EQ tips for playing with a guitarist using open D tuning?

[Lowendtech]

I'm with working with the guitarist to reshape his eq along with yours to strike a good balance. Do they make a HPF for guitars? I doubt that the problem lies with your setup as you've never had this issue before.

 

[Nickweissmusic]

You may want persuade your guitarist that his open D tuning generates to much of lowish 'transient' frequency content which may interefere with other instruments spectrum like your bass guitar.
An more 'acedemic' consideration what might actually happen under the hood with open D tuning of a 6-string may drawn on this thread
ohms and cabs and not enough noise
sorry it's kinda bashing thread so you may want read beside 'bashing noise and academic stuff'
Although the consideration refers to bassy EQ'd 6-string an open D tuning may cause similar artefacts like it is 'academically' described in this thread.
The solution to fix the issue is just the same. Proper EQ'ing of the 6-string open D tuning helps to get a well balanced total mix of the band.

This isn't a bad point... Keith Richards ditched his low E string to clean things up in open G, and open D is even lower... a lot of having a good bass mix is having the other instruments out of the way. I'll bet a high pass filter on the guitar would do a world of good. It's the most useful knob on my Radial Firefly.

 

[wallawallabob]

I very much doubt that his tuning has anything to do with your problems.
But he may have too much low end, which is not unusual in guitarists as often they use a full sound when playing alone and use the same sound with the band... and that low end interferes a lot. Getting him to tame the low end is likely to considerably open up a suitable gap where your bass will be. Also, if you use a Jazz with both pickups on (I don't know what you use, just an example), maybe switch to using only the neck one for a fat sound yet low-mids rich. Maybe a combination of both approaches will do the trick. However, a trio like yours should be easy to mix, so my guess would be overpowering lows from the guitarist.
Also, don't forget the drums. If the drums are mic'd and/or playing in a boomy stage, that kick drum can again produce crazy lows that might swamp you. It can happen too.

I also play in an trio (acoustic) - bass, drums (almost a cocktail set), guitar. Guitar Buddy plays standard E, drop D, C, and G tunings with 3 different guitars, plus a banjitar tuned E. He is more of a singer-songwriter type who played by himself for decades. Since he won't (can't) stay out my bass groove, I just make sure he dials down his low freq's and I dial mine up a bit (yes - I have to transpose my 4-banger). We don't play particularly loud, so this seems to work pretty well.

 

[Downunderwonder]

The problem is his EQ not the D note per se. High pass the guitar LF and all will open up.

 

[Ric5]

Not sure that this is in quite the right forum. Not sure that it is not. Anyways...

I just started playing in a trio - guitar, bass, drums. We play a variety of stuff from the 50 up to the present. Pop, rock, country, funk, disco, you name it. The guitar player is also the vocalist. He's good. The drummer is good. There's about 600 tunes on the playlist. We are booked into 2018. The gigs pay. Life is very good. BUT...

I am having a little difficulty dialling in my stage sound. I can't quite get both a full and punchy sound. It's either full, or punchy. This has not been a problem before. It's not like the guitarist plays all that loud, but the open D tuning he uses is making it hard to sit properly in the stage mix. I have never played with a guitarist who tunes like this, so if anyone has any ideas regarding EQ, cabinets, basses, pickups, whatever, I'd be grateful to hear about it.

Start with a flat eq ... dial in mids ... boost bass and treble as needed

 

[Downunderwonder]

Btw. That Jazz Chorus is one of the loudest meatiest guitar combos invented.

Perhaps a paradigm shift can get around the low mud scrap. If you can persuade him to put the cab to the side, tilt back at himself at relative low volume, and mic it into the PA, then hit the magic 100hz filter.

