Going into battle vs. distorted guitars

[bassrique]

Without hearing your band I don't have an opinion other than this "cutting through the mix" thing is overrated. Fieldy cuts thought the mix and it sounds awful. Guitar heavy music is just that - guitar heavy. It tends not to breathe much and suffocates the bass. That's ok of it's done well, bit it's not my thing. I second the opinion that your sound is a band decision. Volume wars are recipes for bad sound and a bad band chemistry. We can't forget that with that genfre of music, the bass is truly a supportive instrument perhaps better felt than heard.

 

[Gringo Basso]

Over the years I've mostly played with groups doing lighter rock, pop, acoustic, piano, etc. For the first time I'm now playing with a group with two distorted guitars and, whoo boy, my usual bag of tricks isn't cutting it yet. I still have some tinkering to do with my amp and EQ, so I haven't given up... but I am indulging some mental GAS exercises in case I need a Plan B

What pickup configuration would be your weapon of choice, going into battle against two distorted guitars in modern/alt rock?

It depends upon whether you're just planning to put down the bottom or if you are playing parts where you want to be heard clearly. I've used a Rick 4001 and a Fender P (with Rotosound Swings) with great success in both roles, so it's more down to your attack and your amp and EQ. A pick, round-wounds and some treble goes a long way but with 2 guitars there's times where you want to stay out of the battle and hold down the bottom, pluck your strings and roll off some tone.

 

[Pings Bass]

This feels like a variation of "what's the best bass for metal" and I'm here for it. I'm going with active HH into the biggest stack of amps and speakers you can manage to get on stage. Mix those cabs! 18", 10", 12", 15", use whatever power you can get your hands on, don't worry about impedance or any of that nonsense, just pump as much juice as you can into those cones. Party on!!

I'm only halfway joking, by the way. Whatever bass you use, you need a lot of speaker cone surface area driven with a lot of power to keep up with heavy guitars.

 

[mikeswals]

a single 15" isn't going to cut it in metal

 

[DoctorZee]

Like a funny game of telephone, at some point the idea that this is metal creeped into the thread, and I’m not sure how lol. It’s not. Just some alternative/hard rock like STP, Foo Fighters, and so on.

Also, I am loving all the EQ suggestions but folks, I wanted you to stoke my GAS! As mentioned I am planning to continue working with my Jazz bass to find a solution. And im definitely talking with my band mates as well.

I guess the question I meant to ask is more like: what would you bring to rehearsal? What do you like the sound of, combined with distorted guitars?

 

[somebrains]

For giggles you are the new bass player for the Smashing Pumpkins and you need to deal with:


You'll need to carefully map a lane as carefuky as just 1 of your guitarists are manically throwing around a wall of noise. Volume ain't gonna fix your minefield.

 

[Charlzm]

As many others have said, your EQ matters more than anything else here. Make sure you have those lows (but not the booming, bad kind!) and make sure your mids cut through, if that's your goal.

 

[gh0st42]

Like a funny game of telephone, at some point the idea that this is metal creeped into the thread, and I’m not sure how lol. It’s not. Just some alternative/hard rock like STP, Foo Fighters, and so on.

Also, I am loving all the EQ suggestions but folks, I wanted you to stoke my GAS! As mentioned I am planning to continue working with my Jazz bass to find a solution. And im definitely talking with my band mates as well.

I guess the question I meant to ask is more like: what would you bring to rehearsal? What do you like the sound of, combined with distorted guitars?

Walking into unknown ground?

P Bass. Hands down.

With a better sense of type of music, I might go for a Stingray or Ibanez with dual Humbuckers depending on the details/guitar player tones.

 

[bobdabilder]

2 410 cabs and 800 watts will do nicely.

Over the years I've mostly played with groups doing lighter rock, pop, acoustic, piano, etc. For the first time I'm now playing with a group with two distorted guitars and, whoo boy, my usual bag of tricks isn't cutting it yet. I still have some tinkering to do with my amp and EQ, so I haven't given up... but I am indulging some mental GAS exercises in case I need a Plan B

What pickup configuration would be your weapon of choice, going into battle against two distorted guitars in modern/alt rock?

 

[bobbybass85]

Any pickup that will give you versatility (I tend to prefer dual pickup configuration for this purpose, a good neck pickup for the "Meat" and the bridge one to get the mids and definition).

Other trick, a bit of overdrive that boost the mids (à la Green Rhino) to get more presence, and EQ your sound to sound good in the mix (not necessarly by yourself).

