Nokia Theatre NYC Mic'd My Bass Cab :) !

akaTRENT · #1 07-26-2010, 01:09 PM

If anyone on here has followed my threads and my journey as a bassist the past year and half you'd see that I hate D.I. for live shows.

So much to my surprise was when Jeff #3 informed me he was using only a mic on my cab. I asked him where the xlr for the DI was as well and he simply replied, The mic will be fine on this, these Aguilar Rigs sound Fantastic. (It was Shure Beta 52a btw)

Usually at the bigger venues they take a blend, so I was shocked when he only wanted to run the mic. Safe to say I was like a little kid at a candy store.

You guys have any thoughts as to why he preferred the mic over the di and no blend? Usually every sound guy is against this and for once they agreed with me so Im a bit confused haha.

danroche · #2 07-26-2010, 01:17 PM

It sounds like he trusts you as a person and a musician, which is a huge compliment.

Whenever my old band used to run sound for other bands, asking not to be DI'ed was bass player-language for "I don't trust you as a sound guy, and fully intend to wreak havoc with the stage blend the second this set starts, and yes, I plan to use each and every one of these pedals in front of me in independent combinations at randomly interspersed intervals, each of which will totally jack my stage volume in a different direction, so good luck trying to monitor the vocal or drum sound, you poor deluded soul, and one more thing - me and my friends are totally going to blow this place before YOUR band's set starts, even though your fans showed up early, so that there's my thanks."

Sorry, didn't mean to let that sudden wave of bitter cynicism pop in there.

D.A.R.K. · #3 07-26-2010, 01:17 PM

it's not that unusual, not that many house guys are against it.
i take it he wanted a scooped bass sound, and used the 52a.
also, he might have only had one channel for the bass, and went for the "wet" sound of your amp.
not to mention you do have killer gear..

akaTRENT · #4 07-26-2010, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by D.A.R.K.

it's not that unusual, not that many house guys are against it.
i take it he wanted a scooped bass sound, and used the 52a.

So thats why the side fills sounded so bassy, and not midrange heavy like my can does haha!

akaTRENT · #5 07-26-2010, 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by D.A.R.K.

it's not that unusual, not that many house guys are against it.
i take it he wanted a scooped bass sound, and used the 52a.
also, he might have only had one channel for the bass, and went for the "wet" sound of your amp.
not to mention you do have killer gear..

Thanks man I really love Aguilar's stuff. I wouldnt endorse them if I didnt so I recommend it to everyone!

It was funny though because mark king (we opened for level 42) used two ashdown 410's but they took the di signal from his three amps (one of which was a LMii) but no mics on him.

akaTRENT · #6 07-26-2010, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by danroche

It sounds like he trusts you as a person and a musician, which is a huge compliment.

Whenever my old band used to run sound for other bands, asking not to be DI'ed was bass player-language for "I don't trust you as a sound guy, and fully intend to wreak havoc with the stage blend the second this set starts, and yes, I plan to use each and every one of these pedals in front of me in independent combinations at randomly interspersed intervals, each of which will totally jack my stage volume in a different direction, so good luck trying to monitor the vocal or drum sound, you poor deluded soul, and one more thing - me and my friends are totally going to blow this place before YOUR band's set starts, even though your fans showed up early, so that there's my thanks."

Sorry, didn't mean to let that sudden wave of bitter cynicism pop in there.

Funny you should mention that!, My agro is set to be louder than my clean signal to bite a bit more, and they were totally down with it!

Joeykun · #7 07-26-2010, 01:32 PM

I play alot of theaters and large clubs too. Rarely will the sound guys use just a mic.
It's usually Blend or just DI. Funny, I am against just a mic. I prefer the blend.
Some of these places wont take the time and just use the DI.
I try not to argue with soundmen. As long as they capture my tone, I am happy.

akaTRENT · #8 07-26-2010, 01:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joeykun

As long as they capture my tone, I am happy.

