I usually have my volume control all the way up. When things get very quiet (playing behind my pastor who is not on a mic, for instance), I do turn down significantly.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Do you run your bass' volume control wide open?
- Thread starter Bob Coldwell
- Start date
JazznFunk
Supporting Member
Active with a pickup pan? Full on, all the time. If I need volume swells, I use a volume pedal. Giving full volume all the time gives the best signal-to-noise ratio and fullness of tone to the amp, FOH, etc. Passive? Depends. I'll alter the pickup volumes on a J Bass depending on the tone I want, and the tone control as well to compensate for those changes. P-Bass is on full all the time. If you start messing around with changing the volume on the bass itself a bunch, you alter all of the gain staging down the line with any effects, etc you may be using. Not my thing.
I run my passive basses 100% wide open, all the time. For my active basses, it depends. I usually run the volume at about 90-95% on my G&Ls, because they send a HOT signal; I find rolling off that little bit doesn't lose any tone and is easier to avoid overdriving the preamp on the amp. This may be a unique-to-G&L thing, as there are many threads on how they don't need to be wide open all the time. On my Modulus I do run it 100%, and it's active (EMG pickups and pre).
FullumMusic
Commercial User
- Oct 13, 2022
- 2,010
- 5,685
- Disclosures
- Audio/Music software developer, contracted with a company you've heard of and deving my own stuff.
Absolutely feasible!
Not exactly the same as what you want to do, but this is my 1994 Ibanez SR400. PJ parallel into the two buttons. One is Tone 100% open/100% rolled off. The other is a mute. And when i have the time and motivation, i'm going to either un-hook the tone button, or both buttons and go straight to the output jack.
I did this because, on my 2 pickup basses, i only ever play with both pups 100% & tone wide open. It's fantastic.
--
In reference to the OP:
All my basses i play with the volume pot full-open.
Volume adjustments are done at the FOH or on my amp.
Lowering volume on the bass means the signal takes a tone-hit + don't hit the compressor the same + doesn't hit the gain on the amp the same.
Last edited:
Maybe this should be a poll… passive 90%, active 60-75%.
I place my set screws on the control knobs so I can at a glance tell where volume, treble, mids and bass are set as an easy reference.
I place my set screws on the control knobs so I can at a glance tell where volume, treble, mids and bass are set as an easy reference.
I used to adjust volume as needed (both active and passive) until I was instructed by several musicians to leave the volume on full and adjust the amp or technique as needed. This works for me.
This little passive gizmo is useful. Can even be attached to a strap.
Good for long cable runs too.
If volume should just be at full, then we should all just replace the knob with a switch.
I don't mean that in a snarky way, just a thought that occurred to me now. I might have to try it sometime.
I don't mean that in a snarky way, just a thought that occurred to me now. I might have to try it sometime.
That is yet another load on the pickups - if that's what you want, great, but if you want less load, it can't help you at all.
Agree - tone drops off with vol drop off on passive basses.
Treble bleeds are the answer for me - I get the same tone at 80% when plucking, leaving me some extra headroom for pick, slap or dub reggae.
Jazz basses lose some humbucking when the vols are different from each other.
Active basses are uneffected by a vol drop.
I use an optical vol pedal for theatre work.
I know that Radial makes nice DI's, but I'm having my doubts about the efficacy of this device...
Can't find a bass demo but this demonstrates what it does. Looks like it's in the center position to start, then 3 turns one way and 6 the opposite direction to it's brightest setting.
On my bass it does the same. Whether I have the bass volume pot 100% or rolled back.
With a 30' coil cable I hear less highs with the volume pot 100% than I do with a 6' cable. With the Dragster I can get the same highs/brightness with the coil cable as with the 6' cable. At least to my ears.
However it works or precisely what it's doing I don't know, but I like what I'm hearing with it on my board.
Dragster>Broughton Always On HPF> Keeley Bassist
Last edited:
Sounds like it works for you!
I hook my bass to my Broughton high/low pass filter with a 4' cable. The HP/LP filter connects to the amp with an 18" cable and I don't lack for anything in the frequency range that I want to hear...
Last edited:
The reason I got one is because at the time, Radial's description of it on their site mentioned it helps with long cable runs. I like coiled cables so that's why I got it. Their current description doesn't mention it.Sounds like it works for you!
I've only used it with passive basses.
It is an additional shunt load on your instrument - if you have too much "snap" in your sound, it can dial that back. It won't go the other way - if your bass has too much rolloff from a long cable, it won't fix that.
That said, a tone control does pretty much the same thing through the top half of its range - it's a shunt load on the pickups.
The volume knob is not just about controlling bass volume. It also affects the tone. For example, with passive jazz basses that are wired parallel (basically all stock passive Fender jazz basses that I know of) a trick to get a fatter neck pickup sound is to roll back the neck pickup volume about 5-10% and make up for volume loss by turning the amp up a hair. Basically think of it like that last 10% of the volume control for the neck pickup really only increases the volume of the highs. It doesn’t increase lows, mids, and highs uniformly. Also this trick is a different sound than just rolling back the tone control. Even when I’m running both pickups and tone control wide open I have the bridge pickup wide open but my neck pickup at 90%. It sounds more in phase that way and provides a deeper bolder tone. I usually roll the bridge pickup volume back 60% or so just because I prefer that tone. I use noiseless Fralins.
