Getting bass to sit in the mix!

[IMF OnSite Recording]

Check this out:
Into The Lair #43 – Working With Multiple Instrument Tracks | Pensado's Place

Dave ends up using not 1, 2 . .but 3 limiters on the low end bass track.

I've used a limiter on the source track and again at the bass bus because I would sometimes automate sustain rather than have it crushed, but it doesn't seem Dave cares.. he threw on 3 and it worked. For him, this is a time saver because I would much rather automate or at least use something like a bass rider to write automation... but that may give it a different sound. The saturatio non the low end is slamming with these limiters on it, but in this genre, it works great! I used to be scared of limiting my bass too much but this made me realize that I shouldnt be scared about doing anything... if it works it works.

How do you guys approach getting the low end on bass to sit in the mix consistently?

[kakeux]

I've been caught quite a few time having overpowering low end or not consistent lows on the bass (sort of resonating). So far, but it tooks me quite long to understand it, multiband limiter is a really nice tool to control lows.

I'm a former bassist, and I love bass sounds that sound like bass, not like a detuned guitar. So I'm always searching for low rhumble, but it's definitely not always a good choice.

[fHumble fHingaz]

It depends on the song, but a lot of the time I take a multiband approach, but I don't use a mutiband comp. What I mean is: I duplicate the bass track 3 times, then use high & low pass eq to split them up into high-mid, low-mid & sub low ranges. Once I get that, I just process each range to taste, often using compression & saturation on each range - then mix them back together to taste... It's the cooking equivalent of separating the yolks from the whites, then blending them back again, I guess. The sub "band" almost always gets "industrial" levels of compression... I usually then send the whole mess to a buss, which I compress & eq some more.

If there is more than one bass track supplied (ie. DI + amp track) I tend to still use a similar approach - picking whichever track has the most character in a particular frequency range & going with that...

...it's trial & error really - I just make it up as I go along, but usually you can get something good to come out - The reason I like this approach is that it gives you a lot of control in all the different areas that the bass consumes.

[the evil]

i like run a parallel compression and limiting and really smash and limit it and then combine them to a bus.

[brandondrury]

My big thing is to start out doing very little on bass. I usually compress on the way in with maybe 6dB of reduction. When the mix is starting to feel pretty decent, I simply grab the UAD 1176 and slam the input up. I like a reduction in the 15dB ballpark. I've been doing this for about a month and have no found an instance where it didn't work yet. When solo'd it gets a little nasty, but even with the slightest bit of drums in there you'll never notice.

I've tried this trick on most instruments on a track (synths, bass, guitars, vocals, etc) and it can really add an extra KAPOW to hardcore dance, metal, and hard rock productions.

Brandon

[Firedance]

My big thing is to start out doing very little on bass. I usually compress on the way in with maybe 6dB of reduction. When the mix is starting to feel pretty decent, I simply grab the UAD 1176 and slam the input up. I like a reduction in the 15dB ballpark. I've been doing this for about a month and have no found an instance where it didn't work yet. When solo'd it gets a little nasty, but even with the slightest bit of drums in there you'll never notice.

I've tried this trick on most instruments on a track (synths, bass, guitars, vocals, etc) and it can really add an extra KAPOW to hardcore dance, metal, and hard rock productions.

Brandon

Cool! Sounds like a tip to me. I don't have a UAD 1176 but I guess the principle will work anyway - even with plugs.

[wireman957]

My big thing is to start out doing very little on bass. I usually compress on the way in with maybe 6dB of reduction. When the mix is starting to feel pretty decent, I simply grab the UAD 1176 and slam the input up. I like a reduction in the 15dB ballpark. I've been doing this for about a month and have no found an instance where it didn't work yet. When solo'd it gets a little nasty, but even with the slightest bit of drums in there you'll never notice.

I've tried this trick on most instruments on a track (synths, bass, guitars, vocals, etc) and it can really add an extra KAPOW to hardcore dance, metal, and hard rock productions.

Brandon

That's exactly what I do. I have an old Symetrix CL-150 comp with the Valley People VCA that's very transparent which I use for tracking. I'm not fortunate enough to have the UAD stuff, but I use the IK Multimedia Black 76 and it works nicely.

[aj113]

I'm pretty much the same as Brandon. Compress on the way in, then smash the shite out of it. Works every time for me, although I often add chorus, which is a bit of a dated technique these days, but I like it, and it helps to define the bass a bit more.

[Ruprect]

I like to lightly compress on the way in, then crush the shit out of it. I've found that for metal and hard rock duplicating the bass track, filtering the low and high end out, then distorting it and blending it with the original track is crucial. When I try and just use one clean bass track, it always sticks out like a sore thumb.

[IMF OnSite Recording]

I like to lightly compress on the way in, then crush the shit out of it. I've found that for metal and hard rock duplicating the bass track, filtering the low and high end out, then distorting it and blending it with the original track is crucial. When I try and just use one clean bass track, it always sticks out like a sore thumb.

Thats true; dealing with the low frequencies on a separate track is the best way to go.. and I love using distortion to bring out low end because just a little bit has a way of keeping the lower frequencies consistant without sounding like it's booming over the mix.. that's with the help of some limiting as well. Sometimes heavy limiting will get the distorted sound I want, but usually it's not the breakup I want... and I never went about using 3 or more.. I would slam one real hard for the most part... but having a few doing less seems to work better now.

[Jeremy Morrissy]

Lol we all love to seem to crush our bass in the mix, shows how much we love bass players