- Feb 8, 2005
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- Disclosures
- Endorsing Artist: Bag End - Dean Markley - Thunderfunk
Kinda depends on the situation.
If I'm playing in a loud rock band with a fairly thick mix going on (i.e., your typical guitarist playing full 6-string chords all the time and/or keyboardist who cannot resist the urge to play bass notes with his left hand) then a tweeter can come in handy to be audible in the mix. For a small jazz gig I do, I'm using a TubeWorks GUITAR amp and it works fantastic....obviously no tweet.
In general I don't care for the sound, however. There are those that do, and that's fine...whatever floats your boat. I don't exactly buy the arguments, however that your bass rig needs to be a more-or-less flat sounding copy of a PA setup because that's what your sound is going to be FOH, or other arguments that suggest that somehow the only way for the bass to sound good/right in the house is eliminating any coloration and taking a signal straight to a DI.
Oh, I'm familiar with all the parameters involved, and they could all just as easily be applied to a guitarist or a dude playing a B3 with a Leslie. However, they will easily be accommodated with a mic and soundmen spending whatever time is needed to get "their" sound into the house and make it work.
Bass, especially in the last couple decades seems to have been relegated to a more functional role versus one of individuality, and I think bass gear has changed/evolved to reflect this. Thus the ubiquitous boutique rig with a flat/full range sound being the goal, because that's what going to be in the PA.
This is certainly a valid approach, but is not inherently "correct". If "your" sound is a vintage-y thump through a single 15" or an old sealed 8X10, then your efforts are completely defeated when a sound man says "Just plug into this DI".
There's always comments (and valid ones) like
What am I getting at here besides a tirade that harkens back to my "bass bigotry" thread? Well, that I feel there are 2 factors at work here.
There are those like Ken who genuinely like their sound to be more-or-less that "straight to the board" type tone. If that's your thing, that's cool and there's a lot of gear out there to achieve that end.
However, I also think that there is a general mindset out there that "it's only bass" and you need to accept no matter what personal tone you may being trying to achieve it will be sacrificed, so you might as well accept it and deal with that from the get go.
Of course a good soundman can make all of this just fine. I was recently having trouble at a venue with the soundman who I also worked with at a club later, who then came up to me and said "Man! Why can't you give me THAT sound at the other gig?"
I said "I AM. It's the same bass, same head same DI (from the head)." So, I asked him to come up onstage (at the other venue), to listen to my rig and I said "That's my sound, can't we just get THAT in the house?" We talked about just putting a mic on the rig, but we worked with the DI and got a house sound we were both happy with.
Unfortunately IME, soundmen that are this cool and actually take your sound goals into consideration as well as (instead of only) their own are few and far bewteen.
OK, rant off
If I'm playing in a loud rock band with a fairly thick mix going on (i.e., your typical guitarist playing full 6-string chords all the time and/or keyboardist who cannot resist the urge to play bass notes with his left hand) then a tweeter can come in handy to be audible in the mix. For a small jazz gig I do, I'm using a TubeWorks GUITAR amp and it works fantastic....obviously no tweet.
In general I don't care for the sound, however. There are those that do, and that's fine...whatever floats your boat. I don't exactly buy the arguments, however that your bass rig needs to be a more-or-less flat sounding copy of a PA setup because that's what your sound is going to be FOH, or other arguments that suggest that somehow the only way for the bass to sound good/right in the house is eliminating any coloration and taking a signal straight to a DI.
Oh, I'm familiar with all the parameters involved, and they could all just as easily be applied to a guitarist or a dude playing a B3 with a Leslie. However, they will easily be accommodated with a mic and soundmen spending whatever time is needed to get "their" sound into the house and make it work.
Bass, especially in the last couple decades seems to have been relegated to a more functional role versus one of individuality, and I think bass gear has changed/evolved to reflect this. Thus the ubiquitous boutique rig with a flat/full range sound being the goal, because that's what going to be in the PA.
This is certainly a valid approach, but is not inherently "correct". If "your" sound is a vintage-y thump through a single 15" or an old sealed 8X10, then your efforts are completely defeated when a sound man says "Just plug into this DI".
There's always comments (and valid ones) like
This is certainly true...the way your rig sounds to you onstage is not how it will sound in the house and certain accommodations must be made to make it "work", but here's the thing...that's true of ALL instruments...including some that are more "full range" than bass, yet it would be completely blasphemous to suggest a guitarist use a flat sounding/full range rig with a tweeter because that's what will be coming through the PA and giving the soundman a send from his guitar and letting the soundman get "his" sound in the PA.
What am I getting at here besides a tirade that harkens back to my "bass bigotry" thread? Well, that I feel there are 2 factors at work here.
There are those like Ken who genuinely like their sound to be more-or-less that "straight to the board" type tone. If that's your thing, that's cool and there's a lot of gear out there to achieve that end.
However, I also think that there is a general mindset out there that "it's only bass" and you need to accept no matter what personal tone you may being trying to achieve it will be sacrificed, so you might as well accept it and deal with that from the get go.
Of course a good soundman can make all of this just fine. I was recently having trouble at a venue with the soundman who I also worked with at a club later, who then came up to me and said "Man! Why can't you give me THAT sound at the other gig?"
I said "I AM. It's the same bass, same head same DI (from the head)." So, I asked him to come up onstage (at the other venue), to listen to my rig and I said "That's my sound, can't we just get THAT in the house?" We talked about just putting a mic on the rig, but we worked with the DI and got a house sound we were both happy with.
Unfortunately IME, soundmen that are this cool and actually take your sound goals into consideration as well as (instead of only) their own are few and far bewteen.
OK, rant off
