- Mar 8, 2011
- 12,232
- 51,187
- Disclosures
- Authorized greenboy designs builder/Owner of BNA Audio
Those are pretty wild. I just ordered a Qu-Bit Nebulae, which is very similar
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Ambient/Post-Rock/Textural bass playing thread
- Thread starter ttasselm
- Start date
Those are pretty wild. I just ordered a Qu-Bit Nebulae, which is very similar
I know at least five of those personally. I may be at least one of them as well.
I’m stuff on the table guy. Fighting the Beep Boop Machine urges.
I definitely know circuit bent toy guy. He's a bit...out there.
This is going to sound a bit snarky but is there any threads you folks have seen about that are focused on playing ambient bass? I like all the synth/noise stuff going on but I’m trying to get some tips on playing ambient style bass and what’s the most bang for buck pedal setup to get started?
Tons of that in here, it's exactly what I do- browse the thread a bit. Lots of options, a volume pedal, reverb and delay are a must for me. The wetter, the better.
So, the Fractal came in. Really cool unit, but no way in hell will it come even close to being able to emulate what I run with my pedal board, or adequately integrate it. Definitely all about the amp sims and cab IR, which are quite amazing. Tempting to keep for that, but in that case I'd be better off with a rack unit to replace the preamp in my rig.
The discussion here has included bass guitar specific discussion. We do go off into broader synth topics pretty regularly.
For getting started, reverb, delay, and looper pedals are a good start. An EHX Freeze is also a useful tool. There’s a few combo delay and reverb units that might be worth considering.
What’s your budget and your project setting? Are you solo or in a band, are you doing things live or in a studio?
i’d also add some sort of modulation pedal to that list, which gets into how you hear things. i generally don’t like chorus per se, but like vibrato, detuning and rotary effects. tremolo can also be really good. then you can get into ring mod and extreme flanging, which can get into how noisy you like things to be.
for me, the more versatility (range of possibilities) a pedal has, the better.
for me, the more versatility (range of possibilities) a pedal has, the better.
Typically, you start with pedals, building sounds and textures that are good or even great but then one realizes that there are other tools that work even better for the sought after sounds. Thus, a number of us end up using other things like synths, VSTs, samplers and so on so you get the discussions in this thread. Sonic exploration is what matters IMO
The one thing I haven’t seen mentioned for the pedal approach is a PitchFactor or H9. The Eventide pitch algorithms take me on very fun journeys.
The one thing I haven’t seen mentioned for the pedal approach is a PitchFactor or H9. The Eventide pitch algorithms take me on very fun journeys.
On another note I've been thinking about the idea of running those synthy, splatty fuzz pedals in parallel for bass guitar, maybe with (micro)pitch shift, chorus and whatever and why not harmonizer and shimmer fx to create some sort of approximation of supersaw-type of synth sound. Totally unpractical but could produce some interesting results.
for sure pedals are a good place to start. and i'd go further and say to not go into multi effect units, as most of them have limited tweakability for experimentation with changing sounds (and especially live tweaking).
this actually elides into something i was thinking about this thread in that i'm going a different way than the modular thing . . . i'm lusting after a prophet x. need to try one, but the demos look/sounds pretty good to me. i'm more interested in notes and textures on the fly rather than setting up large modular patches, doing one-man band gigs or planning shows, etc.
not a criticism; an observation of different intentions.
anywho, the other thing is that i recently picked up the boss xx-500 series pedals. while they have some drawbacks (what doesn't?), they do some pretty great things:
1. running two separate effects at the same time. reverb into reverb? delay into delay? yes.
2. pretty nice real-time control via programming a patch to respond to an expression pedal and the onboard momentary (tap) switch. morph between forward/reverse reverb (or delay) via exp pedal. change tremolo/delay/flange/panning speed via exp pedal. change delay times in opposite directions for two different delays via exp pedal (wacky pitch bend effects). trigger tight flange/reverse delay/ring mod/non-linear reverb/slicer via momentary switch.
