Removing all the bass from a guitar tone?

[shredder10]

Is fingered bass such a headache to mix? I mean, it's quite a task to make it sound sexy and yet defined at least for me tho'

 

[Fox Mulder]

Is fingered bass such a headache to mix? I mean, it's quite a task to make it sound sexy and yet defined at least for me tho'

Good players won't give you that headache.

 

[Josh Burgess]

I seriously don't know how people get used to that.

Because it sounds good?

 

[Sam Bottner]

Because it sounds good?

 

[muckypup1]

Because it sounds good?

+100000000000000000000000000

It sounds great

 

[arv_foh]

When I listened that, it sounded like its distorted to hell... maybe just my speakers.

it's not the guitars are definitely clipping

 

[HCL]

Sneap definitely has his sound but I prefer bass-heavy mixes. The best ones are incredible because the bass is so loud but you don't realise it unless you really listen out for it.

I'd love to try a Bob Rock and get a baritone tuned to E2 as a thickener.

I usually hipass around 125hz, sometimes higher.

 

[Ermz]

Sneap definitely has his sound but I prefer bass-heavy mixes. The best ones are incredible because the bass is so loud but you don't realise it unless you really listen out for it.

I'd love to try a Bob Rock and get a baritone tuned to E2 as a thickener.

I usually hipass around 125hz, sometimes higher.

Just do what Randy does and pitch shift one of your guitar tracks an octave down for certain parts.

 

[drew_drummer]

I think way too many mixes these days have the bass dominating the mix. It doesn't work in all parts of the music I don't think.

Personally I high-pass my guitars around 120hz, usually with a 12db slope.

 

[Melb_shredder]

+100000000000000000000000000

It sounds great

I USED to feel this way. And don't get me wrong, I love Sneaps work, some of my fave albums are Sneap. But after listen to say something like... heck, even doomsday, it's all up in your face with the drums etc, and then I chuck on something like come clarity, clayman etc, i just shit bricks. It just sounds so much fuller and epic. Just my opinion of course

 

[bryan.batiste]

i'm loving the godcity studios/kurt ballou distorted as fuck bass tone lately. I love how it meshes with guitar tone and gives you that live performance vibe.

see: converge "axe to fall" and black breath "heavy breathing"

 

[reg3n]

one thing i kind'a need the feel to say is, if you need to push your mid-lows or even your low's with eq, you need to go back and work on your bass guitar/guitar tones to fill that gap, i've found that this happens to me when the mid-to-low's range has a lot of dynamics, so maybe you can turn those up on the sources and lower a bit later with multiband comp or something, of course, everything in a very subtle way, overdoing any of the steps, leads to fucking, horrid, messy, frustrating... noise.

 

[Harley Barley]

its that classic saying "you cant even hear the bass" thats why bass players (at least used to be) like the least important player in the band.

i LOVE, sneaps mixes. but i do think he could get a more defined bass tone, not LOUDER where it takes over the mix but a tone that you can pick out easily not have to REALLY listen for the bass to hear it.

 

[zer0_c00l]

I usually try to finding the frequency of the note wich the guitar is tuned, boost it a bit in that freq then hi pass right before that frequency.
In some cases, like drop D, I find the frequency (146Hz I think) boost it up a bit in there and put the hipass only at half of that frequency (in this case somewhere around 75Hz).

 

[TheWinterSnow]

Umm, hi-pass at 60hz and them try a low-shelf from around the lowest 'lower mids' if it's still too boomy. It's always a good idea to have something going on 'down there', but never to the point of pissing of the kick drum or bass guitar

You really don't need to set the high pass filter that high. Sneap himself recommends around 60 khz... maybe up to around 80 khz at the highest. I think it's better to try to get the amount of bass you want through adjusting amp settings and mic placement and then just using the high pass filter to clean things up a little bit. I think you can get away with the HPF at 60 khz even with low tunings and 7/8 string guitars.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with mixing the bass a little lower. I prefer Andy's style where the guitars and drums dominate the mix and the bass is just a foundation. Of course, he fits bass into the mix last... so he's fitting the bass in as a foundation to the guitars and the mix in general, whereas it seems like you and Ermz are trying to fit the guitars to the bass...

