Amp tone on stage (your personal rig) and amp tone through a completely different amp and speakers (FOH) are almost never the same thing.
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Ok bass peeps here's a question for ya !!
- Thread starter slamsinger
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Amp tone on stage (your personal rig) and amp tone through a completely different amp and speakers (FOH) are almost never the same thing.
And the OP says he's already using a Radial DI. Maybe that means a JDI at speaker level, but that's a long shot. Doesn't sound like the stage rig factors into the FOH DI chain.
I'm not familiar with the Radial DI, but most can be run post- or pre-EQ. Is the Radial pre-EQ only?
MDBass
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There's your answer.
You've taken all the great things you love about your signal chain and amp tone out before sending it to FOH...why?
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That might work but if he is not out front listening to how his bass is being eq'd in the mix then sending a pre-signal will have the same effect that he is currently experiencing. I always prefer post eq to the board and then have the sound man tweak it a little so it will sit the mix properly.
Well, that's what sound check is for. Evidently, he has been out front and doesn't like what he hears.
Sometimes post-EQ works, but often it's part of the problem, not the solution. Your amp and speaker cab are waaaaay different from the typical P.A. system/FOH amplifier and speaker cabs. The EQ you carefully craft for your personal stage rig may not sound so good out front through a different amp/cab combination.
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^ This, and I can't tell you how many times over the years I've heard the "all-sub-no-definition" tone from a bass guitar via a FOH system, surprisingly, from some pretty legit touring bands and some very good local sound mixers. IMHO, bass guitar is the single most difficult instrument to mix well in PA system, since where you want the tone to be prominent (see above) is pretty much what most people DON'T want to hear from a PA system - accentuate 200-500hz and 800-1.2khz (subjectively, to taste).
I've self-mixed bass on similar K-12 based systems with companion QSC powered 18" subs, and got it to sound pretty good, with clarity and presence in the mix. The key is that my stage rig is a modeler going into a full range PA-type cabinets, and the tone is styled so that it cuts through both the stage and FOH in context. It can definitely sound a bit on the ratty side in isolation, but IME the more stuff going on in a mix, the more difficult it is to make "polite" isolated bass tones cut through - they need a lot of sonic space to do so.
Thus I'd recommend sending whichever DI signal to the FOH and create a tone listening to it via the PA system only to accentuate lo/lo-mid punch and upper mid bite/presence, and see how that behaves with the stage rig at gig volume in full mix context.
JMHO.
This is a GREAT post, and gets to the heart of the matter.
If you really crafted an appropriate stage rig tone that you want to share with the audience through the P.A., and if it is compatible with the P.A./FOH/channel/amp/speaker combo employed, then you're in business.
I think @jimfist is getting to one of the two choices: Tailor your stage rig so it sounds great out front. Of course, you may not be too keen on it in the stage space you occupy, but this is a viable solution, if you can make it happen OUT FRONT--where it really counts.
If not, you need to dump a direct line signal pre-EQ to the board, tweak the board EQ, and see if that sounds better.
I've seen success both ways, but to be honest, and in my limited experience, sending the sound tech/mixing desk a raw signal pre-EQ has been the easiest solution.
You have to boil this down to the basics or you are forever chasing your tail and pulling your hair out. There is more than one way to skin this cat, but one thing's for sure: Somewhere between your bass and the mains, your tone is picking up or losing fundamental artifacts, and that has to be eliminated.
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Yup, that's the fundamental issue here when the FOH is the primary delivery source of the bass sound to the audience. Damn tricky, and most players are going to opt for a stage tone that inspires rather than one that might be viewed as compromising the stage vibe for the better good of the FOH. Generally, it's just a matter of the bass stage rig components and how they are used. You can have the best of both worlds IMO.
Another critical part of the problem is whether or not the PA system's speakers, by design, have enough clean headroom to be capable of getting the bass clarity of tone without stepping on other critical instruments and/or vocals or just starting to sound bad. Enter skillful compression and tone carving. Like I said, tricky.
It's been mentioned a few times already, but I'm repeating it:
Bass -> DI -> Mixer will give you a very dark/bassy tone with a normalled EQ.
The signal chain you should aim for:
Bass -> Preamp -> DI -> Mixer
- or -
Bass -> Preamp -> Power Amp - > DI -> Mixer
…or just mic the cab.
Preamps boost your treble and mids. How exactly depends on the preamp. The easy way to get your sound out of the mains is to capture the signal later in the signal chain.
That should get you close enough since everything else sounds great.
Beyond that, you might consider reducing your amp's volume in order to reduce phasing issues (in the audience).
Bass -> DI -> Mixer will give you a very dark/bassy tone with a normalled EQ.
The signal chain you should aim for:
Bass -> Preamp -> DI -> Mixer
- or -
Bass -> Preamp -> Power Amp - > DI -> Mixer
…or just mic the cab.
Preamps boost your treble and mids. How exactly depends on the preamp. The easy way to get your sound out of the mains is to capture the signal later in the signal chain.
That should get you close enough since everything else sounds great.
Beyond that, you might consider reducing your amp's volume in order to reduce phasing issues (in the audience).
No. DI-->mixer is one conventional path for live and recorded electric bass. It'll give you "very dark" tone only if something in your chain between bass and FOH cabs is either badly out of spec or else set to shed midrange and treble.
No.
(That is, a mid & treble boost isn't baked into the nature of all preamps.)