3. pretty good sound quality (i like it better than the ventris/nemesis i'm moving)
4. stereo . . .
5. you can tweak important parameters from the knobs on the front
6. not super expensive (compared to strymon, etc.)
drawbacks would be not enough pitch change stuff in the md-500; would love to have an emulation of the old srv-2000's gated reverse reverb in the rv-500 (there's something similar, but not quite); maybe some sort of granular delay in the dd-500. would love to have more programming slots for exp pedal assignment per patch (feedback and delay going in opposite direction, for instance). i wish they were a tad smaller, but the functionality is pretty amazing.
say what you will about boss, they're been doing some great work for a long time.
this actually elides into something i was thinking about this thread in that i'm going a different way than the modular thing . . . i'm lusting after a prophet x. need to try one, but the demos look/sounds pretty good to me. i'm more interested in notes and textures on the fly rather than setting up large modular patches, doing one-man band gigs or planning shows, etc.
not a criticism; an observation of different intentions.
anywho, the other thing is that i recently picked up the boss xx-500 series pedals. while they have some drawbacks (what doesn't?), they do some pretty great things:
1. running two separate effects at the same time. reverb into reverb? delay into delay? yes.
2. pretty nice real-time control via programming a patch to respond to an expression pedal and the onboard momentary (tap) switch. morph between forward/reverse reverb (or delay) via exp pedal. change tremolo/delay/flange/panning speed via exp pedal. change delay times in opposite directions for two different delays via exp pedal (wacky pitch bend effects). trigger tight flange/reverse delay/ring mod/non-linear reverb/slicer via momentary switch.
3. pretty good sound quality (i like it better than the ventris/nemesis i'm moving)
4. stereo . . .
5. you can tweak important parameters from the knobs on the front
6. not super expensive (compared to strymon, etc.)
drawbacks would be not enough pitch change stuff in the md-500; would love to have an emulation of the old srv-2000's gated reverse reverb in the rv-500 (there's something similar, but not quite); maybe some sort of granular delay in the dd-500. would love to have more programming slots for exp pedal assignment per patch (feedback and delay going in opposite direction, for instance). i wish they were a tad smaller, but the functionality is pretty amazing.
say what you will about boss, they're been doing some great work for a long time.
Also, as per the above post with separate pedals, try running them in uncommon order (for example, reverb into fuzz, into delay. A great, cheap verb/ delay with loop combo is the EH Canyon.
- Mar 8, 2011
- 12,232
- 51,187
- Disclosures
- Authorized greenboy designs builder/Owner of BNA Audio
Absolutely! Love the new 500xxx stuff. Stands up against way more expensive competition.
Prophet X is killer. If the modular thing wasn’t so busy raping and pillaging my bank account, it could be on ‘the list’
Speaking of modular. I highly recommend NOT getting into it! It’s a bottomless rabbit hole. That said, I just ordered a bigger case! I spent enough time with loopers and pedals to know while it’s awesome for some, it wasn’t for me. Or maybe I just felt like there was more to the puzzle for me.
I did a ton of solo bass, live looping and sampling into my Octatrack and that got me closer to where I want to be, musically.
The dream I’m currently dreaming is to be able to play one or two bass guitar figures simultaneously into my Octatrack as well as several eurorack samplers/loopers/slicers and ‘compose’ music on the fly. I can honestly say I haven’t come close to getting the sound in my head that way, but I’m going to keep trying.
I doubt I’ll be going down these paths, but perhaps it’ll be educational.
Lot of pretty pictures too.
Lot of pretty pictures too.
DOPE! I LOVE my pocket operator...still use it ALL the time. I owe this thread to that purchase (and a few other purchases too
)I'm still trying to get through
and
as I feel that these will help me be fully deliberate in any knob I twist. These videos just make the topic so tough to focus on.
Boredbrain Transmutron is back in stock. It’s a fun and handy device.
