The thing I've never heard a satisfactory answer to is why is it almost always the bass player and almost always just the bass player who is expected to sacrifice any and all tone sculpting his gear may give him for the "greater good" of the mix?
Don't think for a minute that "we" are asking the bass player to sacrafice any tone. What we are asking for it the ability to take the signal without the eq that you have used for your particular cabinets and let us make the most out of it within the context of the room and our PA and help it fit better in the mix. I don't see how that is a sacrafice of anything. It's for the greater good of everybody including the player... who can't hear the mix and how he sounds in it anyway.
And to add to this, "we" do the same thing for each and every input (except maybe the accordian and banjo which remain muted as much as possible
) to get the best we can out of each part of the mix. The reason why we mic the (electric) guitars is because the natural acoustic filtering of the speaker (due to the response curve which is ANYTHING but "flat") helps make the instrument sound better and fit into the mix better. If there's a ton of low boom from the guitar rig, the first thing I will do (after dogging on the bass player of course) is to sit down with him and work a little bit on his eq & tone. If he is uncooperative, the mix suffers and so does each and every other member of the band. I must then resort to damage control and use my console eq, compression and if all else fails I will lower him in the mix to where he's not detracting as much from everybody else.
Now I will almost always use a DI for acoustic guitar (unlsee it's a really acoustic gig), maybe for mandolin, maybe for violin or fiddle but maybe a miniature condenser DEPENDING ON THE SITUATION like stage volume and required monitor level. Almost always for keys, except for a Leslie where I will always use 2 mics in order to capture the doppler phasing. I will always use mics on drums (except E-drums of course) and I have never been successful with vocals without a mic. I will choose a mic that gives me the best set of compromises, ones that I can live with for the situation I am working with. The mic choice might change if the situation changes too. I will use eq, compression and whatever other tools I need to use to make the band sound as good as I possibly can given the room and the maximum volume I am allowed. I might also ask for some compromises in the monitor mixes if that's interfering with the sound the audience hears, especially in smaller rooms. If the monitors are so loud that I can't use a particular input in the main mix (and it won't sound particularly good at FOH through monitors) I will try to get everybody to back off on volumes a bit so that I can put some in the mix.
So, you can see that I am not picking on the bass player but I am asking that everybody in the band think about how the BAND sounds... the band is not a bass player, it's not a guitarist, it's not even the vocalist. It's the entire package and how the package is delivered, much as gormet food is not a bunch of ingrediants thrown together, because too much of ANY ingrediant, or an ingrediant that doesn't quite fit in detracts from the final product.
I would sure like to see the lower middle end of the music industry grow up a little bit and consider playing together as a band rather than a bunch of musicians that happen to be playing the same song at the same time. It would do a lot for the live music scene and maybe put more butts in the seats by improving the quality of the "package"... and I've said absolutely nothing about the music itself or the talent of the players.
Also, if the band makes it really hard (or impossible) for the sound guy to do a good job,and expecially if they get rude and nasty, I can guarantee you that even most of the good guys will shift to damage control mode and every member in the band will suffer... life is just too short to deal with that kind of crap at a one-off gig. Most will just "get through the night" and move on, the mix will probably be uninspired and just hanging in there along with the sound guy's attutude. Remember this when you deal with them, they can help you or hurt you. As far as crappy sound guys, not much I can say except that you will be the ones in damage control mode and it's no more fun for the band as it is when the shoe's on the other foot.
