Educate me on bi-amping

[slapshot]

I have developed some serious GAS for amps recently, which is something I previously gave very little thought. Mostly used ampeg/acoustic/peavey solid-state combos throughout the years, but after recently buying a few tube amps I have developed a whole new facet of my gear addiction.

I have always just played various genres of rock, plug in a muff fuzz and go. Now I have been playing in a stoner/doom group and I read about how bi-amping can help cut through the mix when stacked up against distorted guitar with heavy mids/lows.

Now while I understand the concept, I don’t understand the execution. Is it possible to bi-amp with 1 head through 2 cabs? I assume most people bi-amp with a pedal that has dual outputs, but how does that work if youre trying to keep one signal completely clean? When bi-amping with a rickenbacker (queued up to be my next purchase they are essential doom equipment, no?) using a split cable how do you determine the “high” and “low” signals? Or are they identical and the dynamics boil down to EQing of the amp? I am just trying to not blow a guitar cabinet by feeding it a bass signal the speakers arent designed to support.

Additionally I am trying to figure out the amp configuration. The most common setup I believe is to run the clean bass signal through a SS bass amp, and the high signal through a tube guitar amp. I assume many people run 2+ of the same rig, unless the walls of marshall/orange amps you see at metal shows are just for aesthetics. I believe conventional wisdom says that 15” speakers are better for bass response, and 10” are better for crisp highs but from browsing this forum its clear that no two speakers are created equally regardless of size. So maybe suggestions on what speakers have which characteristics or which prefabbed cabinets are designed for what applications? Ideally I think I would run a musicman sixtyfive 212/210 for the highs and a 100 watt all-tube amp (I have a weber kit but am also on the hunt for a Bassman 100/Sunn 100s/Ampeg V4B) through a 115 cab for the lows.

Any information would be greatly appreciated. Please steer me in the right direction. Especially when it comes to old sunns and guitar amps. I. Know. Nothing. Im sure that is evident already.

Cheers

Yes, it's possible to Bi-amp with a single head, if it has the necessary set-up. Peavey made a rack-mount head, the MegaBass, that had a built-in crossover circuit. It was meant to be paired with their 36-20 cabinet that was built specifically for bi-amping with inputs for low/high signals or full range(and some others, but don't remember what was available). I always set mine at 700Hz. Lows were routed to the 18s and highs routed to the 10s.

 

[BigTreble]

Today there are some really great cabinets that cover a wide spectrum of sounds. Preamps and running into the PA also provide many sounds and possibilities.

A full range cabinet with say a 1"/6"/15" driver array is going to have a crossover inside of it (or should) designed around those specific drivers in that configuration. Sometimes lots goes into crossover design, sometimes not. The better sounding ones are usually ones that have been properly designed.

And proper design is key. An active crossover, 2 amps and 2 cabs CAN sound great, but if you have no idea what you're doing you can run into all sorts of problems with phase cancellation etc. It may just be a knob or two on a box, but proper crossover design is a lot of work. Granted in lower frequencies some things are easier to manage... Nobody wants a big hole in the middle of their bass signal. At least I don't.

I use active crossovers and multiple amps in my home stereo system and it's probably more trouble than its worth. I definitely miss a single amp and 2 speakers with a passive crossover.

But the Stoner/Doom metal crowd marches to their own drummer, and what works for them may not even seem logical to some of us. They may be the ones to ask.

 

[slapshot]

Yes, it's possible to Bi-amp with a single head, if it has the necessary set-up. Peavey made a rack-mount head, the MegaBass, that had a built-in crossover circuit. It was meant to be paired with their 36-20 cabinet that was built specifically for bi-amping with inputs for low/high signals or full range(and some others, but don't remember what was available). I always set mine at 700Hz. Lows were routed to the 18s and highs routed to the 10s.

Edit: the crossover was set at 400Hz. Hit the wrong key.

 

[agedhorse]

Note that threatening the sound guy as @BrickBatMansion suggests rarely ends well for the player. In fact, it's the quickest way to get zero bass support in the PA and lose out on places to play in the future (if you don't get sent packing right then and there).

