Lost in the mix

[hwyk]

Hi,

New here, this is my first post. Some quick background before I go into the question.

I've been playing bass regularly for about a year with this band. Our sound is on the heavier side of indie rock, with bass, guitar, piano, drums. I played guitar for 5+ years before that. Here's my setup:

'76 Gibson Ripper > Bass Big Muff > Arion SAD-1 delay > Akai Headrush 2 > Fender Tuner Pedal > Sovtek MIG100 Bassov > Sovtek 2x15 cabinet

I set the pickup selector on the Ripper to 2 (about equal amounts of neck and bridge pickups), on the BBM the tone is set at 1 to 2 o'clock and the sustain is at noon, the switch is set at bass boost. On the Sovtek Bassov, the presence is at 4.5, the bass is on 10, the mid is at 6.5, the high is at 6, volume at 10, master usually between 2 and 5, depending on where I'm playing. I never have any problems being heard when we play live. My clean sound is kinda punchy, but has a lot of lows. When I step on the BBM, the sound is really full, espescially with powerchords.

My band just recorded for the first time this weekend and the experience was great, everything sounded pretty good in the studio, the mix sounded pretty good coming from the monitors. After getting the songs on cd, it was hard to hear my bass, even when the rest of the instruments are realtively quiet. There is a lot of low end, if I turn up the volume on the stock stereo in my car, the bass starts shaking my mirrors and rattling the doors, but there is no definition to the notes. The only other time my stereo in my car sounds like that is if I listen to SUPER bass heavy music, like SUNN O))) or Boris' Ablsolutego album.

I tried explaining to the recording engineer the sound I wanted, and asked him to make me more audible during the initial mix, but I guess I didn't press my case enough.

We plan on going back to the studio to fix a couple other things on the recording. What do I need to tell the recording engineer to help explain to him what needs to happen to make me more audible and give my notes more definition?

It's cool that you can FEEL my bass when you're listening to the songs on a really nice, big stereo, but I'd like to be heard on crappy computer speakers and headphones as well.

Thanks in advance!

-Hunter

[Baryonyx]

Turn your amp up.

[scottbass]

Originally Posted by hwyk

It's cool that you can FEEL my bass when you're listening to the songs on a really nice, big stereo, but I'd like to be heard on crappy computer speakers and headphones as well.

It's not rocket science - your bass track needs to be re-EQ'd. It will probably help if the engineer listens to the final mix on some smaller, cheaper speakers before he tries to fix it. Hopefully it was tracked straight up (no EQ, compression or effects) so he has plenty to work with. Less low end, more mids and maybe a touch more high end to make the attacks more crisp. Move it away (EQ-wise) from the kick drum. Depending on how complex your mix is, it might be hard for him to find an unoccupied range in the frequency spectrum to make your bass stand out more. He might have to tweak some other instrument's EQ to make room for you. Good recording engineers know how to do this. Don't hope for too much, though. If you're really honest with yourself, you will admit that most recordings you have heard have bass lines that don't really pop out unless listened to on good-to-great stereos.

Or re-record your bass lines and do it right this time - direct into the board with no BBM, no delay, no headrush, no amp, no cab, etc. Then the engineer will be able to add whatever effects, amp & cab simulation you need to get "your" sound while still having the full output of your pickups and the full attack of your notes to work with.

Or just hire George Martin to fix it in the final mixdown.

[Qvist]

I have the same problem with our new recording, too much low-end = no note-definition. I'm gonna ask the guy who mix's too crank my mids a bit and maybe give me some more crisp, hopefully =) (Recording through a sansamp PSA-1)

[mozarwasagenius]

Originally Posted by Qvist

I have the same problem with our new recording, too much low-end = no note-definition. I'm gonna ask the guy who mix's too crank my mids a bit and maybe give me some more crisp, hopefully =) (Recording through a sansamp PSA-1)

I agree with the suggestion of adding mids. Try a little at a time and see if you can get a good balance in a band mix.

[Qvist]

Originally Posted by mozarwasagenius

I agree with the suggestion of adding mids. Try a little at a time and see if you can get a good balance in a band mix.

Yeah, that's how I imagine we'll proceed. I'd really like to get that tubey grit sound that the PSA-1 can emulate, but without stealing too much from the guitars at the same time. So a boost around... 500hz to 2khz? The actual song is on our myspace, check the link in my sig =)

PS: Sorry for sorta hijacking thread, I hope this is useful to you too hwyk!

[butchblack]

I'll agree with the rest that kicking up the mids and highs may help, as would upping your volume.The fact that you and a guitar are playing the same riff isn't helping. I've also found that setting the amp flat and turning the treble all the way up works well for recording. They should be able to shape your bass tone in production to where you like it. I recently went DI through an SWR head and they were able to get a good tone out of it that I was happy with. What sounds good live in the studio might not sound the best when recorded.

[kirkm24]

The tendency among a lot of audio engineers is to EQ bass with a smiley face. These are usually guitar players turned sound engineers who assume bass should just sound like a bunch of clanky mud (shields up)...