For example, in my original band (in which I play keys), both guitarist have a sound with plenty of bottom and somewhat scooped mids, so pour bass player use a fairly low amount of bottom, but lots of mids (with a slight overdriven preamp) and some highs boosted, which gives him more attack. Not the best sounding bass by itself, but I love the way it sounds in this band context.

This all day!!! I love when the 3rd post in a thread perfectly nails what I'm looking to say. Best advice ever is learning to love a tone you hate. I hated my current tone that I run for almost everything for years! It sounded ugly (especially in my in-ears) alone. But in the mix and in the house, it is glorious.

My mids of choice are between 800hz-1.6K, thats the frequency that my hands can manipulate best with technique and sound good. I drop a bit around the 250hz-400hz to tighten up the lows and the rest is up to taste. Try and see what you like.

 

[mexicanyella]

I’m in a mix with loud drums and a EMG-equipped Les Paul and 100-watt Marshal DSL halfstack, with a pretty distorted tone. I use a Squier P with chrome flats and the stock pickup.

What has been working for me is a slightly dirty tone with a peak around 150 Hz, a slight dip around 350-450 Hz and a bigger peak around 700 Hz-1.6 kHz. Sounds kind of abrasive by itself but seems to come through the mix and leave room for the guitar too.

When I play around with my bass unplugged, it sounds fairly close to that EQ curve other than being much quieter. Not sure how relevant that is, but I’ve noticed it.

 

[zoonose]

If it's anything like the rock/metal bands I've played with, you may want to try cutting low mids a bit - at least one of those guys is probably all up in that space - and bumping up the high mids.

 

[DigitalMan]

As artists, bass players paint with negative space. This is equally true for time and frequency.

 

[marqueemoon]

As someone who is also a guitar player my guess is they need to chill with the gain.

Heaviness is in the playing, not necessarily in a super distorted sound. See Black Sabbath, AC/DC, etc...

A guitar sound that leaves space for others is a beautiful thing.

 

[Dynomuttasaurus]

For giggles you are the new bass player for the Smashing Pumpkins and you need to deal with:


You'll need to carefully map a lane as carefuky as just 1 of your guitarists are manically throwing around a wall of noise. Volume ain't gonna fix your minefield.

We cover a couple Smashing Pumpkins tunes. They are a mess of frequencies. It's hard to pull them off well.

My experience is that for the bass to cut through, it can be a bit counter-intuitive. The more distorted the guitars are, the more clarity the bass needs to be heard as distinct. A jazz bass does surprisingly well if you want to cut through, especially if you use the full fretboard.

If you want to build a wall of power, stick to a high-output P pickup, keep within the lowest octave of the fretboard and use fuzz/distortion.

 

[RyanOh]

 

[somebrains]

We cover a couple Smashing Pumpkins tunes. They are a mess of frequencies. It's hard to pull them off well.

My experience is that for the bass to cut through, it can be a bit counter-intuitive. The more distorted the guitars are, the more clarity the bass needs to be heard as distinct. A jazz bass does surprisingly well if you want to cut through, especially if you use the full fretboard.

If you want to build a wall of power, stick to a high-output P pickup, keep within the lowest octave of the fretboard and use fuzz/distortion.

That’s what I learned during the 80s SF Bay Area Thrash Metal scene I grew up in.
Punk in the East Bay went to near metal distortion.
Funk went to speed thrash polka pace with nonsensical slap bass.

All the bass players toyed with distortion, then pretty much stuck with varying levels of pickup output into a basically clean signal chain. Plenty of GKs, svts, bass 400s alongside SWR/eden/trace/hartke. It’s not like we all didn’t have our own grunt, but Mo Bass and Marshall bass heads didn’t sell at all here bc we value a form of palette cleansing clean.

A lot of P/PJ/humbucker guys were pick players for that whole percussive element.

Trying to fight off Billy Corgan while this dude is trying to carve out his own wall o gain would be why you get paid big $.... bc you are now a part time sound engineer:

 

[David Jayne]

If it were me I'd put rounds on the P and call it a day. If it's gonna be the Jazz, try favoring one pickup or the other. You can have deep growly tone favoring neck or burpy growly favoring bridge. But I'd still pick the P even with the 'vintage' pickup. 'Vintage' doesn't automatically mean polite or mellow.

 

[Machiavelli]

Stingray, but thats my answer to everything lately

 

[BOOG]

I think I’d whack’m in the head with my Spector LC w/Chromes, GAIN dimed, MIDS boosted, HPF cut and pumped through 800 watts into a vertical array 410.