 

[primusfan1989]

I very much doubt that his tuning has anything to do with your problems.
But he may have too much low end, which is not unusual in guitarists as often they use a full sound when playing alone and use the same sound with the band... and that low end interferes a lot. Getting him to tame the low end is likely to considerably open up a suitable gap where your bass will be. Also, if you use a Jazz with both pickups on (I don't know what you use, just an example), maybe switch to using only the neck one for a fat sound yet low-mids rich. Maybe a combination of both approaches will do the trick. However, a trio like yours should be easy to mix, so my guess would be overpowering lows from the guitarist.
Also, don't forget the drums. If the drums are mic'd and/or playing in a boomy stage, that kick drum can again produce crazy lows that might swamp you. It can happen too.

Id agree with you, to me it seems like this whole thing could be resolved by the guitarist rolling the bass on his amp down a bit (then again not having heard the sound you guys make, i can only take guesses). Ive found when Im playing guitar I need to be aware of my bass settings as to not muddy up the mix, had that very issue this weekend on a guitar gig, rolled back my bass and everything started fit in the mix a bit better all around, I found that i was really stepping in the sonic territory of the bass and keys

 

[DukeLeJeune]

I'm not sure what your EQ is capable of, but the Ml112 is plenty strong in the 600Hz to 1k range, so boosting there is going to raise the mids even further, which in turn will convince your ears that the low end just got thinner. With most basses, I typically like the Ml112 with a little bump somewhere between 80Hz and 120Hz, depending on the room and then a little boost at 400Hz. Try that and see if you don't think the low end gets punchier.

^^This^^

 

[Spacecase]

Let's say you don't drop your E to D. Assuming you're playing a 4-string bass with standard tuning, the lowest D you can play will be at the same fundamental pitch as the open D on the guitar. That's bad juju for a bass player.

My opinion: Learn to play songs in drop-D tuning. With a bit of practice it's not all that tricky, and it'll open up your tonal palette for those tunes needing it. I think you'll find dropping to D will sound pretty good in the mix as long as the guitarist doesn't boost his bass to get a 'heavy' tone. That'd be another kind of badness to avoid.

 

[micguy]

I agree with several of the folks above. Chances are pretty good that the eq you need to change is on the guitarist's rig.

 

[Lowendtech]

Let's say you don't drop your E to D. Assuming you're playing a 4-string bass with standard tuning, the lowest D you can play will be at the same fundamental pitch as the open D on the guitar. That's bad juju for a bass player.

My opinion: Learn to play songs in drop-D tuning. With a bit of practice it's not all that tricky, and it'll open up your tonal palette for those tunes needing it. I think you'll find dropping to D will sound pretty good in the mix as long as the guitarist doesn't boost his bass to get a 'heavy' tone. That'd be another kind of badness to avoid.

Assuming? He's already stated several times that he's using a fiver.

 

[Spacecase]

Assuming? He's already stated several times that he's using a fiver.

Lordy. How did I miss that? Color me embarrassed, and apologies to the OP.

 

[beans-on-toast]

Having that data is amazing. How exactly do you use it adjust EQ to prevent frequency overlaps?

If you measure the guitar player alone you can see what frequencies they occupy. Repeat the process for the bass. Then decide how to sculpt the EQ. Some overlap is fine but if one is being swamped out it needs to be addressed.

These sort of measurements also take into account any effects from the room. The last segment in the video shows how the frequencies can be flattened, skikes removed, by adjusting the EQ. Similarly, taken one player at a time, you can adjust the amp EQ to clear up the soundscape.

An active bass can be harder to fit into the mix because of a wider range of frequencies. This can lead to instruments not having their own pocket to sit in because they are competing for the same frequencies. It can take time to balance everything.

 

[Emperor Elite]

I have a similar issue in my band. My guitar player uses a heavy Les Paul though a Bogner amp with a Bogner 4x12 cabinet, the combination of which generates a ton of low end bloom; especially on hollow stages. Even though he cuts the lows on his amp to 9 o'clock, he is still rumbly and blurs up my sonic space to the point where everyone is looking at me when there is boom on stage, even though I'm not playing. Even worse, we have a keyboard player that uses a full blown 1000W PA system as a personal monitor. His generates a ton of low end with his left hand. As a result, I get totally lost in the mix. It got to the point that my sound engineer begged me to play with a pick, so that he could slot me better into the mix. That actually solved most of the problem, and I really do enjoy playing with a pick, so I did that for a while, but then figured there had to be a better way.

