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Kick drum through my bass amp?

#101
Quite apart from whether or not the kick is a problem in a bass rig...

I don’t get and will NEVER get the obsession with the kick drum. Kick on the 1 and 3... I mean so what, unless you’re playing polka music. The groove comes off the back beat. I suppose some reggae uses the kick on the back beat; but, that’s unusual.

The dichotomy between what is mixed on the reference recordings and what many rock bands decide to emphasize continues to amaze.
 
#102
oldrocker said:
We play bar gigs mostly indoors but some outdoors shows on the deck.

We have the typical powered mixer with 2 mains and 2 powered monitors, no subs. Small set up, only the vocals go through the board. For our outdoor shows we want to mic the drums. I like this idea but the sound guy is thinking of putting the bass drum through my bass rig. Yes, my bass plus bass drum through my rig. He's thinking of this to save the expense buying a powered sub and the trouble of loading a heavy sub in and out.

I like the sound guy, he does make the vocals sound good but I'm not sure I'm liking this idea. Not sure I want anything but my bass going through my amp.

Have you guys ever heard of this, any thoughts?
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just not a good idea dude!
 
#108
dlargent said:
I was in a band that did exactly this. Sounded awesome- I don’t get why everyone is saying it’s a bad idea.

It was very cool to hear the kick drum and bass locking in together thumping through my amp.
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Well, so far out of 107 posts, you are the only one that doesn't vote; Hell NO
Doesn't mean you are wrong or careless, just have a difference of opinion.
 
#109
There's real loud stuff in the kick range where the bass is just a shadow of its fundamental. If you try to get that low part of the kick commensurate with the main part of the bass it's curtains for the bass cab. This is what subs are for.

I was long out of my teens when we did the sm57 into kickdrum with the low end cut off just the beater sound going through the vocal PA and just enough to be heard. If you aren't getting subs you should do that.
 
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#110
+1 to HELL NO.
I would also think less of that sound man and disregard ideas from them in the future.
Bass drum is super intense. watch the VU meter on most pop or rock. The kick drum is usually the most recognizable motion on the VU meter. MAJOR SPEAKER EXTRUSION.
 
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#112
DanAdams said:
+1 to HELL NO.
I would also think less of that sound man and disregard ideas from them in the future.
Bass drum is super intense. watch the VU meter on most pop or rock. The kick drum is usually the most recognizable motion on the VU meter. MAJOR SPEAKER EXTRUSION.
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Right - anyone who's ever sat at a mixing console and PFL'd a kick drum would know why it's a bad idea...
 
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#114
OP here.

Thanks for all the responses. There is a lot of good info here. I'll ask further questions on some of the answers but some additional general info for now.

This is not a contentious or confrontational situation with the sound guy. He does a good job for us for very little compensation. He make the singers sound better which make them happy and that makes the band sound better which makes me happy. I have a good working relationship with the sound guy, if I tell the him I'm not comfortable with the bass drum going through my rig - which is my 1st thought - it would be fine. He wouldn't push the idea and we'd still be friends.

The sound guy is just thinking of ways to improve the sound without addition cash outlay and load in/out time and effort. I don't fault him for that. Ultimately it may not be the best solution but it shows he's thinking about it.

The drummer has a strong enough foot but we noticed when playing outdoors on a dock last summer that the drums don't carry as far as the rest of the music. All indoor bar shows are fine, outdoors on the dock we lose some drums. For this exact reason I play a larger rig outdoors than inside. Inside is a Mesa walkabout 300 watt head into 2 1x12s Outdoors is a Eden WT800 bridged mono into an Mesa powerhouse 4x10.

The drummer and/or sound guy have already purchased drum mics and a small mixer for the drums. The idea is to put the drum mics through the dedicated drum mixer line out into the main board.

I did a quick google search and found a representative 15" powered Yamaha sub for about $800 and 85 pounds. I don't think we should go less than 15" but the weight and price is a bit hefty.

I do like the idea and I will suggest we try putting the drums, including the bass drum through the main PA without subs to see how that works out and go from there.

If we so go sub I like the idea of getting one with a built in crossover and running the main output from the PA to sub and then the sub xover output to the mains. Since the mains are not powered I'm guessing in this case the sub would have to be unpowered as well?

Thanks again.
 
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#115
biguglyman said:
Tell your sound guy to get a sub. There are some very nice ones out there that don't weigh that much. You only need one. A lot of them even come with a built-in crossover so you run from the board to the sub then out to the mains. Keeps the real low lows from muddying up your vocals. Hell, with a sub, you can run your bass through the PA too. After all, we all know that's what everybody wants to hear anyway...
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I like the idea of a sub with a built in crossover. Can you recommend any. I'm thinking if we did use a sub since with a built in crossover it would have to be an unpowered sub?

Ultimately the sound guy does want to run the bass through the PA as well, so this may end up being the way we go.
 
#116
dtripoli said:
Well, so far out of 107 posts, you are the only one that doesn't vote; Hell NO
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I'm voting GO FOR IT! So two out of 113 posts are in favor.

But then, I've never blown a speaker....

Seems to me that as long as you have plenty of margin on the power ratings you'll be okay. Just as you would for a PA. Speakers is speakers. Nothing magic about a bass speaker. Or is there?

I'm not guaranteeing it'll sound good. But you won't know till you try.

And I give your sound guy kudos for thinking outside the box.
 
#117
tfer said:
I don’t disagree with much here.

I’ve never tried this, but I’d also never volunteer to. I’m not worried about the frequency that the kick has, but the transient attack.

Even the most aggressive slapper doesn’t hit as hard as a kick drum.
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If you ignore the signal level I'd agree. But that is not how things work. Are you saying that no matter what a drum signal that you send to a bass amp will be larger than any bass signal you could send?



Assuming 80 bars of 4/4 time per song and the kick on one and three, that’s 160 solid thwacks per song. To keep the math easy, let’s say 10 songs per set. That’s now 1600.

Three sets is 4800 thwacks.

There’s no way I’d risk that. Not a chance.
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Amplify those whacks at 90dB. Why 90? Because there seems to be a general consensus on the size of what will go to the amp. Despite the fact that it's only an assumption. At least I stated one.

How many live rigs couldn't handle that?
 
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#118
ktedrow said:
I’ve never done it. But I’d be willing to give it a try. Take one for the rhythm section team. Could be cool to have the kick in my ear along with the bass...
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This is an interesting idea as I can never hear the kick on stage.

I time off the snare or high-hat but when I listen to our recordings the bass and kick drum are so locked sometime I can't tell which is which.

I take this to be a good thing :bassist:
 
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#120
ktedrow said:
I'm voting GO FOR IT! So two out of 113 posts are in favor.

But then, I've never blown a speaker....

Seems to me that as long as you have plenty of margin on the power ratings you'll be okay. Just as you would for a PA. Speakers is speakers. Nothing magic about a bass speaker. Or is there?

I'm not guaranteeing it'll sound good. But you won't know till you try.

And I give your sound guy kudos for thinking outside the box.
Click to expand...

Power ratings are thermal only: you can easily reach mechanical speaker damage/failure with "safe" wattage depending on the speakers' xmax and EQ settings.
 

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