my writing and my music are pretty different but I do find things have a way of informing one another. It’s good to try out different arts.
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Ambient/Post-Rock/Textural bass playing thread
- Thread starter ttasselm
- Start date
my writing and my music are pretty different but I do find things have a way of informing one another. It’s good to try out different arts.
I had a little remote contact with Robert Rich when I was beta testing for Synthesis Technology. He designed the wavetables for the E352/E370 and had a hand in the E520 algorithms if I remember right. I was the first E370 beta tester and he was the second.
yeah. i think that’s right. couldn’t remember all the model names.
cool you got to interact with him.
Speaking of such things, I wound up going a bit more Berlin School with this album release. But also microtonal (it's all in 18edo).
Just got back from Tangerine Dream a little while ago. Great show! They did their 90 minute set of "songs" - heard a bunch that I wanted to hear - recognized maybe 80% of the songs, took little video clips so that I could try and figure out the setlist. Re: loud bass - Thorsten Quaeschning started out first by saying hello to the wrong city (San Diego lol), then after he recovered, he talked about how excited he was to play the Regency Ballroom - apparently some famous live albums were recorded there but I can't remember who he said and I can't find anything online. Anyway, he then said he loved the room and the "Session" at the end would be in C, because that was the most resonant note. He then played some long bass notes, and C was definitely making my body oscillate or something!
But I thought the mix was pretty good. It was definitely loud - I moved from my third row seat to back halfway but in the middle - it was more fun and sounded better there. I found some dancing people and enjoyed the show. More stuff from Raum than I expected, Love on a Real Train was actually kind of disappointing, the song from Phaedra was amazing, plus they played one of my favorites: Choronzon from Exit.
I went back to my seat for the Session. It started mellow but had a lot more rhythmic sections than I expected. TQ played some Risky Business voice samples ("The dream is always the same" etc.) which he then started chopping up. Robert Rich did some stuff on a keyboard, then played a bunch with some kind of lap steel and a slide, which seemed kind of redundant given Hoshino Yamane's presence, but it worked - he just kept doing it, which kind of bugged me but oh well. He went over to one of his laptops and you couldn't tell what he was doing. Then he started playing a long flute, and realized that he was looping it - that section was pretty cool. The improv was at least 30 minutes.
I was surprised that they were selling Edgar Froese's autobiography which I want to get, but didn't want to carry so waited until the show ended - and it was sold out! I can order it from Germany, but would've been nice to get it without having to pay shipping. Oh well! I got to meet some interesting people - one guy started talking to me, turns out he used to have a radio show in SF and would play TD and lots of European electronic music. Then the guy I was sitting next to who was with his family had seen them a bunch of times - his first show was 1976 in NYC!
But I thought the mix was pretty good. It was definitely loud - I moved from my third row seat to back halfway but in the middle - it was more fun and sounded better there. I found some dancing people and enjoyed the show. More stuff from Raum than I expected, Love on a Real Train was actually kind of disappointing, the song from Phaedra was amazing, plus they played one of my favorites: Choronzon from Exit.
I went back to my seat for the Session. It started mellow but had a lot more rhythmic sections than I expected. TQ played some Risky Business voice samples ("The dream is always the same" etc.) which he then started chopping up. Robert Rich did some stuff on a keyboard, then played a bunch with some kind of lap steel and a slide, which seemed kind of redundant given Hoshino Yamane's presence, but it worked - he just kept doing it, which kind of bugged me but oh well. He went over to one of his laptops and you couldn't tell what he was doing. Then he started playing a long flute, and realized that he was looping it - that section was pretty cool. The improv was at least 30 minutes.
I was surprised that they were selling Edgar Froese's autobiography which I want to get, but didn't want to carry so waited until the show ended - and it was sold out! I can order it from Germany, but would've been nice to get it without having to pay shipping. Oh well! I got to meet some interesting people - one guy started talking to me, turns out he used to have a radio show in SF and would play TD and lots of European electronic music. Then the guy I was sitting next to who was with his family had seen them a bunch of times - his first show was 1976 in NYC!
