Metal pedal chain

[René_Julien]

I have since pulled the B7K off the board and will be replacing it with an Empress Bass Compressor into a Damnation Audio MBD-2.

A fifth person with a recommendation for Damnation. I should look into this pedal brand, never played one of their pedals.

You make good points on chasing the tone of those pro metal bassists versus own personal preferences. And to get a good clean tone and build up on that.

I've been thinking by participating in this thread. I'll probably never join a band and go gigging again. But hypothetical; if I were to be in a band right now and we were doing covers of the bands listed by the OP (80's speed/trash metal to 90's nu-metal), I would go fretless with a rather clean tone. It would be my take on the music. Same dish, different seasoning. Unless my hypothetical band-mates want more dirt then I can slowly open the tap of overdrive if needed.

 

[VolverseLoco]

He would do fine with a bass and an amp. But that's besides the point. Pedals and effects are fun!

Yes, pedals ARE fun! I even have real foot pedals to control the scrolling on the computer screen. I'm a closet pedal nut case! I suggested he maybe get the HX Stomp because I did have that one, for 1 week, and it seems like he wants to have all the effects possible, and they are certainly in the HX Stomp, but it's too much for me, I prefer knobs on the pedals, and rack gear too! It's all BIG FUN!

 

[Sascha Erni]

I've been thinking by participating in this thread. I'll probably never join a band and go gigging again. But hypothetical; if I were to be in a band right now and we were doing covers of the bands listed by the OP (80's speed/trash metal to 90's nu-metal), I would go fretless with a rather clean tone. It would be my take on the music. Same dish, different seasoning. Unless my hypothetical band-mates want more dirt then I can slowly open the tap of overdrive if needed.

That’s what I did in the late 90s / early 2000s with our 80s/90s Metal-Grunge-whatever band. There was some opposition when I one day showed up with my fretless, no effects, no cabinets, only Trace-Elliot Pre into FOH. But it worked out fine, and sounded good, albeit a bit weird when playing for example Red Hot Chili Peppers covers. But weird was also good back then, so, eh.

I mostly play fretted basses nowadays, but from time to time I still have the urge to take my fretless along for a spell, just to see what happens …

 

[Obese Chess]

A fifth person with a recommendation for Damnation. I should look into this pedal brand, never played one of their pedals.

The Darkglass stuff is great, but it's another one of those "pick a tone you like" things - most of the players whose distortion sounds I like and am trying to emulate at this stage of my career are using MOSFET-based distortions, which the MBD-2 (and its brother the MBD-1) are. One cool thing about "dirt" pedals is that the options are pretty much limitless and every rock/metal bass player can get their own excellent tone as a result.

 

[theunknowndude]

Also depends on your band mix... I like that I only have one guitarist to play with. It leaves for interesting sonic spaces and I can play more with intro, bridges, but just follow root notes. When I had two guitarists felt like if I played anything other than root notes it just didn’t feel right.

also if your not going to join a band again, nothing wrong with going all out and making crazy noise!

 

[René_Julien]

also if your not going to join a band again, nothing wrong with going all out and making crazy noise!

Oh yeah, I have something in mind like that as well. Going to take my first steps into heavier experimental genres. Like the Doom (game) soundtrack. So fuzzes, phasers, delays, bitcrushers,... and parallel mixing.
First up, building a decent recording setup, and learn more about recording and producing. I'm inexperienced at this but it interests me a lot and I'm eager to study up on this.

 

[paskisti]

Nobody mentioned tunings because sound depends on the tuning too. I have 2 different basses (Fender AM jazz): 5 string for drop-A and 4 string for drop-C and they are not sounding the same. Sansamp RBI sounds very good with drop-C but starts bit annoying farting in drop-A, overdrive profile is somehow not the best for A (B string).

I would suggest to start with only little hair in sound and not too much distortion, it just messes your sound. Sansamp is very good doing that specially if you have mid heavy cab like closed 810. Clang in 1kHz and 3kHz is what you need to be audible and not adding bass, it makes the sound boom and eats power.