A competent mixer should be able to suss this problem out fairly quickly, and if not, make recommendations to the PA and/or bass rig that might be necessary to achieve the goal of a more present bass tone. I'd start there.
The OP's amp's tone stack is not flat. GK's tone stack is based upon a Treble+Bass boost. A direct signal (again, with no equalization) will sound dark in comparison. The tone stack and speaker/cabs in most bass rigs affect frequency response significantly.
In comparison to the amp's output, plugging in directly to a system with pretty flat frequency response will sound dark. Reminder: the amp's output is the OP's point of reference and objective.
I was simplifying. Tomorrow will happen.
That would be reasonable, but the OP's post #17 observes that he sounds fine in the FOH at other venues where the band runs through the house PAs, so I don't think the problem is skewed expectations about DI'ed FOH sound. The OP has also auditioned the band-rig FOH w/ stage rig muted and DI straight into mixer channel; then he has attempted to EQ, and can't cope his regular FOH tone through the band's self-mixing rig.
Similarly, the Mackie DL series has decent eq. Hard to see the EQ limits of the digital DL32R as the likely root problem.
Those look like pretty serious subs. If properly powered, they would easily overpower a pair of K12s if not used with discretion.
FYI, here is the crossover and corrective EQ info specified by Peavey:
Sub to Woofer Crossover: Sub= 24 dB/oct. LR @ 125Hz, Woofer = 24 dB/oct LR @ 100Hz, Sub Polarity Normal, Woofer Polarity Normal
Sub EQ: PEQ +4.0 dB @ 50 Hz, bw= 0.7; PEQ -2.5 dB @ 100 Hz, bw= 0.5
Source: http://assets.peavey.com/literature/additional/00584470_5.pdf
But the OP does not know how that was achieved. Maybe somebody else was doing the sound or maybe it wouldn't meet his expectations today.
He should be able to get a direct bass sound which ranges from passable to very good using the mixer alone. So yes, I agree on that…
However, if he loves the sound he is getting from the amp (it has many tubes and a tone stack), then the obvious starting point seems to suggest using the amp's direct out. The tone out from the preamp should be very close to begin with and will translate better to the audience. What he hears is closer to what the audience hears. In this scenario, a HPF and LPF should usually be used. HPF for safety and to emulate the cab's low frequency rolloff (eg 60-120 Hz @ 6 or 12 dB/octave) and LPF (or High Shelf in some cases) to approximate the high end of his cabs (tweeter? L-Pad?). Those are just starting points. Then perhaps a small mid band adjustment so it sits with everything else. Shouldn't be a struggle since the system seems to sound good playing well-mastered recordings.
The obvious solution is usually the best.
So I'm not saying he'll get a bad sound going direct, just that it will be much easier if he uses his amp's direct out as a starting point.
Crossover is set at 125hz he looked .. I'm narrowing it down lol
Hopefully this thread helps some fellow bassists out in our quest for great tone out front
Hopefully this thread helps some fellow bassists out in our quest for great tone out front
This may have been mentioned already, but despite what the electronic crossover is set at, the real-world acoustical crossover point may be much different depending on the relative gain settings of the subs and mids. If the subs have higher output (real, acoustic output, not as measure by the gain setting on the Driverack) than the tops that actually pushes the acoustical crossover higher and creates mud and incoherence in the overlapped region.Crossover is set at 125hz he looked .. I'm narrowing it down lol
Hopefully this thread helps some fellow bassists out in our quest for great tone out front
It's possible that the HPF for the subs and LPF for the tops will actually need to be spread about a bit more. Really depends on many other variables as well, which others have touched upon.
Also, why is your bass EQd the way it is on the input channel (post #34)? Looks like a low end boost spanning several octaves, is there a reason for that?
Flatten that EQ completely, then listen to how your bass sounds through the mixer monitored via good headphones. Does it sound good? If so, then bring it up in the main speaker system to a nominal level. Does it sound the same, or at least very similar? If not, then maybe there is an issue with the system set-up.
I would expect that Peavey Versarray sub to outrun the QSC tops maybe by a very large margin. Those are KILLER 2x18 subs, here's a short clip from a blues gig I did at an outdoor show held on a ski slope, essentially a natural amphitheater. Maybe 1000-1500 in attendance, audio is from the the video camera (not a board feed) at FOH house position maybe 150' from the stage. That's only about 1/3 into the audience. The FOH system had only two of those Versarray subs and they easily carried the low end for that outdoor space. Listen with decent headphones or speakers to hear the low end.
My point is that unless you're careful it may be too much sub, or to little top for your situation.
who is "he"? an actual soundguy, or somebody mixing from stage?
i guess there's some logic to this approach, if the driverack stays with the PA stacks and is truly set up to control and compensate for the cabs properly, then the mixer's main EQ can start out flat from room to room and just be used for room correction. if he's not using the mixer's far easier EQ at all and wrestling with the driverack for room tweaks throughout the show instead, you may have a problem "behind the board", in which case this is your solution:
Here's a shot of the bass EQ On the iPad bump in 80hz bump in 160hz bump in 800hz high rolled off a bit
i'd be tempted to flatten that out entirely, even ditching the HPF, and start from there.
without the 80Hz "rumble boost" and that high end rolloff, you might find the bass jumps forward in the mix.
+1 to ditching any channel compression on it if you're running a compressor in your own signal chain.
