If so, what kind of results are you getting? I'm finding that the more I travel, the less it becomes convenient to take an entire rig with. The Solstice might be the cure. Thoughts?
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Double Bass Anybody using a Solstice to mix an AMT and a pickup?
- Thread starter Chris Fitzgerald
- Start date
I do. But to be honest Chris, I bought the AMT mic only recently.
And even though I have combed through many of the TB threads on the AMT ("Thank you everyone!"), I have just started experimenting with various positions to find a sweet spot or two for it on my bass. I got a daytime gig, wife, two kids, ... ya know.
I do have more time in however experimenting with the Solstice and a Revolution SOLO pickup. I feel I am getting excellent results, and could go into more detail on this if you point me in one direction or the other.
If you are asking about running it into a PA, I'm sorry, I don't have any experience with that in my gigging situations.
And even though I have combed through many of the TB threads on the AMT ("Thank you everyone!"), I have just started experimenting with various positions to find a sweet spot or two for it on my bass. I got a daytime gig, wife, two kids, ... ya know.
I do have more time in however experimenting with the Solstice and a Revolution SOLO pickup. I feel I am getting excellent results, and could go into more detail on this if you point me in one direction or the other.
If you are asking about running it into a PA, I'm sorry, I don't have any experience with that in my gigging situations.
Thanks - that helps a little. I'm not so much worried about sending stuff to the house as I am wondering if I could get away with getting a Solstice to take on road trips, etc. to plug into the house amp and still get something resembling "my sound" without carrying my whole rig.
For instance, at the Aebersold camps, they have a house amp onstage, and three different groups playing every night. You get about five minutes to set up your group before the downbeat, and I spent ALL of that this week trying to drag my whole rig onstage and set it up in time to play. If I had a Solstice, I could just bring it and my bass and use it to blend the AMT and Full Circle signals through the house amp (which is already plugged into the DI and has a mic in front of it). I can always hope!
For instance, at the Aebersold camps, they have a house amp onstage, and three different groups playing every night. You get about five minutes to set up your group before the downbeat, and I spent ALL of that this week trying to drag my whole rig onstage and set it up in time to play. If I had a Solstice, I could just bring it and my bass and use it to blend the AMT and Full Circle signals through the house amp (which is already plugged into the DI and has a mic in front of it). I can always hope!
A slight highjack here, so apologies...
Chris, I've found that positioning the AMT differently can give you a much more natural sound out of the gate.
What I'm doing nowadays is mounting the clamp on the lower, left bout. I put the head of the mic about 3" or better away from the body of the bass, aiming right at the table. It's between the left foot of the bridge and the F hole, about an inch below the bridge. I've done this on a number of basses and get really consistent results. With this signal, I find that a slight bass boost and adjusts mids to taste (usually 1 or 2 numbers) to get a great, accurate sound. Signal and bleed are no worse than the other approaches. With a good, low maintenance signal like this I would feel pretty comfortable sending this to most sound (de)engineers and house amps....
It's a bit of a tangent, but might help with your quest...
Chris, I've found that positioning the AMT differently can give you a much more natural sound out of the gate.
What I'm doing nowadays is mounting the clamp on the lower, left bout. I put the head of the mic about 3" or better away from the body of the bass, aiming right at the table. It's between the left foot of the bridge and the F hole, about an inch below the bridge. I've done this on a number of basses and get really consistent results. With this signal, I find that a slight bass boost and adjusts mids to taste (usually 1 or 2 numbers) to get a great, accurate sound. Signal and bleed are no worse than the other approaches. With a good, low maintenance signal like this I would feel pretty comfortable sending this to most sound (de)engineers and house amps....
It's a bit of a tangent, but might help with your quest...
Chris Fitzgerald said:
You could always set up your rig on a flat dolly and just wheel it out, plug in, and play.