 

[40Hz]

I used to biamp regularly back in the 80s. For me it was a way of getting around the limitations of the cabs of that era. With the advent of better designed amps and the new full range cabs such as those made by Greenboy, Audiokinesis et al, biamping isn’t really necessary anymore. You can achieve the same sound (and better!) by using a more modern amp and cab.

If you use a lot of effects you might want to explore things like the 4-cable method which only neds a single amp, or a “wet/dry” or “wet/dry/wet” signal chain which uses two amps. There’s a good albeit wordy breakdown of how that all works here.

Can’t speak for everyone, but I’ve found trying to do stereo with bass is pretty much a waste in a live performance setting. The channels don’t stay separated like they do with a guitar running in stereo. The L/R bass channels just mush together in the room and the stereo effect basically disappears. For a recording it can work. But most times the final master mix is going to put the bass in the center channel anyway. So it’s seldom (IMO) worth the effort to go stereo with anything on bass unless you have something very unusual in mind.

One really easy thing to try (it’s a very rudimentary wet/dry setup) if you have two amps is to get a splitter. Plug your bass into the splitter and run one cable straight into on amp, and the other into whatever effects you use and then plug all that into the second amp. The results can be surprising. But with bass you’ll notice the effect will often be much less dramatic.

In this video, if you fast forward to the 3:38 mark you can hear this approach being demonstrated on guitar.



Try listening to it with headphones first to get an idea of how it would sound live or in stereo. Then play it back through your phone and see what happens when it gets reduced to a mono playback. That “mono-ization“ is what tends to happen with bass. The overall sound may be cleaner. But that sense of space frequently disappears at stage volume levels.

Still, hands-on is everything.You never really know what’ll work for you until you try it with your music and your own gear. So best bet is to experiment with what you’ve already got until you’ve explored all those possibilities first. And only then start adding new things - preferably one at a time - until you get to where you want to be. If you take a systematic approach you’ll get there quicker and for less money than if you just start adding things willy-nilly. Otherwise you’ll be out some serious bucks while sitting on a pile of gear you end up never using and hopefully can sell.

Luck!

 

[Passinwind]

Note that threatening the sound guy as @BrickBatMansion suggests rarely ends well for the player. In fact, it's the quickest way to get zero bass support in the PA and lose out on places to play in the future (if you don't get sent packing right then and there).

Yep, but there's a really easy answer to that: just hire in someone sympatico to run FOH. The other A1 in the club I worked in always owed me for something or other, so on the rare occasions when I actually felt like hauling one my big convoluted rigs out everyone worked together respectfully and we just maybe all learned some new things. What a concept, eh?

 

[LanEvo]

One big thing to keep in mind with multi-amp rigs is to make sure everything ends up in phase.

 

[agedhorse]

Yep, but there's a really easy answer to that: just hire in someone sympatico to run FOH. The other A1 in the club I worked in always owed me for something or other, so on the rare occasions when I actually felt like hauling one my big convoluted rigs out everyone worked together respectfully and we just maybe all learned some new things. What a concept, eh?

I seriously doubt that most players in that situation would have even a bit of influence over who is hired to mix.

You having a background in pro audio places you in a different relationship with other in that industry... professional courtesy of sorts.

Just my experience.

 

[Passinwind]

I seriously doubt that most players in that situation would have even a bit of influence over who is hired to mix.

You having a background in pro audio places you in a different relationship with other in that industry... professional courtesy of sorts.

Just my experience.

Roger that. In that club we had a policy of matching the man behind the curtain to the talent as much as possible. Bands were welcome to request a specific guy and we could provide and/or accommodate guest band engineers in a few different ways depending on budget. And we actually read and paid attention to tech riders, so most problems were really on the band or their management. I was often told that our club was an outlier, in a good way. But as you know, no good deed goes unpunished!

