OUsing My New BSS ME-50B Multi-effects pedal & Just Effects in General

[MadModBassist]

I recently purchased the BOSS ME-50B from my "local" Guitar Center, but I have absolutely no idea how to get the tones I want. I mean, it's a pretty simple device by looks, but I know there's got to be more than what I'm seeing.

To tell the truth, I'm rather a noob lazy bassist. I picked up bass and, well, just played. Never really tried experimenting with tone, but I know the knobs must do SOMETHING!

So, any other owners of this beast that can give me hints on making the tones I desire? Since I'm guessing you all can't read my mind, here's what I'm really looking for:

-A general clean tone.
-A somewhat muddy clean tone, kinda like distortion yet not. Maybe like a Fender bass kinda thing.
-Slap & pop-O-rama
-A perfect balance between highs and lows.

As I read this post, I think to myself that I'd really rather have replies that just tell me how to utilize my amp and effects pedal to get the tones I need. I know Low, Mid and High do something miraculous to tone, but I need some recommendations, or some genre-specific settings (funk, modern rock, classic rock, metal, progressive, etc.)

Please just give me some settings you believe are essential for a bassist

[stflbn]

Dedicate yourself to reading the manual. Then start slow adapting an existing patch that you like so it's even closer to your preference. Before you know it you'll be creating patches from scratch.

If you don't commit to learning it you'll never really do more than j ust using the stock patches.

[cheapbasslovin]

For a clean you probably want to leave all the effects off and only tweak the EQ / compressor section as needed. This should also do you for the slap and pop and 'perfect balance.'

For the overdrive tone, I would suggest the bass driver or natural settings on the drive module and tweak to taste.

A different way to attack than stflbn suggested would be to simply leave all the sections off (or neutral in the case of the EQ) and start working each setting on one module and see what it does to your sound. Really get into the details of it, because sometimes a patch is doing more than you think it is if you move through it too fast. Once you've really given a module a once over, then move onto the next one. This allows you to figure out what each sound is doing and then try to figure out how best to blend them together. Oh, and read the manual. It helps to have it around when tweaking parameters so you know what the knobs are doing and you can learn the terminology while tweaking if you don't.

Stflbn's method isn't bad, but when I first got mine I didn't know what I liked about a patch versus what I didn't like and often made them worse before they got better.

Good Luck.