If no in-ear-monitors used then you'll need a lots of firepower and speaker surface - no pedal can help there really. I have 810 cab and PA 1000W power amp because that was the only way to make my sound good and loud with 2 downtuned guitars through half stacks. Then I added sansamp RBI and it was there, happened 15 years ago. Now a days Darkglass B7K replaces the RBI in drop-A tuning because it somehow makes better in that tuning, but drop-C works great still with RBI.

From a clean table: Quilter BB800 with DG B3K or Sansamp BDDI V2, 2 4x10 cabs. Drop A-tuning needs heavy gauge B string like .160 and drop-C needs custom set like 55-75-95-125. Otherwise you cannot make good sound because of lacking highs. Stay away from loose strings

 

[VolverseLoco]

Nobody mentioned tunings because sound depends on the tuning too. I have 2 different basses (Fender AM jazz): 5 string for drop-A and 4 string for drop-C and they are not sounding the same. Sansamp RBI sounds very good with drop-C but starts bit annoying farting in drop-A, overdrive profile is somehow not the best for A (B string).

I would suggest to start with only little hair in sound and not too much distortion, it just messes your sound. Sansamp is very good doing that specially if you have mid heavy cab like closed 810. Clang in 1kHz and 3kHz is what you need to be audible and not adding bass, it makes the sound boom and eats power.

If no in-ear-monitors used then you'll need a lots of firepower and speaker surface - no pedal can help there really. I have 810 cab and PA 1000W power amp because that was the only way to make my sound good and loud with 2 downtuned guitars through half stacks. Then I added sansamp RBI and it was there, happened 15 years ago. Now a days Darkglass B7K replaces the RBI in drop-A tuning because it somehow makes better in that tuning, but drop-C works great still with RBI.

From a clean table: Quilter BB800 with DG B3K or Sansamp BDDI V2, 2 4x10 cabs. Drop A-tuning needs heavy gauge B string like .160 and drop-C needs custom set like 55-75-95-125. Otherwise you cannot make good sound because of lacking highs. Stay away from loose strings

This is great advice you wrote here as it gets you right back to the roots of how to start to achieve that 'heavy metal' sound, I guess, and that is string selection and EQ. I think sometimes that through the great powers of marketing and target advertising, we automatically think that "Well, if you wanna play metal, you need a Darkglass", and that's totally not the truth but somehow the bass playing society has been steered that way.

 

[René_Julien]

"Well, if you wanna play metal, you need a Darkglass", and that's totally not the truth but somehow the bass playing society has been steered that way.

Trends come and go. Brands either have their 15 minutes of fame or if they are lucky dominate the market forever. This is probably true in every industry, I see it in my line of work a lot.

Marketing should be taken with a grain of salt. A Jazz bass through a BOSS Blues Driver can be great for metal. A BOSS Metal Zone can be great for classic rock. A Darkglass pedal can be great for zydeco. ...

 

[Sascha Erni]

The metal board I used last week-end looks like this:

So, basically …

- Preamp with a bit of crunch
- Overdrive for a bit more crunch
- Distortion / Wah for more extreme effects / lead parts
- Compressor (always on)
- Utility pedals (HPF, Tuner)

Of those, what I'd really NEED for our style of metal would be the preamp and compressor, that’s it.

I use the OD to fill sonic space during guitar solos; we’re a trio + singer, so no rhythm guitar. And the Joshwah in two songs as a special effect. OD, Wah and the utility pedals are “luxuries”, the main sound comes from Pre (and especially its EQ settings) and compressor.

… and the bass, naturally. I play P basses in our metal covers band, roundwound Rotosound strings, low action. I do the clank thing. And, as has been mentioned already, detuned to E-flat or Drop-C# for half of our songs. As far as I’m concerned, metal bass is mostly about choosing strings, EQ/Pre and compression. Everything else might be icing on the cake, but not really necessary, especially when starting out, IMO.

