Getting the Guitars and Bass to blend

[Cacoph0ny]

This is one of my main problems mixing. I can never seem to get the guitars and bass to blend together nicely, they sound way too separated in a mix.

Do you guys have any advice on what I should do to make them sound more 'together' almost like it's one instrument. What frequencies should I be targeting for each instrument?

 

[FloridaRolf]

clips plox

 

[drew_drummer]

This is one of my main problems mixing. I can never seem to get the guitars and bass to blend together nicely, they sound way too separated in a mix.

Do you guys have any advice on what I should do to make them sound more 'together' almost like it's one instrument. What frequencies should I be targeting for each instrument?

Try sending them all to a buss, with compression and a slight touch of reverb. Mix to taste.

 

[Trevoire520]

Tight playing is your best friend here.

 

[AudioPhile777]

 

[Deadstar]

hahaa, i'd send the hand to a bus in that case.

 

[Ionei]

Tight playing is your best friend here.

This

 

[Harry Hughes]

Pretty sure there are threads on this topic already

 

[AHChris]

Pretty sure there are threads on this topic already

Really? I´m very interested in that topic as well... Do you remember how the thread was titled? I can´t find it -.-

 

[Fragle]

to quote sneap, tight playing and good mixing.
personally, i'd add good choice of tones to this equation, too. try to have the guitars strong in the midrange, with a tight lowend and controlled (read: not fizzy) high end. have the kick seated nicely anywhere below 100hz. fit in the bass between the kick and guitar midrange - 100-200hz should be a good starting point for the main low end energy.
a boost around 800-1,2k can help with the bass cut through the guitars, but that doesn't seem to be your problem.
oh, and try to distort the midrange of the bass and blend that under the original bass track, to make it gel with the guitars. kataklysm-in the arms of devastation is a pretty obvious example of that one.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

Its all about how you setup the bass. Generally a bass tone with no distortion sticks out like a sore thumb in a mix as soon as it is loud enough to hear. Having too much distortion will blend it in too much, kill the low end and make the top end brittle. Its finding the right amount of distortion that is needed to get it to blend but still separated enough to have its own space. The first thing is to have distortion followed by an OD of some sort, into the amp, compressed some more if the amp has onboard compression, and also if available from the amp a limiter, then compress it some more after the mic/preamp to solidify the sound, and thow an eq (to taste), high pass (around 50-60Hz) and low pass (to taste). The big trick is mild amounts of cascading compressors to even out the extreme high and low volumes a bass naturally has, adding an OD to the front end gives the bass the harmonic content of the guitars and gives the bass more aggression while still having a relatively clean sound, which helps the compression even more.