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Envelope filter headaches!

Welcome! @Akyarro most bass amps are gonna be a little too loud for home use, especially if it's an amp that's meant to be played with other musicians in the room. So you often have to fiddle with the volume knob to get it *just* right. As well, I'd recommend bringing down the low/bass frequencies on the amp, too; that stuff gets really loud, really quick in home environments.

If that is still proving really tricky to navigate, you could also grab a volume pedal (Ernie Ball VP Jr springs to mind) and put it after any other pedals you are using. That way you can send full bass signal to the pedals, and then just bring down the volume the amp is receiving. Personally, I'd try and find settings on my amp which worked alright for home play, but the volume pedal will definitely get the job done! I just prefer to work with what I have already as a first solution, before adding more tools to the mix.
 
Thanks for the welcome! My friends and I have a garage band going so I need the amp to be sufficiently loud to be heard over drums and 2 guitars, but when I need to quickly adjust my volume I prefer to do it at the bass and avoid walking over to the amp every time, that works but now with the envelope filter in the mix, the bass is maxed out and I have to adjust at the amp which is less than ideal. Not that it's a huge garage but being lazy sometimes gets in the way ;)
The volume pedal sounds like a great idea, I'll look into it, thanks again.
 
Thanks for the welcome! My friends and I have a garage band going so I need the amp to be sufficiently loud to be heard over drums and 2 guitars, but when I need to quickly adjust my volume I prefer to do it at the bass and avoid walking over to the amp every time, that works but now with the envelope filter in the mix, the bass is maxed out and I have to adjust at the amp which is less than ideal. Not that it's a huge garage but being lazy sometimes gets in the way ;)
The volume pedal sounds like a great idea, I'll look into it, thanks again.

Right on, that's cool. Yeah, you could set the amp so it's just a little bit too loud for normal playing, maybe let's call it "solo"ing level. But, y'know, bass solos. Lol.

But yeah, set it somewhere around there, and then just use the volume pedal to control your overall volume in the mix. No need to walk over to the amp, and you can keep your bass turned all the way up, for the sake of any pedals
 
Thanks for the welcome! My friends and I have a garage band going so I need the amp to be sufficiently loud to be heard over drums and 2 guitars, but when I need to quickly adjust my volume I prefer to do it at the bass and avoid walking over to the amp every time, that works but now with the envelope filter in the mix, the bass is maxed out and I have to adjust at the amp which is less than ideal. Not that it's a huge garage but being lazy sometimes gets in the way ;)
The volume pedal sounds like a great idea, I'll look into it, thanks again.
Is there not a way to control the output volume on the filter pedal?
 
The MXR Envelope does not have a volume on it unfortunately.
I see that there are signal booster pedals available (or preamps), I was wondering if this can be used instead in front of the envelope filter? With the bass volume at half, would this allow you to boost the signal sufficiently to activate the effects of the envelope filter?
 
The MXR Envelope does not have a volume on it unfortunately.
I see that there are signal booster pedals available (or preamps), I was wondering if this can be used instead in front of the envelope filter? With the bass volume at half, would this allow you to boost the signal sufficiently to activate the effects of the envelope filter?
If it's the M82, it's does. The Dry and FX knobs are the levels for each of those signals. Try fiddling with them to reach unity.
 
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I have had my best results with a multi fx. I do mostly "causal" gigs in restaurants with little to no sound check time.
it might not be the best envelope filter sound but it is reliable.
I'm currently using a korg pandora stomp. The patch has a compressor before the envelope filter and I need to dial in the treble on my bass to get a sound that can be heard. I also have a good patch with my zoom ms.
I could not get a good sound with my source audio or mxr with the time allotted to sound check.