Hadn't seen this. Looks like an excellent replacement for the failure-prone D-TAR. Video demo on acoustic guitar sounds very good.
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Double bass vs eletric in a mix
- Thread starter tutubass
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Hadn't seen this. Looks like an excellent replacement for the failure-prone D-TAR. Video demo on acoustic guitar sounds very good.
He likes to be controversial for controversy's sake and it really spoils his status as a very good sax player. I have gotten tired of his non musical content a long time ago and it is sad because sometimes it makes me also not like to watch his musical performances.
I don't agree. I am very committed double bass player and use it in ways beyond walking bass. I am a fan of Mark Dresser and our very own Damon Smith - plus Daniele Roccato, Gary Peacock, William Parker , Renaud and Joelle Leandre --- I love Stanley and Christians electric playing or even when Dave Holland dabbles but I like them first and foremost as upright bass players . Both can play arco and I prefer Stanley over Christian for that Dave too I believe but it is rarer.
I respect whatever bass anyone plays but there is a reason I play a double bass and hope to be able to do it for thee remainder of my time on earth. For me it is futile to find a substitute.
I don't agree. I am very committed double bass player and use it in ways beyond walking bass. I am a fan of Mark Dresser and our very own Damon Smith - plus Daniele Roccato, Gary Peacock, William Parker , Renaud and Joelle Leandre --- I love Stanley and Christians electric playing or even when Dave Holland dabbles but I like them first and foremost as upright bass players . Both can play arco and I prefer Stanley over Christian for that Dave too I believe but it is rarer.
I respect whatever bass anyone plays but there is a reason I play a double bass and hope to be able to do it for thee remainder of my time on earth. For me it is futile to find a substitute.
You can just stop at flats and it isn't even necessary maybe a foam. If we are talking jazz -- that's probably why Patrick made the comment in the first place is that the playing and attitude is more important than the accuracy of the tone itself. You can have all the IRs and what not and it still will not sound convincing. Why does Steve Swallow sound good with a pick and a bass guitar - well he started first on upright bass. I think he as well as Jamerson sound and play like they do is because of their DB experience and although not obvious at first, the way Stanley "tortures or aggressively plays " his 30 scale Alembic that way is because of the physicality he had with the upright.
I play jazz on a P bass. My feeling is that trying to get an electric to sound like an upright is a waste of time. Playing jazz on electric bass is a thing in itself and my experience is that the jazz ‘vibe’ is less about tone and emulation and much more about knowing how to play the actual music.
I don’t see guitar players trying to emulate arch-tops, they show up and play jazz on strats / teles / whatever. Drummers play jazz just fine on bright sounding modern kits with sticks, not just old minimal kits with brushes. People play jazz using lots of different instruments.
Upright bass is an amazing instrument, but to me emulating it seems pointless, it’s a bit like trying to emulate electric bass on a synth. At best it’s a poor substitute. There are lots of players out there playing jazz on electric bass and sounding insanely good without worrying too much about getting close to the tone of another instrument.
I don’t see guitar players trying to emulate arch-tops, they show up and play jazz on strats / teles / whatever. Drummers play jazz just fine on bright sounding modern kits with sticks, not just old minimal kits with brushes. People play jazz using lots of different instruments.
Upright bass is an amazing instrument, but to me emulating it seems pointless, it’s a bit like trying to emulate electric bass on a synth. At best it’s a poor substitute. There are lots of players out there playing jazz on electric bass and sounding insanely good without worrying too much about getting close to the tone of another instrument.
The Tone Dexter is basically an (finite impulse response: FIR) multifilter bank that gets its parameters from the training algorithm to get the same frequency response from the pickup as from the mic.
What it does not do is modeling resonances (at best very short ones) and dynamic envelope of a note. So a sustainy note keeps the same sustain. So EUBs and BG with a long sustain keep it.
