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New Origin Effects DCX Bass

#241
Maxi Funkl said:
Cool board FYI, I'm stealing some Ideas for a future board. :)
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thank you. its a fairly tight 20" across since I need to keep my footprint on stage as small as possible (we play on a variety of stages and sometimes its a bit of a squeeze to fit all 9 of us on some). I feel like its a great hybrid of Analog and Digital tools and works very well in alot of the scenarios I've run through. The last test of this set up will be this Friday. It's a half way to halloween show and we're playing as My Chemical Foemance (basically MCR with a horn section). DCX Bass has been a The venue we are playing has an incredible sound system and during check I'll be able to run through a few of my options before landing on a "final tone" for the show. With bonus points if I can save the sound engineer having to make any major eq or level adjustments.
 
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#244
MattFoes said:
I have a metro 24 that I got in a trade lying in storage. I’d be more than comfortable just taking the top row of my pedalboard (plus the octave) for a meat and potatoes sound and amp swap.
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Honestly that was my exact idea Cioks Sol tuner>Cali76>oct>DCX>Bassrig 64 placed right on top of my amp boom done. Solid lineup. Maybe SA LUNAR for some mods.
 
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#246
Maxi Funkl said:
Honestly that was my exact idea Cioks Sol tuner>Cali76>oct>DCX>Bassrig 64 placed right on top of my amp boom done. Solid lineup. Maybe SA LUNAR for some mods.
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Yeah when we're talking bass gigging tone, I only need some EQ, comp and that's really it. I don't play any songs that need modulation or any aggressive distortion, maybe some synth. Just straight away core tone. I love playing with effects ,maybe on my own project.
 
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#247
odarellmc said:
Yeah when we're talking bass gigging tone, I only need some EQ, comp and that's really it. I don't play any songs that need modulation or any aggressive distortion, maybe some synth. Just straight away core tone. I love playing with effects ,maybe on my own project.
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core tone for me is fairly clean for me as well, the synthy texture of some slight grit, a chorus and an octave is generally as complicated as I get. BUT I also do some long drawn out ambient drones as intros for songs or underneath vocal sections. Sometimes I have to fill in the space underneath guitars for some covers when our rhythm guitar player is playing trombone. But that’s also why I like to blend a lot of my clean signal in there so it doesn’t feel like the bass player took a break for a second.
 
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#248
Scott Williams said:
My setup has always been pretty simple - an always-on compressor first just to smooth things out a bit, an OD/boost to add a little grit on some songs, and a DI with CAB sim set to clean on the edge of growl. My play a P-bass with flats in a classic rock cover band. My old setup was Empress Bass Compressor > TC Electronics Spark > Tech 21 VT Bass DI. About a month ago I swapped the VT Bass for the OE BassRig and was so impressed I swapped out the Empress for the OE Cali 76 - also a huge improvement for me. Coincidently the DCX Bass came out right after that! I've had my DCX a day now and am really happy with it. With the drive set pretty low it does a great job of taking the BassRig from a clean/growl to a nice OD sound. As others have mentioned, the notes stay clear and it doesn't just fizz out. I will say that to my ears I can get a pretty similar sound with the BassRig itself, but I'm not gonna do a bunch of knob fiddling during a live gig.

View attachment 5058176
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What did you like about the Cali vs the Empress?
 
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#249
Stranger Danger said:
What did you like about the Cali vs the Empress?
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I know you didn’t ask me, but I’ll way in… I’ve had both at the same time and while the Empress was a cool comp, I never jelled with its base tone. It sounded a little processed to my ears. The Cali sounds a little more natural and seems to mesh better with the BassRigs, the SV in my case. Even though I have one, I haven’t tried the Cali with the Black Panel. But I suspect it’s the same.

I’m looking forward to trying the DCX, it arrives on Monday.
 
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#250
It's TalkBass: I'll weigh in as well haha. I had the opposite experience with the Cali76 and Empress. But I also play an active bass and I hear that the Cali76 CB works especially well with passive Fender-style instruments.

I was using a Cali76 TX-L and wanted to get something smaller so I could fit more effects on my board. Naturally I opted for a Cali76 CB. I also grabbed an Empress because I'd heard great things. I liked the Compact Bass before dirt. It has a pleasing and subtle high-end roll-off that does nice things to dirt which follows it. And it adds some equally subtle harmonic color which that dirt can pick up on. But it also has a higher noise floor (than the Empress). And I didn't like the combined attack and release controls because it limits flexibility, though I admit it is easy to use and covers a great many (and the most common) use-cases.

The Empress is superior in both control flexibility (except ratio, where it has a 3-way switch instead of knob, but that's fine for my use-case) and noise. And it has incredible double metering for both input gain and compression level. I love its transparent tone for what I do because I have other ways of adding color. Transparent is perfect for always on. It also has two tone/color positions with a switch and the mid-cut one is amazing. Really great for a clean tone. The 2K boost is nice before dirt.
 
