Sustain - how much do you need?

[Roland Rock]

One of the attributes of a great bass is that it has great sustain. To me his means playing a note, leaving it, and the string will keep vibrating for ages, a long note with minimal 'decay'.

When practicing the other night, I was noting the longest I hold a note for, and it was three seconds. Even though I have an old P bass with a BBOT bridge, a gap in the neck pocket and nylon strings, there was no noticeable decay in that three seconds.

How many of you hold a note for so long that decay becomes an issue? Perhaps there are some other benefits that good sustain allows, like improved tone?

[Mr. Foxen]

The decay envelop is part of the tone of a bass so how you manipulat eit is important, and its much easier to cut with muting than to improve by technique.

I sustain notes for ages, minutes, because that is the sort of music I play. A lot of that comes down to acoustic feedback though, but the natural sustain is important to the colour.

[LukeFRC]

i think, but the way the attack sounds also affects how we perceive sustain.

[BigRedX]

It all depends on what sort of style of music you play, but IMO you can never have too much sustain. Excess can always be controlled by muting and damping, but you can't add sustain that isn't naturally there.

[51m0n]

UNless you have a nice compressor or overdrive or distortion to add level where it drops off of course

[BigRedX]

[quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1340373738' post='1703580']
UNless you have a nice compressor or overdrive or distortion to add level where it drops off of course
[/quote]

I still haven't heard a distortion that manages to properly preserve the attack though....

[Al Heeley]

basses dont need that much - its not nigel tuffnell's Les Paul. Too much sustain leads to lack of clarity. You end up struggling to mute it when you have too much, just gives you extra work.

[thisnameistaken]

Sustain is useful if you're in the habit of triggering effects, or playing long notes that you then modulate with tremolos or filters or whatever. I've had to change basses when recording in the past because I couldn't get some of the notes I needed out of the bass I was using.

I agree with BRX - it's way better to have sustain and add muting if you don't want so much of it, rather than not having enough sustain and trying to add more.

[LawrenceH]

You can mute a note but it's very tricky to get a natural sounding, gradual cutoff. I'd suggest a relatively rapid, smooth decay is suited to a lot of genres and personally I [i]can[/i] have too much sustain. Having said that, I've never chosen an instrument based on sustain! Though dead spots are a pain.

[Wil]

I actually think too much sustain leads to a certain lack of character in a bass sound. My home made P doesnt have a massive amount of it, and when the note tails off it undergoes a timberal change which I quite like. It's almost like the tail off from a double bass to my ears, and the attack and decay of each note is all part of the sound of that particular bass.

When I owned a Spector, it had sustain for days, and notes were far more uniform tonally. I'm not sure that was a good thing.

Edited June 22, 2012 by Wil

[Doctor J]

I've never needed more sustain than even the shittiest bass could provide.

[chris_b]

You need the sustain you need. Some people don't need any, but if you want sustain and your bass won't give it then you need to change basses.

In my experience a bass that sustains well will sound better on all the notes.

[JTUK]

My basse are good for sustain.. and the key is to have them on most fretted notes

[EssentialTension]

[quote name='Doctor J' timestamp='1340388066' post='1703982']
I've never needed more sustain than even the shittiest bass could provide.
[/quote]
Same here.

[Conan]

Isn't good sustain usually a result of good design and construction? In which case the bass will probably sound good anyway... My Status, for example, sustains practically for ever. Not that It is an especially useful characteristic, to be fair!

[KingBollock]

My new main Bass is neck-through and has oodles and oodles of sustain. This is brilliant for noodling around the higher notes, it sounds lovely, but for some of the lower stuff I'm finding I'm having to alter my technique to keep it under control, else it can start to sound muddled, even with flatwounds.
As has already been said, it's easier to take it away if you've got it than to add it if you ain't.

[Beer of the Bass]

The only time I've noticed not having enough sustain is on a dead spot. Unfortunately flatwounds seem to bring them out in basses where I don't notice them with roundwounds.

[visog]

It's a mixed blessing. My GB has acres of sustain which puts the onus on you to damp carefully otherwise the whole things reverberates like a kicked grand piano. (Basically it's my fault!)

[risingson]

[quote name='Doctor J' timestamp='1340388066' post='1703982']
I've never needed more sustain than even the shittiest bass could provide.
[/quote]

Likewise. And I struggle to think of a type of music where I'd require my bass to sustain for extraordinary periods of time, the idea of 'sustain' on basses marketed as such always seemed a false economy to me.

[KingBollock]

[quote name='risingson' timestamp='1340401746' post='1704206']
Likewise. And I struggle to think of a type of music where I'd require my bass to sustain for extraordinary periods of time, the idea of 'sustain' on basses marketed as such always seemed a false economy to me.
[/quote]
I think it's nice to allow high notes to ring for a while, but I find I use the sustain more when I'm droning one string and playing notes on another while using a pick. On Basses with less sustain I will use thumb and two fingers instead, but I prefer playing with a pick.

[Mr. Foxen]

Oh yeah, adding sustain:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx1RccwlF5g

Kinda more polite volumes than I sue to do stuff like this.

[brensabre79]

Thats a lot of equipment and technique to sound like a Yamaha DX7
The cough at 6.50 was a highlight for me though!

[police squad]

my steinberger XL2 sustains for days. Don't know if it's a good thing or not

[Lfalex v1.1]

Shouldn't it be all about the whole ADSR envelope of the instrument and how you control it to best fit in with the music you're playing?

[discreet]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1340404974' post='1704245']
Oh yeah, adding sustain:

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx1RccwlF5g[/media]

Kinda more polite volumes than I sue to do stuff like this.[/quote]

Is that an Ebow he's using?

[quote name='brensabre79' timestamp='1340438825' post='1704381']
Thats a lot of equipment and technique to sound like a Yamaha DX7 [/quote]

Sounds a bit like aeolian harp to me...

[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qESQa8UHCTw&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qESQa8UHCTw&feature=related[/url]

Edited June 23, 2012 by discreet