In general I don’t like foam dampers close to the bridge as they kill the higher frequency components quicker than the lower ones, getting a muddy sound rather quickly. Together with a tone dexter they theoretically might work (at least to ascertain degree), but since both don’t have a representative acoustic sound, training won’t work. Using and modifying (!) for a DB wavemap might work, but with a lot of manual tuning. And don’t forget that different pickups sound differently, so a piezo trained DB wavemap might not work without massive tweaking on a magnetic pickup. And for piezo vs. piezo, a different position on a bridge delivers different sound, even the bridge itself influences at the same position.
It might be possible to use a wavemap or impulse response (IR) to sound closer to a DB, but it would never be the same.
BTW the IR devices are basically a tone dexter without the training functionality, so the pickup needs to take the the signal at the same position as exitated for the IR, typically a knock on the top of the bridge.
I put a piezo disk under the bridge of my cheap 6-string BG. Soldering point into the hole that already existed there into the electronics cavity.
Wired it in parallel to one pickup or the active output, not good, I know, but still get some acoustic vibe too. Just did it out of curiosity and it stayed there.
Just saying that a piezo (with impedance buffer), flatwounds or tapewounds and more plucking force and more flesh can make a difference.
One problem with BG strings is that they all have a solid wire as a core, an aircraft cable as a core would make a difference too, but might allow the string to vibrate too wide for a BG.
Wired it in parallel to one pickup or the active output, not good, I know, but still get some acoustic vibe too. Just did it out of curiosity and it stayed there.
Just saying that a piezo (with impedance buffer), flatwounds or tapewounds and more plucking force and more flesh can make a difference.
One problem with BG strings is that they all have a solid wire as a core, an aircraft cable as a core would make a difference too, but might allow the string to vibrate too wide for a BG.
For those of you who diss soundmen, I will say I’ve attended plenty of shows where it seemed that the soundman had no idea what a DB actually sounds like. It would be way too loud in the mix and sounded like a bass guitar, with a booming low end.
But that’s only recently…for over five decades he used roundwounds and has always played BG with a pick. He always used a pick and for many years he used a copper pick.
As he stated in that interview, he’s been moving towards recreating the sound he used to get on a DB with gut strings.
But that’s only recently…for over five decades he used roundwounds and has always played BG with a pick. He always used a pick and for many years he used a copper pick.
As he stated in that interview, he’s been moving towards recreating the sound he used to get on a DB with gut strings.
Steve Swallow is somewhat of a bass anomaly. The apocryphal story is that he lent his Double Bass to a friend and that it was never returned to him. So he took EB and liked it. I’ve heard him play live through his personal Walter Woods MI-100-8 a 1x15 cab. The Citron bass he plays is live acoustically and his pick technique is also unique. He kind of grazes the string sideways. Sliding the pick over the string. It does approximate the DB sound along with his years of playing DB.
I’ve been playing upright about half the number of years I’ve been playing EB.
I play mostly bluegrass on my UB, but also play some pop & folk with bluegrass instrumentation. Due to size & transport of UB, I’ve been working to make EB & uke bass sound more like UB for a couple decades.
Here’s my conclusion;
1. Most players want the sound of their amplified UB to sound just like their UB played acoustically. As @Wasnex explained; MBOL. That’s hard. A large diaphragm condenser mic straight out from the bridge on a stand is the best thing I’ve found, and that’s not practical in a lot of settings.
2. So, most upright players (me included) use some version of a piezo pickup on / under their bridge, which makes their upright sound like a big fretless EB.
3. What I’ve discovered is that I can make an EB and a uke bass sound about as good as my upright amplified. None of them, including my upright using the piezo on the bridge, sound like my UB played purely acoustic
So if I can get my upright to a gig OK, and I can play acoustically or into a condenser mic, I use my upright, and the reason is mostly because of how I play songs on my upright. I play in different locations on the fingerboard on different strings than I play on EB. That also has a lot to do with how I sound on UB regardless of what type of music I’m playing.
I play mostly bluegrass on my UB, but also play some pop & folk with bluegrass instrumentation. Due to size & transport of UB, I’ve been working to make EB & uke bass sound more like UB for a couple decades.
Here’s my conclusion;
1. Most players want the sound of their amplified UB to sound just like their UB played acoustically. As @Wasnex explained; MBOL. That’s hard. A large diaphragm condenser mic straight out from the bridge on a stand is the best thing I’ve found, and that’s not practical in a lot of settings.
