Any More Advice/Opinions Re: Bass for MIDI?

[man called aerodynamics]

All -reviewed some of the older posts re: bass for MIDI.
Seemed the bottom line was:
1. Not a whole lot of bass for MIDI (but some high quality sounds from some key companies)
2. Brandon thought that playing bass through the MIDI controller was the way to go (I agree).
Soooo.....after the discussion, any results/ideas/opinions/etc?
Just got into MIDI, and need some bass sounds.
Anthying around that's FREE or under $150?
I have M-Audio Session (came with controller) - some decent sounds, but can't seem to export them to ACID Music Studio (any suggestions?).

Thanks in advance for all the good/honest/true/witty/superb advice and info from this forum.


-jg
Gear:
Dell Inspiron E1705; WXP; 1.73 GHZ/ 1 GB RAM
Acid Music Studio 6.0
M-Audio Fast Track Pro
M-Audio Keystation 49

[bubba]

Hello:

To get started, I would check out soundfonts. Just another sample format, but they are smaller than most and easy to download. There are shitloads of very good free soundfonts available on the web, there are lots of shitty ones too. Just Google "soundfont" and start downloading. You will need a free soundfont player. Get it at link below. Some soundfonts now come compressed with a program called SFPack. It is free. Download at second link. Good Luck

http://www.rgcaudio.com/sfz.htm soundfont player

http://www.personalcopy.com/sfpack.htm sfpack link

Peace: bubba

[krissy longfella]

i find vanguard is one of the leading vsti at the moment. excellent presets some good bass tones, make youre own preset bank with the bass's then using programme change swith as you like. it has a multi speed trance gate, arp with again gating option, the spread control allowing various, three envolope shapers. be careful to press the arp set up when youre on another screen there will be some option to sync bpm, overide host bpm, ignore all midi cc. i have really had fun with this instrument and cant recomend it enough, i write electro and cyber houdse and this is relevent to me i dont know what type of music you write but worth looking at as well as albino 3.

[brandondrury]

Brandon thought that playing bass through the MIDI controller was the way to go (I agree).

For some things. For a lot of things, I'd want a real bass player these days. It just depends on the music, really.



What kind of bass sounds are you looking for? Synth bass? Real electric bass?

Brandon

[man called aerodynamics]

I have been using an M-Audio keystudio 49 to play rock bass with some vst plugins. So far so good, but there are some limitations to the sound.
For example, for eight notes (I think that's right), there's no sustain to the notes, and it sounds choppy.
As for synthesizes bass sounds, all sounds well given what I'm using.
I think playing bass on a keyboard has definitely helped my music theory knowledge, and at least I've been able to give some bottom end to my demos.
Given that, I just went and impulsively purchased a Fender Squier bass today that I am going to plug through Native Instruments Guitar Rig 2.0, and see what happens.
I think that the downside is that I'll get trapped in using my familiar guitar neck shapes/patterns to put down bass lines. Using keys helps me break out of the rut of using those familiar neck shapes, so I think I will still try and come up with bass lines on the keys.
OK, this long post basically means I'll continue to use MIDI and dive in to this new bass I've purchased.
Soooo....still, any suggestions on a good vst for rock bass?
thanks!

[brandondrury]

For example, for eight notes (I think that's right), there's no sustain to the notes, and it sounds choppy.

This is because you are playing them that way. A sustain pedal could help (I've always wanted one), but there is no great way to play rock bass on a synth. It's very limited! I end up spending a lot of time with the mouse getting the tracks right and even then I always feel like it's a shitty way of doing it.

There are samples out there that have a down stroke and an upstroke on different keys. So maybe your low E downstroke is in the normal spot, but the the low E upstroke is on E4 or whatever. However, I don't know which samples have this. I've seen it in videos. I don't own any that have this feature.

Given that, I just went and impulsively purchased a Fender Squier bass today that I am going to plug through Native Instruments Guitar Rig 2.0, and see what happens.

I think this is a great idea. You may not need Guitar Rig as much as you think.

Using keys helps me break out of the rut of using those familiar neck shapes, so I think I will still try and come up with bass lines on the keys.

I know the feeling. This sounds like a great idea!

Another option is to look into one of those MIDI guitar pickups. I don't know. Bass is such a "feel" thing. The real thing just might be the best way.

Brandon