Hard/Processed Bass Synth Sound

JiveTurkey777 · #1 05-30-2010, 04:47 PM

Would anyone know how to achieve a kind of hard/processed bass synth sound? I'm looking for a sound much like (a band that some of you may not be too entirely hot on) Passion Pits "Little Secret". *Link at bottom*. I do know that their "bass player" uses a keyboard but I was wondering if it would be possible to make this sound with just my bass and a couple of pedals.

I was thinking that combining a Boss Bass Overdrive (ODB-3), with a Boss Bass Synthesizer (SYB-5) might replicate something similar? I would give it a shot but I only have an OBD-3 to work with at the moment.

Not my style of music, but would be sweet to implement into the set. Let me know what you guys think.

By the way, first time poster. Been coming to this forum for a while now and decided to finally sign up!

* Link - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxL9Hod_qCY *
Comes in at about 0:06

**TheMutt** · #2 05-30-2010, 08:29 PM

Actually I like Passion Pit, but I'm sure I'm part of the minority here. Sounds like you might be able to get that kind of sound with an EHX Bass Micro Synth.

jrmy · #3 05-31-2010, 06:14 AM

While the build quality is, well, Behringer, the Behringer bass synth pedal can do some really cool hard bass synth sounds when the filter sweep is all the way off. BigChiefBC hipped me to that, and now I actually want to buy a Behringer for the first time ever.

bigchiefbc · #4 05-31-2010, 10:12 AM

Yeah, if you're considering the Boss, I'd actually steer you to the Behringer BSY-600. The reason why is that when you have the decay knob all the way up on the Boss, the filter still sweeps. But on the Behringer, that completely shuts off the filter sweep, and makes it a static filter. That way, you can get a straight up synth oscillator tone. I dig it.

TL5 · #5 08-15-2010, 06:14 AM

[aside, hopefully not to derail the thread]

Thanks for posting the link to Passion Pit. I'd never heard of them, but that is really cool. Their bass player seems to use both a bass and the synth. I was looking at the live video from Bonnaroo 2009 and he's playing a bass on one song (not Little Secret, that's a synth).

on topic (hopefully). You can get some pretty wild synth type sounds by layering octave, distortion and spacial effects such as flanger and chorus.
With the addition of a decent synth pedal, even the Behringer, I'd bet you be able to get some pretty creative tones.

Personally, I love synth bass and have some old 70s/80s era synths that I drag out