Live Bass Tone

[HCL]

What's a simple rig for a good live bass sound for hardcore/metal? It's currently our weakest link. We're setting ourselves the task of getting everything we need tonally out of our amps without relying on the PA mix for anything but snare and kick after a particularly bad/poorly prepared experience in a small venue. I know nothing about bass in a live scenario really, I'm used to splitting DI tracks in DAWs. I could search for the info but I know there's a lot of wisdom on this forum. What are your preferences? What works for you?

 

[xFkx]

the new tc electronic bass rigs are quite good and very lightweight, check out the rh750. A sansamp or b7k is a must too.

 

[Fragle]

Sansamp BDDI straight into the PA. There might be other/better options, but imho you can't go wrong with that pedal.

 

[HCL]

Sansamp BDDI straight into the PA. There might be other/better options, but imho you can't go wrong with that pedal.

We're trying to get a high quality sound without depending on the engineer, or depending on them as little as possible though so DI options are just a nice extra really.

 

[SoundsLikeFog]

We're trying to get a high quality sound without depending on the engineer, or depending on them as little as possible though so DI options are just a nice extra really.

So it's too much trust to let the guy flip up a fader..?

But considering backline, it's pretty hard to go wrong with an SVT and a 8x10, boosted with sansamp or darkglass.. Your back nor wallet may not agree, though.

 

[Clockwork]

I'm a big advocate of an RBI into a Gallien Krueger as a pretty cheap but effective rig. I find the Hartke Bass Attack an even cheaper alternative to a sansamp/RBI if you are super poor. b7k being a more expensive alternative to a sansamp but well worth it if you can get it. One advantage of the RBI being that you can rack it though.

What is the bass guitar in question though because that could either be working for you or against you.

 

[HCL]

I'm a big advocate of an RBI into a Gallien Krueger as a pretty cheap but effective rig. I find the Hartke Bass Attack an even cheaper alternative to a sansamp/RBI if you are super poor. b7k being a more expensive alternative to a sansamp but well worth it if you can get it. One advantage of the RBI being that you can rack it though.

What is the bass guitar in question though because that could either be working for you or against you.

We're looking into an AMT BC-1 as we've got a good price on one, what about head/cab/combo recommendations?

 

[Christian WUFU]

An RBI and a decent 4x10 or bigger will work perfectly

 

[Deuteronomy]

Sansamp PSA 1

 

[egan.]

I'm a big advocate of an RBI into a Gallien Krueger as a pretty cheap but effective rig. I find the Hartke Bass Attack an even cheaper alternative to a sansamp/RBI if you are super poor. b7k being a more expensive alternative to a sansamp but well worth it if you can get it. One advantage of the RBI being that you can rack it though.

I think Galien is the best bang for your buck. I haven't used ampeg regularly in 10 years but certainly it's still a standard and provides most of the grind the rpi is meant to emulate. Personally I'm digging the darkglass through an aguilar but that is admittedly pricey.

 

[Trevoire520]

Sansamp into pretty much any decent amp should get you where you want. Also maybe it's time to get your own FOH guy if you've been having bad experience with house engineers?

 

[HCL]

Sansamp into pretty much any decent amp should get you where you want. Also maybe it's time to get your own FOH guy if you've been having bad experience with house engineers?

Easier said than done. What's spurred this is playing a small venue which only mic'd up the kick/snare through a very basic desk (three band EQ per channel and that's it) and had no monitoring whatsoever. We played with Continents and Pay No Respect. We didn't really take the time out to sort our sound out and with no real involvement from the engineer it was a complete mess. Continents played much better than we did and still sounded crap because we were all going into it with the usual mentality you'd have at a regular venue; an involved line check with feedback from the engineer and the ability to hear what you're doing.

So after this we were ready to blame the venue, then PNR played and sounded phenomenal, just with their basic setup. It opened my eyes really, you can get a fantastic live sound with an absolute minimum of processing.

 

[xFkx]

Easier said than done. What's spurred this is playing a small venue which only mic'd up the kick/snare through a very basic desk (three band EQ per channel and that's it) and had no monitoring whatsoever. We played with Continents and Pay No Respect. We didn't really take the time out to sort our sound out and with no real involvement from the engineer it was a complete mess. Continents played much better than we did and still sounded crap because we were all going into it with the usual mentality you'd have at a regular venue; an involved line check with feedback from the engineer and the ability to hear what you're doing.

So after this we were ready to blame the venue, then PNR played and sounded phenomenal, just with their basic setup. It opened my eyes really, you can get a fantastic live sound with an absolute minimum of processing.

Derp. You can't take a bad sounding band and throw "processing" at it, and see if it'll fly. There's a lesson in all of this.

 

[HCL]

Derp. You can't take a bad sounding band and throw "processing" at it, and see if it'll fly. There's a lesson in all of this.

Continents are far from a bad sounding band but their live sound was poor at this gig because like us they went in assuming the engineer would work on setting levels*. I think you misunderstand my point, none of the bands played poorly. It's more a case of wanting to get everything sounding as good as possible without relying on an engineer in case a situation like this happens again. As far as bass goes, we always go DI, hence the thread asking about bass rigs so we can get a great sound independently.

*I'm not even blaming the engineer here, sometimes gigs just go wrong, we just want to eliminate every variable that could

 

[mstone564]

Get a used 810e (or something similar, just don't skimp on it, actually get a nice one or you'll regret it) and either a:
- preamp/power amp setup
- hybrid tube/solid state head
- all tube head (if money permits)

Look into a nice distortion/od pedal, too. Check YouTube for reviews if you can't play it yourself.
Then a tuner and noise gate if you ever decide to crank your dist pedals and you'll be set.

 

[HeadCrusher]

So after this we were ready to blame the venue, then PNR played and sounded phenomenal, just with their basic setup. It opened my eyes really, you can get a fantastic live sound with an absolute minimum of processing.

Seen this happen more often than I'd like to. Imo the tightness of the band has a huge impact on their sound as well as stage presence (you will perceive a band with a great presence as "better").

 

[PD-Baraka]

Kemper with a wedge Works like a dream live, because bass dont suffer from full solid state imo.

 

[arvoitus]

As a starting/beginner FOH engineer, i've seen this happen a lot when i do sound.
One evening, same venue, same drumkit, same guitar amplifiers, same microphone's (placement) ... just different guitars and musicians.

Happened to me two weeks ago:
The opening act was a bit shitty so i constantly had to re-adjust the kick and snare, add/cut lows on bass guitar, put vocals louder/softer. Lots of work, and the mix was not satisfying.
Then the main act comes on stage and plugs in ... i re-adjusted the gain for the signals and put all my faders on unity: near perfect mix (and i even didn't have to change the EQ).

How that's possible i don't know, but it probably has something to do with better/tighter musicians that knows how to setup their stage and dial in their sounds.

 

[arvoitus]

And a lot of engineers like the Sansamp pedals. I have seen multiple festivals where the sound engineer has a Sansamp pedal plugged into the FOH sound desk so he can use the clean DI channel, and a dirty channel to blend in.

 

[wishtheend]

I've used the Tech 21 VT Deluxe live for a while as my micro rig (plus it gives me 6 presets). I run into a power amp/cab but had a show where the cab was not getting any signal (turned out faulty power at club caused the amp to go into safe mode), so I had the FOH just take the DI out and just told him to raise the monitors on stage so I could hear myself since I had no on stage amp. Worked pretty damn good for a single pedal