Treble Side. I had almost said 'Driver's Side', but thought that this would cause even more confusionSam Sherry said:
Chris, very briefly (2 gigs to be exact), I used an AMT and a Solstice with my Bass Max. It sounded fantabulous without a whole lot of tweaking at all, but I had to abandon that idea for the very reason you cite. My gigs are real quick on/off deals most of the time, and I had to settle for the pickup only for the sake of expediency...luckily it's plenty good for my usual audience.
ALL MY CHILDREE said:
I'm okay here, since my AMT is now mounted on my bass.
FLOWER FREDDELS said:
With the cab way up on the PA speaker stand? That'd be quite a balancing act!
Chris Fitzgerald said:With the cab way up on the PA speaker stand? That'd be quite a balancing act!
Sure, keep putting in more variables into the problem.
Get some roadies!!
Spring load the thing and install a latch on the dolly. When it's time to play, just yell "FOOOORE" and pull the string.
And keep your head out of the path of the speaker when you're pushing the cabinet back down and reaching for the latch.
And keep your head out of the path of the speaker when you're pushing the cabinet back down and reaching for the latch.
Does anybody know if a Solstice would allow me to send a mixed signal to the amp and still send the AMT only to the house? If so, it's a done deal.
Couldn't you send the blended signal...I think the Main XLR out...to the amp, and then use the direct out from the mic channel to feed to the mains? The only thing I can think of is that you'd need an impedance-matching adapter to go into the 1/4" input on the amp.
Yes, you can do this with the Solstice.Chris Fitzgerald said:
There are three XLR balanced outputs on the back of the unit: Channel 1, Channel 2, and both channels combined.
There is also an output jack for a 1/4" instrument cable that contains the blended signal. You can use this output to send to your amp.
The Solstice is a thing of beauty. I am STRONGLY considering one right now. I may have a steady show gig coming up and it would be great to send the mic channel to the house as well as having a pickup/mic channel going into the house amplifier. Chris, I wouldn't hesitate in buying one of these units....Don't you have a Raven Labs blender though?
Adrian Juras said:
I do own a PMB-II (although it's currently on loan to a friend in need), and it's a great unit - but in order to use the AMT with the RL unit, you have to use one of those "cannon" impedance plugs to get the XLR signal down to 1/4" input, and I always feel that something gets lost in translation when you do that. But I'm certainly going to try it next week at the camp concert. I'm not sure if I could send channel 1 only to the house while sending both to the amp, either...but only because I've never tried it.
Chris,
I just took the solstice (full circle and ATM 35) on a road trip across the country and I didn't take anything else (except my bass) and it worked beautifully. I have used the set up on a lot of gigs recently too, running it into the board (and running the PUP into different amps too) The solstice is a great little unit that is very versatile. I now figure if I can get any kind of clean amp or PA I can get a useable sound from the solstice. I really dig the sound of a Neuman 184 and full circle mixed thru the solstice. (I dont have a AMT...yet)
I just took the solstice (full circle and ATM 35) on a road trip across the country and I didn't take anything else (except my bass) and it worked beautifully. I have used the set up on a lot of gigs recently too, running it into the board (and running the PUP into different amps too) The solstice is a great little unit that is very versatile. I now figure if I can get any kind of clean amp or PA I can get a useable sound from the solstice. I really dig the sound of a Neuman 184 and full circle mixed thru the solstice. (I dont have a AMT...yet)
Played a concert in a rotten hall (for jazz, anyway) tonight through the house amp with the PMB-II, and the sound was really good. Since I couldn't find my old transformer, I had to buy another one this morning. I couldn't tell if there was any signal degradation on the mic channel at all, and I was really appreciating the absence of a wall-wart for setup. I think I'll just hang onto the PMB for now, at least until I get to see a Solstice in person. Thanks for all the replies!
flatback said:
I was disappointed to find that the Solstice didn't have enough phantom power (15V) for the Neumann (spec sez 48V ±4V) - I found that neither the 184 or the 185 would work with the Solstice. However, I found that the Solstice does work very well with the ATM-35 (spec sez 11-52V) - FWIW
- Wil