I found myself doing this and kinda placed the pieces together and realized that Andy does the same thing. He is not using the HPF to get rid of bass. Setting the HP to 60Hz is the fundamental frequency of a low B and 90 is a low E. For gutiars you don't need anything lower than the fundamental as everything below that is just rumble noise that kills headroom. You guys are using the HPF to get rid of the mid-bass resonant frequency, which imo isn't the best way of going about it. Remember Andy's C4 settings? That is what you would use to tame down the resonant peaks around 100-150. It allows you to keep the natural amount of low end that the guitar have without fighting the bass, the HPF is just getting rid of rumble noise.

I tend to mix with guitars and drums first and then add the bass as a foundation, but I also mute the guitar to hear how the drums sound to the bass, and depending if the bass is too loud or quiet to get final eq and volumes, then bring the guitars back in and bring them to volume, so I kind of do a little of both methods.

For Low B tunings I High Pass at 61.8Hz (low B frequency) and place an eq in and drop the 100-200 area (NOT with a shelf) until the sound isn't so boxy/wooly. You could use a multiband compressor, but I find that the way I eq amps that they really don't need it or that its a bit too much work for the results that I have.

 

[Ermz]

No. Using a HPF to get rid of the mid-bass resonance in guitars would necessitate going up past 150hz in most cases. More likely 170 or beyond.

Going up to 130hz or so lets the bass guitar take dominance of the 100hz area. This creates an intelligibility to the bass that's otherwise unheard when the guitars are allowed to linger down there. The guitars will still need multiband compression in the midbass/low-mid frequencies in most cases along with the HPF.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

No. Using a HPF to get rid of the mid-bass resonance in guitars would necessitate going up past 150hz in most cases. More likely 170 or beyond.

Going up to 130hz or so lets the bass guitar take dominance of the 100hz area. This creates an intelligibility to the bass that's otherwise unheard when the guitars are allowed to linger down there. The guitars will still need multiband compression in the midbass/low-mid frequencies in most cases along with the HPF.

Two different approaches. The way I mentioned is the approach for tightening up the bass in the guitars but trying to keep as much as possible, then shaping the bass guitar to fill in the rest of the low end space. And I never said getting rid of mid bass, as a guitar is naturally full of mid-bass, it just needs to be more controlled.

There is no wrong or right way of doing it, like I said, its two different approaches, and down to personal taste of the person mixing.

 

[Ermz]

The problem with the post was this: 'You guys are using the HPF to get rid of the mid-bass resonant frequency, which imo isn't the best way of going about it.'.

It's misrepresenting what some of us use heavier high-passing for. Yes, there are multiple methods, but they need to be characterized correctly so as to not misinform those who are trying to learn here.

 

[TheWinterSnow]

The problem with the post was this: 'You guys are using the HPF to get rid of the mid-bass resonant frequency, which imo isn't the best way of going about it.'.

It's misrepresenting what some of us use heavier high-passing for. Yes, there are multiple methods, but they need to be characterized correctly so as to not misinform those who are trying to learn here.

I don't get how anything I said was misinformed. Let me reword it then. Simply put the resonant frequency in the bass region. Guitars have an area where they peak pretty high before they shelf off, and that peak become more drastic during palm mutes. The way I look at it is that everything typically below that resonant peak is unwanted and that peak itself (depending on the setup, from 100Hz-200Hz) needs to be drastically tamed. Doesn't matter how its tamed, but in most cases if the amp setup was dialed in correctly, its not much, not does it warrant completely eliminate it with a HP. We are talking about the naturally loudest part of an mic'd guitar, why on earth would you completely get rid of it.

So that is more of what I meant, not necessarily to get rid of mid bass, I meant, using a HPF to get rid of the resonant bass frequency. Again, I don't agree with getting rid of it, taming it with an eq or multiband comp on the other hand, is a must.

 

[Fecal Tone]

I reckon Blood Of The Nations by Accept has an awesome bass tone! Suits the band so well.

Sneap knows when to do the right thing I guess. That album called for a proper ball-swelling feel and he got it dead on.