 

[dbsfgyd1]

While in this era of the micro ultra light gear, bi-amping has gone the way of the dodo. Back in the day, bi-amping was done for frequency as speakers had a much more limited range. Today, most speaker cab come with full range speaker, may have a tweeter for additional clarity, and or a smaller speaker for more mid range punch. The bottom line, bi-amping for frequency reasons is a waste.

IMO, bi-amping still can be used to day for things like effects. Personally, most of the gigs I play I’m using a stereo amp with cabs with different characteristics. Eden World Tour stereo heads allow you bi-amp with a built in crossover if that’s what you want, but for most, Multiple cabs and use of the stereo balance control, you will basically get the same effect while being able to use the cab’s full available frequency range.

Eden’s, Navigator preamp (see my avatar rack) in addition, offers optical compression, the ability to mix in a side chain in addition to the features listed above. You would need a power amp to drive the speakers.

I will say this, Eden WT Heads are stereo, which means two transformers, and much heavier that your basic class D heads, but they are packed with features will allow you the maximum options possible for creating a rig(s).

 

[Nev375]

I went through a phase in the late 90's, early 2000s where I had to have a big complicated rack system. I experimented with actual bi-amp, dual-amp, clean/dirty and .5 aligned dual amp rigs.

Now that I'm older and slightly wiser I understand the beauty and genius of keeping things simple.

 

[MYLOWFREQ]

I belive you want to run a dirty guitar amp along with your clean bass rig rather than bi-amping which is more splitting your full range signal into lows and highs and sending them to different speakers usung a crossover.

If so, then you ideally need a hi-pass filter for the signal that's being sent to the guitar amp so you don't potentially blow up the speaker (still be careful, but I don't think you'd harm a guitar amp if you set the hipass filter above let's say 180Hz).

 

[Jack Butler]

1001 RB Specs — Gallien-Krueger

 

[Mostyn]

 

[Anemic_SluG]

Yes, it's possible to Bi-amp with a single head, if it has the necessary set-up. Peavey made a rack-mount head, the MegaBass, that had a built-in crossover circuit. It was meant to be paired with their 36-20 cabinet that was built specifically for bi-amping with inputs for low/high signals or full range(and some others, but don't remember what was available). I always set mine at 700Hz. Lows were routed to the 18s and highs routed to the 10s.

I still own a Peavey Megabass head and one 1516 cabinet. It’s a 15 for the lows powered by 200 watts and 2 8” drivers for the highs also powered with a separate 200 watt amp in the same head. Back in the day I had 2 cabs which covered most everything. You could run distortion or effects through the loop and the signal would only go through the 8” speakers leaving the clean lows through the 15’s. It had 2 balanced line outs for the sound guy as well. It is a true bi-amp rig with a crossover. It still sounds great and did clean up the sound back in the day.
However with all the new effects pedals of today that have a clean blend knob you don’t need a fancy biamp’d rig to separate your lows and distortion.

If you want to multi amp ala Royal Blood that is a whole different game and set of equipment.
Lastly here is a Sherman rig rundown of his bi-amp 2 signal rig.

 

[Blankandson]

Honestly back in the dark ages of bass amplification the 15" is better for bass and the 10" better for highs was pretty much true but today with Well designed cabs the 10's can equal if not outperform the 15's.

Some swear that a few 7" speakers can equal if not outperform the 15's.

 

[elpancho]

Bummer it gets a bad rep, I like my killer sound running full range lows with 15 and all effect going to the 410 only, im good

 

[Adam Tuttle]

As others have said there is a different between bi-amp and dual amp set up. I have spent the last few years developing my two amp set up and am supper happy with what I have. I play black metal/grind/drone/stoner and this set up is very versatile. Both sides are a dirty, but my bass heavy side is less so. I tried use a few different bi-amp set-ups with filters, but its really easy to screw up. With two different amps it's harder to mess up. I'm running a Hilbish Beta pre amp with both channels into their own a Crest power amp 3.0 channel.

