My guitarist and I got into a discussion the other day about muddy sounds. He claims peavey was notorious for causing a muddy sound. I used to play out of a peavey 115 combo and he said that nothing I did could dial the mud out. 20 years later I got a fender rumble 800 stage and he loved the tone out of that amp. I also have an ampeg SVT vr with the 410 HLF heritage cabinet he likes and a fender bassman 800 he likes. He says that mids on a bass amp turned up cause the sound to be muddier and I always thought mids helped you cut through. It’s weird. He always told me to turn down with the peavey when I could barely hear myself. With the ampeg I think I’m way too loud and he tells me to turn up. What are your thoughts on this? Is his argument valid? I had used 4 and 5 strings with the peavey.
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Muddy sound
- Thread starter Cory rich40
- Start date
His eq can be pushing yours into the mud.
He needs to eq out of your zone as well.
He needs to eq out of your zone as well.
Makes sense. The hard part is convincing him of that.
And yes I played with the eq and never got a sound he was completely happy with. Prior to that 115 combo I used a peavey mega bass head with the two 10 one 18 cabinet and he never thought that had a muddy sound. So it’s not all peavey amps. My theory is that the combo didn’t have enough juice. He was using a fender ultimate chorus amp and I believe they were rated at 200 watts with 212’s
- Feb 12, 2006
- 61,066
- 5
- 221,114
- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
I wouldn’t say Peaveys are known to be muddy, but many players of the era turned them into muddy amps by not understanding eq. This was not unique to Peavey either.
Exactly ! A lot of ‘boxiness/mud’ lives in the low mids 2-400Hz. This reminds me of Ron Carter, saying to a young Herbie Hancock: “You see that ‘Steinway & Sons’ logo on your piano ? - Everything below the first ‘S’ belongs to me !!”
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Muddy tones are a result of the EQ controls, your bass, your playing style, your rig, your strings, and so on. The way you play and what you play with will influence the final tone and if it is muddy sounding to YOU.
I think you are missing exactly what mid frequencies are causing mud and what frequencies are clashing with his. "Mids" are a broad term thrown around A LOT on Talkbass and it's not always clear what many of us are talking about.
This is how I view it:
I think you are missing exactly what mid frequencies are causing mud and what frequencies are clashing with his. "Mids" are a broad term thrown around A LOT on Talkbass and it's not always clear what many of us are talking about.
This is how I view it:
- 200hz to 400hz is thick low midrange (Mud zone, typically)
- 500hz to 700hz is the nasal range (good for fullness of a bass tone)
- 800hz to 1khz is the upper midrange (string growl, pick growl starts here)
- 2khz to 4khz is the treble range. (Finger and pick style high end clarity)
- 5khz to 10khz is the ultra high range (fingerboard clarity, great for slapping, awful for distortion)
Keep in mind, I never had any complaints personally with a muddy sound. It was always the guitarist complaining about it. He would even tinker with the eq and was never satisfied. I ended up selling that amp because it was old but the buyer could probably get another 20 years out of it. As I’ve said, the guitarist has no issues with the SVT or bassman 800 or the rumble combo amps. With the bassman I use a fender rumble 410 cabinet and the combos use 210 speakers. And anybody that has played the Adam Clayton amp will tell you it’s midrangey.!
Where is the guitarist standing when he is listening to your rig? If he is not standing in front of the rig and anywhere off to the side, it will likely sound muffled to him. 800hz and up gets very directional and unless he is in line with your rig, I would not listen to his rumblings much further. In addition, if he has his bass knob cranked, and you are playing close enough together, that will result in a muddy tone for both of you! I suggest asking him to back off the bass knob a bit and see what happens to the perception of your tone.
- Feb 12, 2006
- 61,066
- 5
- 221,114
- Disclosures
- Development Engineer-Mesa Boogie, Development Engineer-Genzler (pedals), Product Support-Genz Benz
Might the guitarist have hearing damage?
Tendinitis is I’m spelling it right. He played with a band on and off in the 60’s
I agree. I used to play with a guitarist who loved his low end (Les Paul into Marshall or Mesa Boogie heads and a 4x12 Marshall cabinet). He also took a lot of responsibility for working on the overall stage sound. He always told me that I sounded best with my mids cut way back and highs boosted. Looking back now, I'm convinced that he was simply trying to carve out space for his low end.
Your taste and orientation matter a lot. He was coming from an AC/DC or Metallica frame of mind, and I was coming from Motown/Stax.
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I think you mean tintinitis, which is a ringing, clicking, or buzzing sound entire within your ears and not an external sound.
Tendinitis (also called tendonitis) is experiencing pain in the connective tissues (tendons) between muscles and bones. Most often as a result of repetitive motion or overextension.
FWIW, if your guitarist is over 50 he probably suffers from both.
"And another question I have is are 15’s known to have a muddy sound?" YES!!!
However, before we sound the death alarm, on single 15's, it truly does come down to the enclosure.
Best advice: 4X10, minimum. Happy sound. Happy Life.
