the sound, you cant do that like this with eq, or a filter, or anything else really...

Beyond that you are aware that virtually every track you hear since the 70s (barring classical stuff) has compression all over it aren't you?

Buss comps, individual comps, its all there all the time in contempory stuff, not to mention compression from tape, compression from overdriving tubes etc etc etc. Really the whole sound of these tracks is tailored with liberal use of compression. Every recorded piece of music in this genre has compression going on!

I dont understand the aversion to compression at all....

Edited by 51m0n
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[quote name='51m0n' post='972520' date='Sep 30 2010, 11:40 AM']I dont understand the aversion to compression at all....[/quote]

I think that, as you mentioned earlier, most of us have only experienced poor-quality ones and that may have coloured our judgement.

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[quote name='Conan' post='972527' date='Sep 30 2010, 11:51 AM']I think that, as you mentioned earlier, most of us have only experienced poor-quality ones and that may have coloured our judgement.[/quote]

You may have a point.

Also I think a lot of people find it hard to hear compression (it took me a long time).

So when they get their hands on a compressor they tend to overdo it to prove its working, then dont like the fact that it can change the feel.

Compressors without decent metering are a complete disaster IMO (stop me if you've heard this rant before!), since it is in fact really really hard to hear a compressor set up to be gently squeezing the levels, I can set my Compounder up to be giving a consistent 3dB of compression and not be able to hear it happening (out of a mix setting where this starts to really count). If I didnt have the metering and was trying to set it up on my own I wouldnt be able to tell what was going on at all.

The kind of compression on that track is different (longer attack, shorter release, higher ratio, higher threshold) than a gentle squeeze, which is why you can hear it at all, but for all that it wont mean there are no dynamics left to the player....

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Have to say I'm finding this thread useful reading, so cheers to everyone for the advice so far.

One of the things that I am a bit stuck on is getting a good slap sound to come from my amp. I think I read previously that from an EQ perspective, you're looking to boos the treble and bass, and really cut the mids. Is this correct? Anybody have any more specific advice to give? PuP blend would also be useful too.

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[quote name='M-Bass-M' post='973840' date='Oct 1 2010, 12:43 PM']Have to say I'm finding this thread useful reading, so cheers to everyone for the advice so far.

One of the things that I am a bit stuck on is getting a good slap sound to come from my amp. I think I read previously that from an EQ perspective, you're looking to boos the treble and bass, and really cut the mids. Is this correct? Anybody have any more specific advice to give? PuP blend would also be useful too.[/quote]

Well thats one sound.

If you blend pups on a jazz bass equally you get a mid cut due to the phase of the two signals.

A little bit of low end and a little bit of top may be necessary, but if you have a nice new set of strings on you shouldnt really need to eq a special 'slap' setting at all IMO.

If you do scoop the mids then you will diappear in the mix with a band....

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