 

[PawleeP]

You can also use the Tech21 dUg Pinnick DP-3X pedal and get the same affect through a single amp and cab.

sure pal, whatever you say

 

[PawleeP]

What you're talking about is not bi-amping, splitting a single source signal (PA, bass guitar, etc.) at a certain crossover frequency into dedicated amps and speakers for lows and highs. This was done in bass guitars in the 70's and 80's, and for most, its time has come and gone with the advent of current technology. Modern amps and cabinets have made it unnecessary these days. I did it back in the day, but would not now.

There are lots of cabinets with several different size speakers in them (PA bins, home hi-fi, lots of bass guitar cabinets) driven off single amps, but these used passive crossovers inside the cabinet (an electronic circuit) that divides and sends the right frequencies to the right speaker inside the cabinet.

Now, some guys may still bi-amp for effects following the technique that you leave your big fundamentals, the low end of the split, unaffected and clean, then use the upper part of the signal for the applied effects (chorus, distortion, etc.). We see this practice followed electronically in some bass pedals, and you can still use your regular amp and cabinets with those.

You're talking more about a split signal (which can be done with any bass, not just Rickenbackers, with a 'Y' cable) where you're split-sending signal to a bass amp for your bass tone, and generally a smaller guitar amp for distortion, from the bass guitar. This would be easier than trying to do this with splitting cabinets off one head, by far, which most likely wouldn't work, two amps work best for this. Sending big bass through guitar cabinets is generally a recipe for disaster at any kind of loud levels: They're generally not built for that.

Now you could do this with a Rickenbacker with the separate outs, but don't get confused by those: Those outputs aren't 'stereo', nor are they after a crossover inside the bass. It's actually an output for each pickup. So you could use the neck pickup to drive a bass amp (the deeper sounding of the two) and the bridge pickup for the guitar amp and effects (the thinner sounding of the two). One bass, two cables, two amps, but you'd have to match the amps so one would not drown out the other.

I'd also advise steering clear of old Sunns or any of the other ancient sleds: Unless they're VERY properly maintained, they were built for a different time . . . . . a long time ago. What slightly different preferred tone you might think you hear would be far outweighed by maintenance headaches for those of us that aren't touring with guitar roadies and electronic techs. I'm old enough to have used a lot of the ancient 'lead sleds' back in my time, and would NOT trade them for modern gear.

Here's one of the 'Rig Rundown' vids from PREMIER GUITAR about Stanley Clarke's touring rig from 2011. SC was running a small Fender guitar amp for a distortion edge on some tunes, and here his tech explains how they did it, right around the 3:00 mark:

Rig Rundown - Stanley Clarke

The two Alembics run off 18v phantom power (those big plug-in cables on the face of the two Alembics just below the knobs), and the 'preamps' his tech is talking about are actually Alembic DS5R power supplies for each bass in the top rack. These have HIGH, LOW, and FULL RANGE outputs, and for one of the amps, they tapped the HIGH output (while still feeding the Ampeg heads simultaneously from the FULL RANGE output) to go to that Fender amp for one of the Alembics. Mic'd up thru the house and monitors, it's 'big enough'. It's similar to the Rickenbacker setup, the HIGH is the bridge pickup, the LOW is the neck pickup, and FULL RANGE is both pickups.

Now most of us don't have the advantage of touring with a trunk full of Alembic gear, but this illustration of the idea is what you want to take away for the best way to do this: Ideally, to feed a signal short of the deep end of the signal to a suitable guitar amp.

There's several ways to do it, and you'll have to decide what's best for you.

AND . . . . . however you do this, MAKE SURE you've got it squared away and it WORKS, every time. The surest way to lose gigs is to show up with some half-ass, only-works-if-I-hold-my-mouth-just-right rig that you're fighting all night long to keep it running. Mess up like that on a regular basis, and you'll be back gigging in the bedroom so fast you won't believe it. Being a pro and green are NOT mutually exclusive, and very few will give you time to grow up on the bandstand. With the real musicians, being prepared is an expected given.

Been here, this is a good point although i do love experimenting and having a good full tone, a disaster at a gig doesn't usually end well ..