Double Bass Powered speaker as bass amp?

[Chickenwheels]

I’d echo the sentiment that powered speakers are “okay” in quieter situations. They’re not great for DB unless you mic. For electric they have a dead tone unless you amp model. I do still use QSCs for some work but they’ve got nothing on the tone, punch and feel of an EVM 15L in a live band setting imo. And if you mic that EVM and send that to the QSCs....DANG!!

 

[Ric Vice]

Yup that's, like, exactly what I meant. I'm a lot more concerned with how much I like my sound than how much the audience likes it. Selfish, I know but if I like my sound, I will play better and that's more important than anything else IMHO.

And generally speaking, if you are comfortable with your sound and the band can hear you onstage, that’s communicated out into the audience. In large venues the FOH is out of our hands, while in amp only small venues most modern amps will carry most of the room with proper EQ settings, but you can’t really set the amp to entirely cover the house. Fortunately bass notes are omni directional, so they can be heard throughout the room. Just my take. Mike Arnopol’s cabinets cover the room better than anything I’ve owned and they sound great onstage. My QSC K8 was nice but it needed to be elevated and the midrange was to edgy if you had to ramp up the volume.

 

[Mike Arnopol]

Yup that's, like, exactly what I meant. I'm a lot more concerned with how much I like my sound than how much the audience likes it. Selfish, I know but if I like my sound, I will play better and that's more important than anything else IMHO.

I feel exactly the same! It's like when you're in the studio and you've got this terrible sound in the cans. I dealt with this with an exceptionally gifted multi-Grammy engineer. Super bright and nasally. I asked him if he could eq the headphone feed. He said--"no, I don't want any eq going to tape" He was just lazy--he could have bounced to another channel and Eq that to the cans.
Same thing with sound guys. Fortunately we traveled with our own sound guy for the last 15 years. I hated when the sound guys tried do do house sound first. they would prefer you to be inaudible. I now insist that we get our stage sound perfect first. Now--sound guys reluctantly admit that the sound coming out of my speakers is better than what they can get from the mains, since the dispersion and sound drop-off is preferable.
I would always go for the best possible stage sound and balance. When you're playing jazz--the interaction with the other musicians is critical. The more comfortable with my stage sound the better I can accompany. If that means that there is a compromise in room sound---so be it. What initially attracted me to this technology is that I can get the same impact and tonal balance throughout the house.
If the dough is crazy good---I shut up and do the best I can.

 

[Don Hergert]

I'm not sure where I read it -- I'm also active on a few other instrument related forums -- but someone was expressing that a person on stage never really knows exactly how things are sounding in the audience.

Wow, how true that is...

• Playing acoustically, we can balance ourselves and polish the tone of our instruments as much as possible, but then we're mic'ed into the FOH.

• If we're amped, even with no FOH, we can get our amps sounding terrific but then venue acoustics where the audience is may change the sound and its focus.

• FOH monitors only give us what the sound person wants us to hear and most of the time monitors produce different sound than the speakers that the audience hears.

• If we go out into the audience to listen, we're hearing the stage mix without us.

• If we have spies in the audience, their hearing and impressions are, like the rest of us, very subjective.

• Even if we have a live IEM feed from the audience (which most people never do), we're only getting one location in the audience at any given time.

So from a practical sense, the most that people on stage can do is to get things sounding as good as possible on stage. From there, hope is that the venue acoustics and/or the sound people and their equipment will work together as they should to reproduce that sound for the audience.

I'm just at the beginning with my amp experience. Mike, your entry into smaller lighter boxes, especially combos including a prime amp, really has my attention. Admittedly, I'm spoiled, but are you considering battery power at all?

 

[bassmanbrent]

Seriously?

Yes, absolutely! Mike Arnopol explained it much better than I ever will above. To flip things the other way, I have been in the audience many times where initially I wasn't crazy about the tone of one of the musicians I was listening to but what they played and how they played was great enough that it made me forget about the tone thing. My point - I think the audience is most concerned about performance. If I'm not happy with my sound then it effects my ability to perform well, so everyone loses.

 

[Povl Carstensen]

In a way, the purpose of your sound is to be able to interact with the other musicians in the best possible way. And if the musicians interact well (swing?), it is difficult for FOH to ruin it totally. But ofcourse they can try.

 

[Ric Vice]

Playing acoustically, we can balance ourselves and polish the tone of our instruments as much as possible, but then we're mic'ed into the FOH.

It's been quite some time since someone used a microphone on my bass in a live setting, I generally bring my Remic 5400 LB if they want one and it works just fine.

If we're amped, even with no FOH, we can get our amps sounding terrific but then venue acoustics where the audience is may change the sound and its focus.

IME you can't really worry about that, you have to know how to EQ an amplifier on the fly.

FOH monitors only give us what the sound person wants us to hear and most of the time monitors produce different sound than the speakers that the audience hears.

Generally, Monitors are for you to hear yourself on stage, but the reality is, few houses have separate monitor sends for each individual instrument, I avoid them or have them turned off, unless there is a separate bass channel.

If we go out into the audience to listen, we're hearing the stage mix without us.

I never listen to the house mix, it's not for me deciide how that will work.

If we have spies in the audience, their hearing and impressions are, like the rest of us, very subjective.

For the most part, I don’t ask someone in the audience what it sounds like, unless it's someone I really trust.

Even if we have a live IEM feed from the audience (which most people never do), we're only getting one location in the audience at any given time.

On a big stage with lots of instruments, and great sound tech's IEM's can be incredible.

So from a practical sense, the most that people on stage can do is to get things sounding as good as possible on stage. From there, hope is that the venue acoustics and/or the sound people and their equipment will work together as they should to reproduce that sound for the audience.[/QUOTE]

Hope is the key word

I'm just at the beginning with my amp experience. Mike, your entry into smaller lighter boxes, especially combos including a prime amp, really has my attention. Admittedly, I'm spoiled, but are you considering battery power at all?[/QUOTE]

Unless you're outside in the woods, I cannot think of a reason for a battery powered unit, I have a Roland BA-330 ordered for just this purpose. Just my take of course