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09-21-2006, 08:54 PM
|  | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: New Jersey | | | Mark King bass tone question
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What would you describe the eq setting on this song? http://youtube.com/watch?v=z8FzgVXZUWs |
09-21-2006, 09:28 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada | | Hi fleabee, Mark King used his signature model JayDee Supernatural bass for "It's Over" I believe. Aside from the seriously light guage strings ( 30 - 90 ) that he used, I think he rolled off most of the mids and cranked the bass and treble, his signature JayDee bass has a three band eq. I actually used to own a Mark King signature JayDee and to get a very close replication of his tone all I needed was the ( 30 - 90 ) gauge strings, a Boss bass chorus pedal and a Trace Elliot amp with most of the upper mids pulled out of the amp's eq. It's a great tone, albeit a little light obviously on the bottom end.
Cheers,
Paul Theriault
Bassjones http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page...?bandID=234528 |
09-21-2006, 09:30 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: New Jersey | | | great..very thorough answer...much appreciated |
09-22-2006, 03:39 AM
| | Banned | | Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Marathon Man | | | Well, judging by the video, and Alembic will get you closer!
Obviously, without using the basses and amps that Mark King uses (Alembic, Jaydee, Status, GB, whatever) you're not going to get it 100%, but you can get it sonding pretty close.
As has been said, you'll need very light strings. 30.'s to 90's will do it for you, and they sound great, though obviously they'll "specialise" whatever bass you put them on and you'll not be able to use it for a trad jazz gig for a while! I find this string gauge to be very conducive for Mark's style of playing, with lots of slap, but as he has proved, in the right mix it can work for a slower, ballady song like this one. I used to use that gauge as standard on my Kubicki, but I changed back to using 40's (still pretty light) for more stiffness.
Also, Trace Elliot amp will do you just fine in terms of getting a nice "Mark King" style bass tone. Being a bit of a Mark King fan myself, I just had to pounce on some Trace Gear myself! In terms of EQ'ing, I think a lot of it he does from his bass, especially on the Alembic where the EQ was quite dynamic. If you look on the "live at Wembley" dvd you can see he runs a separate EQ for his 4x10" and another one for his 15" speaker cabs, though I don't doubt that these will have been fine tuned as stage monitors for the venue. Basically, take a very slight roll off the mids, perhaps more towards to low end than the high end, as those high mids will really add to that spicey tone he gets! And yes, at times, a touch of chorus does appear, so get whatever unit works for you! |
09-22-2006, 07:06 AM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: New Jersey | | | In addition to my original question, does he change his eq for his slap vs. fingerstyle sound? |
09-22-2006, 03:44 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada | | Hey guys, I know for a certainty that Mark King didn't start using Alembics until late 1987 as told to me by Mica Wickersham way back in 1989, that's almost a year after Level 42 recorded the Running In the Family album which as you know includes the track "It's Over". I believe the video for "It's Over" was shot in 1987, exactly when Mark had made the switch to Alembic. According to the "Level 42 - live at Wembley" vhs video which I have watched to the point of the video almost completely disintegrating  ( thank god for DVDs!! ), Mark did not appear to ever adjust anything but his volume control when switching from fingerstyle to slapping. In the studio though who knows, Mark's basses are like the voice of god on some trx IMO  . Just to point out, Mark also used and still uses Status basses. There a few trx on Running In The Family that Mark used his Status, however one can easily spot the tight, hifi, Ken Smith-like brilliance of his Status tone compared to the much more open, warm, drowned in chorus JayDee tone. The JayDee tone that Mark favoured especially for World Machine and Running In The Family was duplicated for the most part in his live rig IMHO, which is the exact tone I hear in "It's Over". For what it's worth, I believe that the Alembic tone is more Status like, it is just as easily identifiable as far as I am concerned. The Staring at the Sun album is all Alembic as is the Guaranteed album. Apparently Mark also used a Zon Legacy bass for the track "Lying Still" off of the World Machine album. He used that Zon even briefer than the Moon J-bass he defretted for the Guaranteed album. Ok, I'm done.......  That was the long answer to your second question Fleabee. I don't know much about anything, but I know a little about Mark King.
Cheers,
Paul Theriault
Bassjones http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page...?bandID=234528 |
09-22-2006, 10:45 PM
| | Registered User | | Join Date: May 2005 Location: New Jersey | | | awesome...thanks for the info...anyone else feel free to chime in |
09-29-2006, 04:46 PM
|  | An ounce of perception, a pound of obscure. | | Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Denver | | There's a great bassography on the Level 42 website here. I bet few people would guess that he recorded all of Forever Now on a Stingray.
I love Mark King's tone, but I do not try to approximate it myself. We have to remember that a)he is the featured soloist in his band, and b)he often has synth support, giving him the ability to use a certain kind of tone effectively. | | Thread Tools | Search this Thread | | | | 
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