Physics behind "growl"

[Honkey tonk]

If that was the cause of growl, wouldn't it happen with all pickups all the time?

Until they figure out how to make a perfect coil I'm sure all pickups do to some extent growl out of imperfection

 

[Bruce Johnson]

Good thread, too bad the OP did not specify what type of growl we are talking about here.
Also, kinda mind-boggling that a lot of people talk about the setup here - I get it, but I do not think this is the case with Wicks. Fretless wicks growl for days as well and they got no frets to fret over, for example... as it was mentioned above.

Eh.

The mechanical growl that I described, the controlled buzzing from the strings on the frets, is almost the same thing as Mwah on a fretless. They are the same mechanics. On a fretless, which usually has smoother strings, a softer wooden surface and warmer pickups, the low frequency rattle is more Mwah than Growl. It's a Pit Bull holding a towel in his mouth. But, on a fretless with brighter strings and switched on a brighter pickup, the Mwah gets more Growl-like. Some fretless basses, like Warwicks, certainly can growl almost as nastily as a fretted bass.

 

[chadds]

Growl is a balance of touch. Sometimes it’s firm sometimes light. It’s what you find your amp giving back to you on that stage or studio.
It can be a response to an acoustic experience you’re having that is different with different players and different environments.

Your own choice of string attack is first cause. Do you do that in a ballad or in metal or polka funk. Depends.

 

[socialleper]

This is the way!

I like that you mention "even the drummer can hear it".
It must be true

Right. Usually no one gives a hoot about the bass players tone. But my drummer is always like "that's the one." Unfortunately "the one" is a Spector Euro 5 with solid maple wings and weighs a ton. But that's where the tone comes from. My Euro 5 LE has "weight reliefs", a slab of walnut in the middle, and a poplar back. The difference isn't night and day, but it's there.

Same goes for the Thumb. If you made it out of alder with a maple neck it would sound terrible.

 

[Mike Vee]

For me when I think clean P-bass growl, with no fuzz, this is a prime example, if not a tad bright:



Pretty much just a P-bass with rounds and a good EQ curve. (Also my favorite song of all time

 

[JanBerisha]

For me when I think clean P-bass growl, with no fuzz, this is a prime example, if not a tad bright:



Pretty much just a P-bass with rounds and a good EQ curve. (Also my favorite song of all time

Thats less than growl and more like a sparking bright treble fuss

 

[Lardass5000]

Right. Usually no one gives a hoot about the bass players tone. But my drummer is always like "that's the one." Unfortunately "the one" is a Spector Euro 5 with solid maple wings and weighs a ton. But that's where the tone comes from. My Euro 5 LE has "weight reliefs", a slab of walnut in the middle, and a poplar back. The difference isn't night and day, but it's there.

Same goes for the Thumb. If you made it out of alder with a maple neck it would sound terrible.

Yep im all Spectors and Wicks too. Its a small price for greatness

 

[Dincrest]

In my earlier post, I mentioned finding growl in my LTD, a Warwick I used to own, and a friend's Ibanez.

We hear about the Warwick growl, the Spector growl, the Jazz Bass growl... All are very different.

No two growls are alike. A lion's growl differs from a doberman's growl which differs from an alligator's growl. Heck even among dogs, a pitbull will growl differently than a rottweiler.

(And it's still interesting to me that when I had a luthier swap out the stock active MECs in my old 'wick for passive Duncans, it changed the nature of the growl. The growl never went away. Honestly, I think it improved with the passive Duncans).

And even strings can change the nature of a bass's growl. My LTD with the stock D'Addario XLs did not have the aggressive (maybe too aggressive) growl that DR steel Lo-Riders impart on it. Even when broken in, DR steel Lo-Riders on a merbau-bodied LTD D-5 growl like a beast.

 

[Tim Skaggs]

For me when I think clean P-bass growl, with no fuzz, this is a prime example, if not a tad bright:



Pretty much just a P-bass with rounds and a good EQ curve. (Also my favorite song of all time

I wasn’t very familiar with the song but I think I’ve heard it a couple times. It’s a good example of growl and exactly what I was talking about in an earlier post that the growl is the tone / harmonic content in the low-mids.

I like this example @ 4:00 and again at 7:17.

 

[Indiedog]

Growl in a fretted bass is a controlled mechanical buzz of the strings on the frets. It's not created by the pickups. To get a nice even growl, the fretwork needs to be accurately leveled, and the action needs to be set at just the right height to work with the players' plucking style. You need to find the point where there's no buzz when you pluck lightly, and the buzzing comes in as you increase the power of your plucking. And you have to learn to work with it, to control the amount of buzzing. Listen to Geddy Lee, he's a master of growl. He puts in the amount of growl he wants on individual notes, where he wants it.