Boosting the lo mids can give you bottom end that still cuts through the mix and those frequencies are usually not occupied by guitars, vocals or drums.. sometimes they are. I always find that a low mid boost does the job most of the time.

Also, try recording with 2 channels. Run your amp mic'd with all the effects on one and run a clean, unaltered DI on the other (just put the DI in your signal chain before everything else. The sound guy can then balance the two together and/ or scratch one or the other depending on how it works out.

[jruberto]

first, i am brand new here. hi everyone! (quick background: guitar 25 years, bass 10, producer/engineer 15) found this thread and think there are some unexamined perspectives from the playing and the engineering side:

- more bridge pickup and/or play your notes closer to the bridge

- a little mid-bump from the eq on your bass can greatly increase note definition.

- examine the compressor settings on the bass track, if the attack is set too fast, the "tops" of the notes will get squished.. suggest a slower attack in the neighborhood of 40 to 50 milliseconds

- an easily overlooked method is not to EQ the bass differently, but to cut out some low-mids from the kick drum to make room for the bass. if you can hear the kick okay but not the bass, this might be the deal

- the bass might simply be too low. try pushing the bass up 1dB.

- however, and i think this may be the case here, if the "bass" setting on your amp was on 10 (and the DI was post-EQ or you were miking the cabinet), then you kinda got what you asked for. all deep deep low end, no definition. you should really start with amp EQ on zero (or whatever is the "neutral" setting in the middle) & listen through the monitors playing with the drums. if it sounds good, leave it. tweak the settings on your instrument as necessary and then (and only then) reach for the EQ on your amp.

anyway, here's some practical advice for when you go back in. in this order:

- check the compressor on the bass track. make sure the attack is no lower than 40ms. if it isn't compressed, try a compressor with appropriate settings (which is another huge topic outside of the scope of this reply.)

- check the EQ on the kick drum. if there is any boost in the low mids 150-250Hz, take it out. try a small cut in that range.

- check the EQ on the bass track. consider a high-pass filter set very low (30-40Hz) to remove subsonic info that uses a lot of sonic energy, but does nothing unless listening on a system with subwoofers.

- check the kick against the bass. they should be pretty similar in level and sound like they are playing together. adjust bass level accordingly.

- listen to just the drums and the bass. it should sound like, well, drums and bass playing together. adjust bass level accordingly.

if it still sounds bad after that, then you should re-record, or do something a little more extreme with the bass EQ. cut out a bunch more of the low low (slide the high pass filter up & increase level to make up for lost energy until it starts sounding better). add just a little low-mids. if you get it sounding good with the drums then it drops out again after adding the other instruments, try high pass filters on the guitars (depending on the style & how beefy the guitars need to be, the high pass filters can be as high as 200-300Hz.)

subsonic hygiene in mixes is often overlooked. pretty much anything that isn't a bass instrument should have a high pass filter unless there is a really good reason to keep the low low stuff. especially guitars.. guitar tracks with unnecessary low frequency information can really muddy up a mix.

hope this helps. cheers and happy holidays. ~j

[ManOnStreet]

Well, very helpful post Mr jruberto, thanks so much. .

Wish all TBers a happy holiday ..

[hwyk]

Thanks everyone! There have been a bunch of great suggestions, exactly what I was looking for!

Here's some additional information:
My cab was mic'ed with two mic's, not really sure what they were. The DI was recorded direct. It was recorded using pro-tools (not LE). The engineer definitely eq'd the recorded bass sound, but I don't think it's permanent. The bass is quiet even when the guitar and bass are playing completely different riffs/notes and during quieter parts of songs. Also, I feel the kick drum suffers from the same problems the bass does, but to a lesser extent.

Once again, killer advice and much appreciated. I feel much better going back to the studio with some suggestions that are a little more concrete than "I wanna be heard more." I don't think we have the budget for me to re-record my parts, but I feel pretty confident that the bass can be remixed fairly quickly and easily. I know "my" sound is there because I heard it in the headphones when we tracked all the songs live.

-Hunter

[jruberto]

i have found that when using multiple bass sources (DI + mic) that maintaining the phase coherency between the sources is imperative. they just simply won't be in phase with each other by dumb luck (unless you are really lucky) and there will be massive phase cancellation.

a DI plus two mics seems excessive. i'd say listen to each mic by itself, decide which one sounds better and discard the other mic track. then zoom waaaay in on the waveforms and try to make the DI track match up with the mic track by nudging the mic track around. even better, solo the DI and the mic track, and keep nudging the mic track a few samples at a time until it sounds good.

an alternate way to get the phase worked out is to invert the phase of the mic track, then nudge it around until it sounds as thin and awful as you can get it when mixed with the DI track, then set its phase back to normal and it will sound as good as it's going to sound.

worst case, try using just the DI track, i bet you can sculpt a pretty good sound with the EQ guidelines i mentioned above from the single source and not worry about screwing around with the phase issues that are introduced by using multiple sources. this will be the fastest and easiest solution.

cheers! ~j

[atheos]

It could also be that the overall mix would be worse if the bass tone was like you wanted it to be. If the sound guy is an experienced one he knows what he's doing. Same with studio engineers, they know how to make the overall tone good - and sometimes it needs sacrifices.