We went to Janelle Monáe last night. Also a great show, obvs for other reasons. But the bass also came up. Where we were in the venue the mix was a bit muddy. You could hear everything but lots of room tone. The bassist, however, was fantastic. Not surprisingly, his name is not widely reported in the press about the tour.
Was it still Teja Veal on bass?
I looooooove soul music, cant stand Mrs Monae…….
ok, shes more pop than soul,but still off lawn now,,,..
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rr makes his own (microtonal?) flutes from pvc, iirc.
jm is the real deal, imo, but i don’t like everything she does.
jm is the real deal, imo, but i don’t like everything she does.
Yep, she’s got talent for sure.
Just not my shizzle.
That's what I thought at first - then I was like "nah!" I went to high school in Japan and our music teacher was a renowned shakuhachi player. I took the class and we got to play on PVC shakuhachi - I had mine for years! That's cool to realize that's what he was playing! You couldn't really hear him at first - he kept tweaking a tabletop unit - but gradually it emerged from the mix and became one of the nicest moments of the Session.
Was it still Teja Veal on bass?
I looooooove soul music, cant stand Mrs Monae…….
ok, shes more pop than soul,but still off lawn now,,,..
I think it’s “Ms. Monáe” I’m not normally a pop person and I prefer the Afrofuturism to the new record, though I understand it as a political gesture. It was a fantastically executed show. The band was just a joy to watch.
Definitely not Teja Veal on bass but thanks for the rec as I will check her out. It was a guy. I am more into funk than soul and pop but of course everything crosses over. Last night she had set pieces that were tributes to Prince, James Brown, and Michael Jackson and they were all just perfectly executed.
Is there a "start here" post regarding ambient-ish playing on bass, specifically with the Line6 Helix?
I've really been enjoying playing with delays and reverbs on my HXStomp, and then between Devin Townsend's recent ambient releases and this part of his interview with Rick Beato, I really want to experiment more with this kind of thing when I'm practicing. But with the dozens of verbs and delays on the Helix and my lack of knowledge on how to get them to do *that* thing or make *this* kind of sound, I'm a little lost.
I've really been enjoying playing with delays and reverbs on my HXStomp, and then between Devin Townsend's recent ambient releases and this part of his interview with Rick Beato, I really want to experiment more with this kind of thing when I'm practicing. But with the dozens of verbs and delays on the Helix and my lack of knowledge on how to get them to do *that* thing or make *this* kind of sound, I'm a little lost.
hi
interesting question.
just going for it and dealing with the joys and frustrations of exploring is what worked for me. that’s my recommendation.
i don’t know the helix, but i’d go for the most vanilla delays and verbs to begin.
maybe a digital delay that can get you anywhere from 250-1,000 ms and a hall reverb that can go small to large. and then tweak to get what you’re hearing at that time.
i think a critical piece is a volume pedal, which i’d place *before* the delay/reverb. if you’re gonna use overdrive/distortion, place the volume pedal *after* those.
od/dist -> vol -> del -> rev
if you do chorus/flange i’d do *after* the od/dist, envelope filter/octave *before* od/dist, but all *before* the volume pedal. however, everyone has their own sound path.
have fun.
This.
/end
@steubig ftw
my 2 cents, ideas and constant work ethic beats any piece of gear
Failing is a major part of learning.
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agreed on the work thing.
there was a time in the 80s (!) when i stayed late once a week at the warehouse (commercial company’s in-house lighting) where i worked and did 45-minute looping improvs and taped them all. did it for six months or so. learned a lot.
mix tape, part one of the 49 or so that i did.
I have over 10 hours of synth, drone, no input mixer, sampling and experimental and just noise stuff I recorded over the past 4 years.
I recorded everything I did as not to miss something random that could not be replicated.
Alot of it is straight up crap, but at least I put in the work.
These days, I just stayed oiled up on my bass technique and read books.
Inspiration and motivation haven’t visited me in quite a while.
- Mar 8, 2011
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- Authorized greenboy designs builder/Owner of BNA Audio
great advice from @steubig . I have come to prefer a volume pedal before overdrive/distortion, but after fuzz. Also distortion after delay or verb can be wild.
Most definitely on team Delay before Dirt.
Only reason to one after is that there are 2 on signal chain.