Making a fretted bass growl is very much like making a fretless bass Mwah. It's mostly mechanical, with the setup and your finger skill.

Now, the sound of the growl (or Mwah) can be adjusted by your choice of pickup design, pickup position, and strings. Bright roundwounds and a bridge pickup can make the growl bright and buzz-like. Flatwounds, a neck pickup, low EQ boost, etc. can make the growl deep and warmer and softer. Almost like a Mwah. It's your choice of what you want your growl to sound like.

What basses have the "best" growl? I dunno. The ones that are set up and played well. Any bass can be made to growl, as long as the frets are leveled and it's set up well, and you learn the playing technique. The tone of the growl is your choice.

Dang, Bruce! I can always count on you to deliver the real story on anything bass-related. Thank you for always being willing to take the time to write these great posts!! I always learn so much.

 

[logdrum]

This is part of the issue - there are as many definitions of what growl is as there are people using the term.

As to the Physics of such things, assuming your definition of what we're taking about exists at some point in the midrange, the most powerful influence on the sound of your bass in that range is the position of the pickups - that positioning imparts a series of comb filters on the sound (each string has it's own filter for each pickup position or combination) that's far stronger than any other factor in that region. Those filters (given that each sting has its own), can not be eq'd out - the comb filter is a very complex thing, and even if you applied enough eq to fix it on one string, every other string would be worse. So, that comb filter just is, and it determines a huge part of the bass's sound - a Ric will sound like a Ric, regardless of what else you do to the signal, likewise a P, a J, and a 'Ray will have their own voices in the midrange.

Yes, a bit of fret buzz (on the note attack) will send some harmonics into that filter - that is part of getting some "growl" going (for most folks' definition of it) - how you play the thing (accentuating or diminishing that bit of fret buzz) helps unlock growl.

Anyway, given all that, the things that form most of the growl exist on the physical platform that you're playing - if you put a fresh set of rounds on a well set up bass, crank up the tone controls, and it doesn't growl, you should move on to another bass if that's what you want.

I keep my action high on most of my basses. I also can get growl on an upright bass which has no frets if I use Spirocore strings but not so much with gut or say Belcanto which has silk in the wrappings I believe which dampens the tone. With the same piezo pickup. the growl can be heard acoustically or picked up by the mic. In general Spirocores do this on the E and A string on double bass unless you get the Stark - thick gauges

In the EB, guys like Jamerson got the growl from a slightly over driven channel strip in the recording console or the B15. Those sounds are flats growling to me.

I am also fret on fret itself, not behind type of guy. Learned that from Jaco's video where he emphasized that, so even with low action, I tend to not buzz. Some strings on certain pitches and pickup combos will produce a growl, fret or no fret. What is growl for me - well from subtractive synthesis which I also do with my analog synths, Square wave or sawtooth wave. How to get this will vary from string to string , bass to bass etc. setup to setup, player to player.

However I have a bass, that would send the B string into a weird oscillation acoustically in one use case. I will get this when I fret on B on A (10 fret) while playing the E A harmonic on the 9th fret. The B will beat on the frets above my fretting hand and you will hear it buzz. However the pickups do not get that buzz. It's just A on B and the resulting harmonic on the 9th on E, A, D/ Only happens on 2 roundwounds - DR High Beams and NYXL - worse on the NYXL. How do you explain that. No growly A string out of the amp but turn off the amp and there is this buzz with a slight ring. No buzz if you don't do the harmonic on the 9th fret and the amplified tone of the B on that fret is the same.

 

[Outbush]

I’m not sure about the impact of the location of the pickup as much as pickup height relative to the vibration of the string. I play light with the pickups close to the strings & get a nice growl out of a Pbass. When my pickups are adjusted lower there is less growl. There are also a lot of players who really dig in who must have a higher action & if they’re not getting a “clank” out of their bass they must have a greater gap between their pickups & strings and they also get a good growl. My guess is that it’s all about the way the pickup’s magnetic field is affected by the strings that generates growl.

I think other variables exist too including how hot the pickups are. Hotter pickups seem to growl more easily with a heavier touch.

All that said. I’ve never fiddled with my basses to investigate this specific question so I might be way off!

 

[pepj]

I'm thinking any Warwick Thumb and Jazzes I've played are chalk and cheese, and especially in terms of sound.