(Extreme metal, or experimental stuff, excluded. I’m mostly talking about “normal” metal from Megadeth to Slayer to Maiden to Sabbath etc., not the cool stuff à la Gorguts or the like )

 

[moshuajusic]

Or a Maxon CP9-PRO+, I love mine. Even the BOSS LMB-3 is very adequate on the cheap.

+1 on the Maxon. When Keeley came out with their bassist comp, I was GASing, but then realized, "wait, this sounds AWFULLY like the CP9Pro+ ...at least on paper, I'm good!" I originally got it for guitar. Great transparent comp all around.

The metal board I used last week-end looks like this:

View attachment 4205441

So, basically …

- Preamp with a bit of crunch
- Overdrive for a bit more crunch
- Distortion / Wah for more extreme effects / lead parts
- Compressor (always on)
- Utility pedals (HPF, Tuner)

Of those, what I'd really NEED for our style of metal would be the preamp and compressor, that’s it.

I use the OD to fill sonic space during guitar solos; we’re a trio + singer, so no rhythm guitar. And the Joshwah in two songs as a special effect. OD, Wah and the utility pedals are “luxuries”, the main sound comes from Pre (and especially its EQ settings) and compressor.

… and the bass, naturally. I play P basses in our metal covers band, roundwound Rotosound strings, low action. I do the clank thing. And, as has been mentioned already, detuned to E-flat or Drop-C# for half of our songs. As far as I’m concerned, metal bass is mostly about choosing strings, EQ/Pre and compression. Everything else might be icing on the cake, but not really necessary, especially when starting out, IMO.

(Extreme metal, or experimental stuff, excluded. I’m mostly talking about “normal” metal from Megadeth to Slayer to Maiden to Sabbath etc., not the cool stuff à la Gorguts or the like )

And don't forget EBS flat patch cables!

Interesting you put the comp at the end. Do you use a lot of distortion?

 

[Sascha Erni]

And don't forget EBS flat patch cables!

Interesting you put the comp at the end. Do you use a lot of distortion?

The EBS make everything so much tidier, I also use the EBS Flat power cables. In the past few years, only one went bad, too, so that’s quite cool.

The comp ended up at the, well, end of my board(s) primarily for sound reasons – I simply liked it best in that position. The Broughton Thread Guys gave me the idea; many run their comps after the SV-Pre. Since switching it from in front of the chain to the very end, I got thinking why this might work for me, and found three main reasons.

1) I prefer colored compressors, hence the Diamond, and use them less for controlling dynamics and more as a “let’s make this board sound more like a closed cab being fired at by saturated tubes”. I think that’s why my second pre, and still my favourite pre, turned out to be the Orange Bass Butler. Its compressor also isn’t all that transparent, and as the BB also figures as the DI to FOH, compression automatically ends up at the end of the pedal chain. So, in short: preference for sound/coloration, rather than dynamics/control.

2) As I do the clank thing as mentioned above, there’s usually not too much dynamics going on for me anyways – it’s either bouncing strings off the frets every single note for a whole song, or no clank at all. No need to “even out” attack or the like in my case – but keeping the rig’s overall volume inside the desired bracket no matter whether I clank or not is a good idea, this works better with the comp at the end of the chain, for me.

3) What you asked – I don’t use a LOT of distortion, and not as always-on. I prefer a slightly overdriven base tone. But if I DO use distortion (a Damnation Audio MBD-2 is in transit as we speak), I prefer for it to react directly and “naturally” to attack dynamics (when I’m not clanking) and the bass's Tone dial (which I use a lot in between songs). I found this works better for me with no compressor in front of my dirt. Again mentioning the Bass Butler here – its built-in comp doesn’t compress the dirt channel at all, only the clean channel.

Mind, mark all those “for me” and “prefer” etc.. YMMV.