2. So, most upright players (me included) use some version of a piezo pickup on / under their bridge, which makes their upright sound like a big fretless EB.
3. What I’ve discovered is that I can make an EB and a uke bass sound about as good as my upright amplified. None of them, including my upright using the piezo on the bridge, sound like my UB played purely acoustic
So if I can get my upright to a gig OK, and I can play acoustically or into a condenser mic, I use my upright, and the reason is mostly because of how I play songs on my upright. I play in different locations on the fingerboard on different strings than I play on EB. That also has a lot to do with how I sound on UB regardless of what type of music I’m playing.
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Sometimes incredible musicians can't explain things in rational terms. That is painful to watch/listen to even 30 seconds of.
A couple of opinions here from my experience.
First - piezos all sound like crap without a TON of processing. There is no magic to them, and they don't reproduce acoustic tonality (at least on DB). They are however, a necessary evil for most of us. Slapping one on a fretless BG doesn't transform it to anything close to acoustic DB.
There are a handful of videos out there with gents getting really good approximation of DB on BG's, but it's as more about time/feel/note choice then it is tone. It can be a hard concept to try to describe to someone who hasn't played both instruments for years, but DB has such a different feel and attack to it, plus percussive elements. My mental approach to playing one is completely different than playing the other.
I agree that the Ubass gets closer than a BG in the right set of hands.
Ironically I got into DB when I ended up playing playing in a jazz/swing/jump blues combo years ago. The guitar player kept sending me songs to learn, and all of them had DB players on them. After trying for a year to cop those lines onto my Fender, I gave up and bought an DB.
A couple of opinions here from my experience.
First - piezos all sound like crap without a TON of processing. There is no magic to them, and they don't reproduce acoustic tonality (at least on DB). They are however, a necessary evil for most of us. Slapping one on a fretless BG doesn't transform it to anything close to acoustic DB.
There are a handful of videos out there with gents getting really good approximation of DB on BG's, but it's as more about time/feel/note choice then it is tone. It can be a hard concept to try to describe to someone who hasn't played both instruments for years, but DB has such a different feel and attack to it, plus percussive elements. My mental approach to playing one is completely different than playing the other.
I agree that the Ubass gets closer than a BG in the right set of hands.
Ironically I got into DB when I ended up playing playing in a jazz/swing/jump blues combo years ago. The guitar player kept sending me songs to learn, and all of them had DB players on them. After trying for a year to cop those lines onto my Fender, I gave up and bought an DB.
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The magic is if the piezos are in the bridge saddles. I agree it does not sound exactly like a DB, but it does sample the vibrations at the point that is most characteristically DB in terms of both comb filtering and dynamic envelope. Still never going to sound exactly like a DB, but IMHO it's possible to get a little closer (in some ways)...especially if you also apply suitable processing
.what would be suitable processing?The magic is if the piezos are in the bridge saddles. I agree it does not sound exactly like a DB, but it does sample the vibrations at the point that is most characteristically DB in terms of both comb filtering and dynamic envelope. Still never going to sound exactly like a DB, but IMHO it's possible to get a little closer (in some ways)...especially if you also apply suitable processing
A high-impedance buffer and EQ to include an HPF could be useful.
A soild bodied instrument supports fundamentals and overtones for a long time. A hollow bodied instrument steals energy from the strings - high frequencies die out fast, then the mids, etc. flat woulds do a similar thing, which is why Leo put flats on Precisions. Round wound strings pre-date bass guitars by hundreds of years (pianos, harpsichords), which means flats were an intentional choice.
This is probably relevant in some way
AFAIK longer scale basses tend to produce more fundamental in relation to harmonics. For context, a standard upright often has 42" scale vs 34" scale for the standard bass guitar. However, AFAIK the standard upright is not big enough to acoustically radiate strong fundamentals below approximately the open G string. So AFAIK you have some factors that sort of work against each other.
I will add that my 42" scale, NS Design EU6 (solid-body, electric upright) has the most incredible low B I have ever experience.
