Bass Pocketing

[Zombietakeover]

I always read about you saying that you "Pocketed the Bass".....IS that just another way of saying tightly edited? what are some of your Techniques for pocketing bass?

thanks dude and congrats on the forum

 

[Dustin Morrison]

I would assume he most definitely edits the bass parts and graph tunes with auto-tune or melodyne. It really tightens everything up. But he might chim in otherwise.

And congrats on the forum Joey.

 

[JeffTD]

"Pocketing" is when you edit tracks to be "in the pocket" - aka tight with the drums, either on the beat or just behind the beat.

 

[christopher ridley]

Ya, basically you would edit the bass picks right behind the kick hits with some slip editing to tighten the groove. Usually sounds goofy if you have the bass picks in front of the kick drum.

 

[joeymusicguy]

yep, jeff nailed it. you might look up "zero crossing" as well. its part of a technique where you cut an audio wave form right where it crosses the 0 point in DC. this is the only spot you can cut audio and not have a "click or pop" audible when the edit is played back. using this can allow you to extend or shorten notes.

of course now days, we have time stretching which can be used for almost any edit if you're using a good algorithm. but some sticky situations still require the old school "cut / loop a full wave cycle, rejoin" method.

 

[Trevoire520]

What kind of parts would you normally have on the beat and which ones behind the beat?

 

[Vinny]

I personally like it when the bass is edited to be a tad bit "late" in comparison to guitars. Sounds really cool.

 

[Harley Barley]

I personally like it when the bass is edited to be a tad bit "late" in comparison to guitars. Sounds really cool.

same, i usually just edit guitar and drums super tight then have the bass a little crazy wild. makes everything sit real nice i think super tight but not machine like

 

[Vinny]

It really helps the nasty grittiness of the bass cut through.

 

[GearMan2point0]

I agree, it lets the chug of the guitar cut through more crispy like, and then the bass hits in milliseconds later to fill the "hold" of the power stroke! love it!

 

[Vinny]

Haha yep.
OT, but does anyone know the threshold of human hearing as far as samples per second? Like for example, the threshold of sight is 24 frames a second, but what about hearing?

 

[jimwilbourne]

in regards to the delayed bass,
do any of you have any advice on deciding how close to the kick the bass should hit?
also are you guys doing late bass throughout whole songs? or just on parts that hard-hitting like hardcore/metalcore breakdowns?
thoughts about both?

 

[Vinny]

Mainly breakdowns/Chuggy riffs.
Keep it spot on for the rest of the song, especially in fast riffs where the bass is mirroring the guitars. Like for example, you want the bass to be spot on during tremolo picking parts. But in slower riffs you can edit to be "late" too.
Don't overdo it though, 'else it will lose its effect. Just play around with it. Some breakdowns won't sound good with it, others will.
And just late enough to where it sounds good. Nothing more than a few ms at most.

 

[GearMan2point0]

when you are doing a breakdown that is 200 bps, and the double kick is blasting 16 beats per measure, in my experience it would be more better to the ear if you would just have the bass pop in a little later than the kick, because I found that with the start of the chug, it starts resonating and makes it sort of muddy on me. Could be different for different people. But when I am editing a breakdown at, say, 145 bps doing 16 bpm, I notice that it sounds better when I align the bass with the kick on some occasion, sometimes a little after and a couple times a little before if I want that push to enter in more quickly during the slower rest palm muted breakdowns. It's all about taste, just mess around and you will find the sweet spot. Use those flappy things on the sides of your face! =P you'll get it

 

[Vinny]

+1
...but 200 beats per second...? Haha

 

[ahjteam]

Haha yep.
OT, but does anyone know the threshold of human hearing as far as samples per second? Like for example, the threshold of sight is 24 frames a second, but what about hearing?

I had a session with a super annoying producer who started moving piano tracks around like 1ms (around ~20-50 samples) because she thought they were too early or too late... Delayed the session by a month because she (yes; she) didn't notice these things until we already had mixed everything, and she blamed me for this. I didn't even track the sessions. She also had said yes to almost all songs on version 2 or 3, but because she had the benefit of the second thought, the final versions of all mixes ended at around version 11. Hated those sessions. Since I didn't get any more salary for the revisions, I just refused to touch the sessions any more as I had done everything that was agreed on our contract. I understood she still hasn't finished the album and I heard she had tracked some extra organ tracks yesterday(!).

 

[GearMan2point0]

bpm lol, my bad

 

[Vinny]

Haha Anssi, that sucks man! I'd probably shoot myself.
So, are you saying it's around 1ms?

 

[ahjteam]

So, are you saying it's around 1ms?

Well, if you have a duplicated track and get phase errors, you can even hear as small 3 samples difference, but when talking about just musical timing my personal threshold is WAY higher than most musicians, as I don't come from a "sitting in a dark corner and grinding scales up and down all my youth and thus I can spot 0.3 cent off tune and 1.3 nanosecond off timing" type musician background, the smallest change (edit: in musical context) I can detect is something around 64-128th note, which depending on the tempo is like 5-30ms. (16th note at 200bpm is 75ms, 32th note is 37ms, 64th note is 18ms and 128th note is 10ms) But the thing is... Does it bother me if something is off time ~128th note, or do I think it's groove? Totally case dependent. Any excess swing above 64th or 32th notes is usually always distracting and/or annoying tho.