They usually dont though in my case haha! I end up sounding like fieldy or smooth jazz most of the time.

taurus1 · #9 07-26-2010, 01:36 PM

broad topic this one. when I do sound. nine times out of ten a bassist will point to the back of his amp and say "there's the Di output". I prefer usind my own Di's because they usually sound a lot better. I have mixed feelings about micing, if a guy/girl has an overdriven amp tone then I'd want a mic on the cab and would probably want a Di too. you can run into phase problems doing this but that's another topic. if a bass player has a clean straight tone I'd prefer a Di. both would be the ultimate though. i find micing bass cabs in general is difficult.

Joeykun · #10 07-26-2010, 01:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by akaTRENT

They usually dont though in my case haha! I end up sounding like fieldy or smooth jazz most of the time.

Yeah, I hear ya....Lately, I set my DI to post EQ so they get some of the tone I'm after.
I like when soundmen actually come up on stage, listen to your rig then make adjustments on the board to get your tone.
This has happened a few times and it is a pleasure hangin' with these guys to talk about music, etc.

I hate that quick sound check...its good enough attitude.

akaTRENT · #11 07-26-2010, 01:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by taurus1

broad topic this one. when I do sound. nine times out of ten a bassist will point to the back of his amp and say "there's the Di output". I prefer usind my own Di's because they usually sound a lot better. I have mixed feelings about micing, if a guy/girl has an overdriven amp tone then I'd want a mic on the cab and would probably want a Di too. you can run into phase problems doing this but that's another topic. if a bass player has a clean straight tone I'd prefer a Di. both would be the ultimate though. i find micing bass cabs in general is difficult.

I use a distorted crunchy tone so the di never does me justice even post eq. The best part is when sound guys have no idea what Aguilar is. The usually give me a really low end di box, and I have to explain to them that their is a VERY capable Jenson DI in my 751... My old svt cl had the worst di though, noisy as &^%

JimmyM · #12 07-26-2010, 01:54 PM

every now and then you run into a soundman who just plain gets it. it's a good feeling not to have to argue with soundmen when you're a "special needs" bassist. 52's not my first choice but it's better than a di imho. however, i've made my peace with the di as long as i get to pick it. and starting tomorrow it'll be a vt deluxe, which is way tolerable because i get to pick what freqs he gets and it sounds like what i want when i mic my amp.

johnk_10 · #13 07-26-2010, 02:52 PM

IMO, it's cool that he used a mic, but unfortunate that he chose a 52a to mic it. IME, those mics work well on kick drums but not very well on anything else.

4-string · #14 07-26-2010, 03:17 PM

Cool gig! So what do you think of MK and Level 42?

Timi · #15 07-26-2010, 05:13 PM

Most bands I mix have charactered and/or overdriven bass tones and I have to assume that the tone coming out of someones amp is the tone they want, so to use a DI just seems stupid. Hey let's DI the guitar too!

Not a fan of kick mics on bass personally, too boomy in the low end and mid scooped, it gets lost with the kick drum. Usually an SM57 does it for me, never had a problem with "not enough" low end (I can't stand going to a show and hearing an awful boomy bass), but if the bass player insists on a kick mic I will do it.

Will happily DI if someone asks me to or if they have a really clean hifi rig, but that just never seems to happen for the bands I mix. I never do the blend thing, don't want to deal with potential phase issues and never needed more than what the mic could give me.

Always surprised when I'm the one playing that other sound engineers are so anti miking bass.....

JimmyM · #16 07-26-2010, 06:43 PM

they're just anti digging out another mic and stand. or they're so hung up on their own preconceptions that they really don't know how to deal with a mic. ridiculous, i say. it's just another amplification source like a di and no harder to use. but they just want you to have the sound THEY want you to have, and not the sound YOU want.

danroche · #17 07-26-2010, 07:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimmyM

they're just anti digging out another mic and stand. or they're so hung up on their own preconceptions that they really don't know how to deal with a mic. ridiculous, i say. it's just another amplification source like a di and no harder to use. but they just want you to have the sound THEY want you to have, and not the sound YOU want.