 

[5StringBlues]

Oh the shark has, pretty teeth dear......

 

[Swings]

I’m not sure about the impact of the location of the pickup as much as pickup height relative to the vibration of the string. I play light with the pickups close to the strings & get a nice growl out of a Pbass. When my pickups are adjusted lower there is less growl. There are also a lot of players who really dig in who must have a higher action & if they’re not getting a “clank” out of their bass they must have a greater gap between their pickups & strings and they also get a good growl. My guess is that it’s all about the way the pickup’s magnetic field is affected by the strings that generates growl.

I think other variables exist too including how hot the pickups are. Hotter pickups seem to growl more easily with a heavier touch.

All that said. I’ve never fiddled with my basses to investigate this specific question so I might be way off!

I think you are on to something there re: hot pickups.

pickups have a lot of string noise as well as so much more to get down the lines besides the frequency of the string vibrating…
Hot pickups wide open would be more susceptible to pushing ALL THE SIGNAL down the line.
I’m thinking there’s gonna be distortion when the wide band of sound is not cleanly captured
I thought the case has already been made that if you back off your volume pots part of that is throttling more and more “noise” vs. The Actual Note Played.
That’s just my understanding— it’s helped me tame s**+¥ ambience and radio from pickups?

Won’t write that active vs passive preamps make a difference-
Per unit of volume, sonic character being delivered stays the same, with a push/pull active bypass. (At least with the Warwick).

I have cheap passive p/j configurations that give Stingray vibes soundwise, it’s the way they shape the sound and not effects like fret buzz. It helps to set the bass up well though.

Is it the energy of the string vibration, ESPECIALLY in the case of bridge pickups, making or losing the growl?

Warwick manuals for their mec/thumbs stress that the two bridge pickups should be ridiculously as close as possible to the strings - down on the B side that defies logic.
I fell victim to magnetic pull altering my tuning.

?? ideas.

 

[micguy]

I think you are on to something there re: hot pickups.

pickups have a lot of string noise as well as so much more to get down the lines besides the frequency of the string vibrating…
Hot pickups wide open would be more susceptible to pushing ALL THE SIGNAL down the line.

The truth is that hot pickups are wound with more wire, and have higher impedance - inductance, especially. If you’re trying to get “all the signal” down the cable, hot pickups lose the most signal, as the loading effects are most pronounced with a high impedance source.

 

[Swings]

So warwicks are known for their "growl" (especially the thumb), but I want to know is what causes that sound, and why it doesn't sound, say like a jazz bass, I mean they've got the same pickups, what separates a Thumb BO4 from an American Professional Jazz.

If anyone is interested i have photos of different basses from the bridge down to the necks; they show action height, pickup height&positon + type, i have the stats on what strings (materials, age, label) and my description of what sound they make.
The ranges are from polite growl thru to obnoxious growl

i could be pressed to go into woods etc but there’s nothing outstanding apart from the bodies i have not discovered.

(that was badly worded. The woods of the bodies…)

 

[Swings]

The truth is that hot pickups are wound with more wire, and have higher impedance - inductance, especially. If you’re trying to get “all the signal” down the cable, hot pickups lose the most signal, as the loading effects are most pronounced with a high impedance source.

Okay, so I’m not so strong on this (the theory in pickups is not something i have cared about until lately)

When you say “hot” You mean … What?

I have been interpreted hot as relatively loud output, overloads when pushed…

Does the pickup being active and able to be cut/boosted affect if it’s thought of as hot?

Is it a simple measure of how many windings?

 

[Swings]

I’m not sure about the impact of the location of the pickup as much as pickup height relative to the vibration of the string. I play light with the pickups close to the strings & get a nice growl out of a Pbass. When my pickups are adjusted lower there is less growl. There are also a lot of players who really dig in who must have a higher action & if they’re not getting a “clank” out of their bass they must have a greater gap between their pickups & strings and they also get a good growl. My guess is that it’s all about the way the pickup’s magnetic field is affected by the strings that generates growl.

I think other variables exist too including how hot the pickups are. Hotter pickups seem to growl more easily with a heavier touch.

All that said. I’ve never fiddled with my basses to investigate this specific question so I might be way off!

p/j pickups close-ish to the string.

Mucking around with note attack.

 

[micguy]

27394503[/URL], member: 396653"]Okay, so I’m not so strong on this (the theory in pickups is not something i have cared about until lately)

When you say “hot” You mean … What?

The word hot, when talking about pickups, means it has a lot of output. Usually, that’s achieved with lots of turns of wire.