I did a lot of research and experimentation, and recently I found an excellent solution. I was playing my basses (with Precision pickups) though either a Markbass 2x10 combo or an Alembic F1-X and an Epifani T410UL cabinet, depending on the size of the room. Both rigs are excellent and sound great, but are voiced to have a noticeable, and very satisfying bump in the deep low mids. Consequently, they sound muscular, but they can rumble a bit on on a hollow stage, and that boominess and rumble is aggravated by my low-mid greedy guitar player and the left hand of my keyboard player. Everything was a blurry mess. My solution was to go with a tighter, more precise amp (Glockenklang) which helped quite bit, but didn't fully solve the problem. The silver bullet was when I switched to a more neutral-sounding cabinet that didn't have a pronounced, built in low-mid hump, a fEARful 15/6/1, (the OP's MI112 cabinet is also excellent in this regard). I gave the cabinet a little bump at 300-350Hz, while cutting 2k by 3db. Voila, problem totally solved. The difference on stage was profound. My sound engineer could not believe it. He was delighted. Not that I ever need to, but if I want to I can get crazy loud with no boom, and I mean no boom whatsoever. This new setup is fantastic. Best of all, everyone on stage can hear me. With the addition of that 6" speaker in my cabinet, my on-stage sound dispersion is excellent. Now, whenever there is boom onstage, everyone looks at the guitar player. PERFECT!

I bet most of your problems can be solved with EQing, and am curious to learn what happened when you bumped 100Hz and 400Hz, like Duke suggested. If that doesn't work, and you haven't tried playing with a pick, please do give it a try.

 

[Lowendtech]

Even worse, we have a keyboard player that uses a full blown 1000W PA system as a personal monitor. His generates a ton of low end with his left hand

Here's my quick fix for this.

1000w personal PA? Ugh.

 

[Groove Doctor]

Guitarists that keep their chord voicings up the neck are uncommon these days.
I (half) jokingly retort "If you wanna play bass, buy a freakin' bass"

complementary EQ... in other words, make your cabs ZIG where his cab ZAGs, so that your individual tones fit together like a two-piece jigsaw puzzle.

.. a lot of having a good bass mix is having the other instruments out of the way. I'll bet a high pass filter on the guitar would do a world of good.

Btw. That Jazz Chorus is one of the loudest meatiest guitar combos invented.

Perhaps a paradigm shift can get around the low mud scrap. If you can persuade him to put the cab to the side, tilt back at himself at relative low volume, and mic it into the PA, then hit the magic 100hz filter.

+1 All these suggestions are great.

Also, get the guitarists amp >2ft off the floor. On a table or couple of milk crates. That'll reduce the boom by decoupling the speaker from the floor. Also - If it's closer to ear level & pointing at his ears he won't need it as loud.

 

[Stumbo]

Guitarists that keep their chord voicings up the neck are uncommon these days.
I (half) jokingly retort "If you wanna play bass, buy a freakin' bass"







+1 All these suggestions are great.

Also, get the guitarists amp >2ft off the floor. On a table or couple of milk crates. That'll reduce the boom by decoupling the speaker from the floor. Also - If it's closer to ear level & pointing at his ears he won't need it as loud.

Tilt back amp stand might do it. Also, if you decouple your cab from the stage with a stand or pad, that may also help.

 

[esoxhntr]

Apparently, the correct answer was a sealed 212 cabinet.

 

[kapaauguy]

If your guitarist doesnt want to vacate your sonic space then take the space where he should be. Go for a Entwistle-ish high mid screaming tone and play some of his melodic parts as well. Your bass will jump right to the front of the mix and believe me....he is going to be much more responsive to EQ changes at that point with his guitar low droning in the background.