While this might be the case with some sound guys, when I personally was this kind of sound guy it wasn't any preconceptions or hidden agendas of how the bass should sound. It was a reaction to the 15-20% of guys I'd work with (gals were more trusting) who would treat sound-check as tuning-up time and then proceed to mess with their levels (never turning down) throughout the entire set.

While every bass player has the right to pursue their own sound, a few bass players won't understand that the acoustics of a particular venue, which the sound guy probably understands better than they do, will make something that sounds "punchy and warm" in their bedrooms or practice space sound like soggy graham crackers to an audience. What's more, some players forget that something that sounds "just right" right in front of the cabinets might very well be ear-splittingly loud back by the bar, obscuring what the singer is doing, and generally not helping people enjoy the music.

Again, crappy and/or lazy sound guys may exist, and may thwart good sound, but in my general experience are the exception. What's more, if my sound guy is spending time on my bass tone as the expense of the drum mix or the vocals, then frankly he's doing the whole band a disservice.

Don't want to sound like a buzzkill here, but a lot of bass players aren't the enlightened Talkbass kind, and they kind of train sound guy behaviors.

JimmyM · #18 07-26-2010, 07:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by danroche

While this might be the case with some sound guys, when I personally was this kind of sound guy it wasn't any preconceptions or hidden agendas of how the bass should sound. It was a reaction to the 15-20% of guys I'd work with (gals were more trusting) who would treat sound-check as tuning-up time and then proceed to mess with their levels (never turning down) throughout the entire set.

yeah but you have a slider and eq knobs. all you have to do it turn it down. not like you're doing anything else there

besides, guitar levels also go up and down, and keyboard patches are a big culprit. why hold the bass to a different standard?

WJGreer · #19 07-26-2010, 07:27 PM

Slightly buried in the context of this thread is the fact that you just opened for Level 42.

Come on, spill. I realize that band's glory days are far behind, but still...what a wonderful honor. How did it go?

danroche · #20 07-26-2010, 07:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimmyM

yeah but you have a slider and eq knobs. all you have to do it turn it down. not like you're doing anything else there

besides, guitar levels also go up and down, and keyboard patches are a big culprit. why hold the bass to a different standard?

Well that's the thing. If I'm mic'ing a bass cab, it's very easy for the bass player to forget the purpose of that thin, ice cream cone-shaped thing directed at his cabinet, and decide that the PAs need his "assistance" to get the sound he's looking for. Also, and this is just human nature, if the bass player doesn't hear enough of himself in the monitors, he can just turn up his cab. This is fine, except he's now messing with the house sound, which in turn feeds back to his monitors, etc.... so to compensate I turn the bass down to avoid feedback, which makes the bass player turn himself up again in a few minutes, and so on, and so forth, and then finally there's no bass in the PA.

Keyboard patches can be a pain too, which is why you wanna ask the pianists to scan through all their sounds during sound check, hopefully to see what's waiting for you the third song in. Keyboardists tend not to haul big amps to gigs, and in general I've found don't try to mess with the volume as much as we or guitarists do.

Guitar players, not excusing them - they can be as loud and as obstinate. We never used to mic them, let alone tried to feed them into a DI. If little Angus is going to turn the Marshall up to 10, that's just what he's going to do. But the thing is, it's not like they're being handed a favor or anything. A Marshall stack cranked in a concrete box of a club with a low ceiling will sound TERRIBLE. This "different standard" is more resigned acceptance to the fact that someone with top-of-the-line boutique tube gear is often not someone who will take your feedback, sometimes to their own detriment.

EDIT - Let me reiterate here that I'm talking about a greener, less enlightened kind of band here. Bands that are comprised of seasoned musicians, like say, those playing with FREAKING LEVEL 42, will not fall into these stereotypical behaviors most likely.