I'm both engineer and musician so I understand that there are two ways to think - the engineer hears the overall mix better while musicians hear their own instruments. I've been through situations where somebody wants himself be heard better but that would sound awful in the mix and would serve no purpose. I've come across the kind of situation many times where bass is really just a rhythm guitar root note doubler - there's no point to make it stand out. There has to be something special about the bass tone or the player so that I would bother making the bass really stand out. And I AM a bassist myself!

Naturally every instrument has to be heard in the mix but my recommendation is that if the mix sounds good in every other aspect then the sound guy is doing good job and tone issues are probably just in your head. Listen to the whole mix and ask him to mute and unmute you a couple of times - if the sound guy does his job well the mix lacks balls immediately when he mutes the bass.

Ps. jruberto is making an excellent point with the phase thing. If there are two sources (DI and mic) the tone MUST BE PHASE ALIGNED. There will be uncontrolled phase cancellation without doing so. As said, there are two ways: 100% same phase or "phase eq" which means you nudge the mic signal 1ms at a time to find the optimal phase. The tech part goes like this: at certain delay point the phase cancellation hits the muddy part of your tone making it better by canceling the bad sounding stuff. Three sources... Well, I would take the better one and see if there's something missing and use the other to add some of it (only if needed). One possible option is that the mics are for woofer and tweeter and the engineer adds just a little bit of the tweeter mic into the mix to add a little high end.

[hwyk]

Some additional things that the new suggestions brought up:

I am 99% sure that the DI and mics are in phase. The engineer knows what he is doing, for the most part. Also, I believe that there is only one mic out of two that we actually used in in the mix, along with the DI.

Also, I am more than willing to make some concessions for the betterment of the mix, but everyone in the band agrees that there is not enough bass, espescially in the parts where the guitar and bass are playing different parts. I don't mind fading into the background when the bass and guitar are playing the same chords, but during the parts of the song when the bass is the driving force, you shouldn't have to strain to hear it. I feel that the lack of the bass sound guts the songs in certain places.

Another idea: is there a way to post a song so that those who are interested could listen to it and make some recommendations based on something a little better than my vaguely worded descriptions?

Thanks again,
Hunter

[jruberto]

unless very particular attention was paid when setting up the mics with at least a few rounds of test/check/correct, it is hard to imagine the DI signal being perfectly in phase with the mics. there will *always* be some amount of phase cancellation, the trick is to get it so it sounds good. i've found that eyeballing the waveforms can get you close, but you should trust your ears more than your eyes.

there is also a lot of truth that the bass player will hear the mix differently than the drummer or the singer or the keyboardist will. before i record anyone, if they do not have someone in a producer role i strongly recommend that they find someone trusted & experienced to be in that role so that when the final mix is made, they can be a voice of reason when everyone thinks their part isn't loud enough. it does seem like there is a valid problem with the bass track here, and i think it's mostly rooted in the fact that the EQ of the bass on the way in was kind of screwy, and some fairly extreme corrective EQ is going to be necessary to make it right.

the good tool is going to be that high-pass filter (important: EQ *before* the compressor). and the high pass may have to be set surprisingly high. while the fundamental note of the low E string is around 40Hz (low B is closer to 30Hz for you 5 stringers), most speaker systems don't reproduce those low frequencies at all. your ears hear the higher order harmonics -- again, use the science as a guide, but your ears are the final judge. if it sounds good, it is good. don't be afraid to push that high pass up to 60, 70, 80Hz or higher if that's what it takes to make it sound good.

cheers, j

[jruberto]

so how'd it turn out?

[hwyk]

Sorry for the long overdue update.

After 4 mixing sessions of not getting it right, I wound up re-recording my bass parts on three out of four songs using a stingray into a sansamp bass driver direct into the board. It took 2 hours to record and mix. I'm happy that this ordeal is over, but bummed that it took 8-10 hours and $400 to get to that point. I'm also bummed that it's not "my sound." Oh well, live and learn.

The final mastered mix is up on myspace or facebook. Check my sig for the link. The original bass recording is on "carry on" and the re-recorded bass is on the rest. If you'd like a better quality copy to listen to, pm me and I'll figure out a way to post the WAV files online. Or, if you're really into it, let me know and I'll mail you a for real copy.

Also, constructive comments and suggsetions are always welcome.

Finally, thank you all for your help. It was really great to have the support of people who understand what I was going through and willing to help out.

[jruberto]

Like the songs! Sorry it's taken me a minute to get back...

Hard to really hear detail in the low quality myspace mp3s, but I think the bass on "carry on" sounds pretty good, it's kind of the right texture for that track. But I can totally understand that it would get lost or buried in a track like "wheat and black" when everything gets loud. The guitars sound cool. Nice stuff.