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#251
Erithon said:
It's TalkBass: I'll weigh in as well haha. I had the opposite experience with the Cali76 and Empress. But I also play an active bass and I hear that the Cali76 CB works especially well with passive Fender-style instruments.

I was using a Cali76 TX-L and wanted to get something smaller so I could fit more effects on my board. Naturally I opted for a Cali76 CB. I also grabbed an Empress because I'd heard great things. I liked the Compact Bass before dirt. It has a pleasing and subtle high-end roll-off that does nice things to dirt which follows it. And it adds some equally subtle harmonic color which that dirt can pick up on. But it also has a higher noise floor (than the Empress). And I didn't like the combined attack and release controls because it limits flexibility, though I admit it is easy to use and covers a great many (and the most common) use-cases.

The Empress is superior in both control flexibility (except ratio, where it has a 3-way switch instead of knob, but that's fine for my use-case) and noise. And it has incredible double metering for both input gain and compression level. I love its transparent tone for what I do because I have other ways of adding color. Transparent is perfect for always on. It also has two tone/color positions with a switch and the mid-cut one is amazing. Really great for a clean tone. The 2K boost is nice before dirt.
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Yes, the Tone/Color switch is very effective, and a major plus in the column for the Empress. I’m also of a similar mind regarding the control it offers.
 
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#252
Matt Dean said:
I know you didn’t ask me, but I’ll way in… I’ve had both at the same time and while the Empress was a cool comp, I never jelled with its base tone. It sounded a little processed to my ears. The Cali sounds a little more natural and seems to mesh better with the BassRigs, the SV in my case. Even though I have one, I haven’t tried the Cali with the Black Panel. But I suspect it’s the same.

I’m looking forward to trying the DCX, it arrives on Monday.
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The reason I asked in here is because I am looking at pairing one of the two with the DCX. So this is all good information
 
#253
Stranger Danger said:
What did you like about the Cali vs the Empress?
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Well, I am no expert and my use case is an always-on compressor at the start of my chain to smooth things out and bit and add a bit of punch. Although the tone stuff was cool on the Empress, for live always-on use that doesn't really factor in as I'm going to change tone on my pre-amp instead. I'm not going to reach down and fiddle with pedals during a gig. Some day everything will be midi-controlled :-)

To me the Empress was always "well it's compressing my signal I guess" where the Cali76 is "it's compressing my signal and it sounds better". Maybe my ears just aren't tuned to appreciate the Empress "transparency". Generally speaking I'd struggle to hear the difference I'd expect when adjusting the Empress. I would spend time trying to dial it in and then turn it off and I just never thought it sounded much better on. Up until recently I used a VT Bass DI which also does some compression with it's gain so maybe that is part of it.

Ultimately you just need to try both and see what works for you. For me the Cali76 + DCX + BassRig SV took about 10 minutes to dial in the exact sounds I've always wanted.

FWIW I play an American Professional II P-Bass with chrome flats.
 
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#254
Scott Williams said:
Well, I am no expert and my use case is an always-on compressor at the start of my chain to smooth things out and bit and add a bit of punch. Although the tone stuff was cool on the Empress, for live always-on use that doesn't really factor in as I'm going to change tone on my pre-amp instead. I'm not going to reach down and fiddle with pedals during a gig. Some day everything will be midi-controlled :)

To me the Empress was always "well it's compressing my signal I guess" where the Cali76 is "it's compressing my signal and it sounds better". Maybe my ears just aren't tuned to appreciate the Empress "transparency". Generally speaking I'd struggle to hear the difference I'd expect when adjusting the Empress. I would spend time trying to dial it in and then turn it off and I just never thought it sounded much better on. Up until recently I used a VT Bass DI which also does some compression with it's gain so maybe that is part of it.

Ultimately you just need to try both and see what works for you. For me the Cali76 + DCX + BassRig SV took about 10 minutes to dial in the exact sounds I've always wanted.

FWIW I play an American Professional II P-Bass with chrome flats.
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And I play an American Professional II J-Bass with Fender flats.

I would definitely be using one of these at the front of the chain after the tuner with octave>DCX>Filter Twin>Grape Phaser after it. With all that going on, the transparent one would possibly be the better choice.
 
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#256
Stranger Danger said:
The reason I asked in here is because I am looking at pairing one of the two with the DCX. So this is all good information
Click to expand...
For what it’s worth, this is my board, currently:
IMG_1449.jpeg
 
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#260
Egid said:
Not Sure but whats the Benefit of pairing the dcx and the SV?
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can’t speak to the SV specifically since I only have the BlackPanel. The way I’ve been wrapping my head around using it with the bass rig, if you approach the Bass Rig like it’s a tube amp then the DCX pushes the amp into break up land without having to add more gain than you’d want.
 
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