All the EQs I have work differently form one another. The Q is different, the frequencies are different, the amount I can change them by are different, so on. My main bass currently has a passive tone knob. That's not exactly an EQ, but it does most of what I want for tone shaping. I have a preamp pedal that is always set the same with a speaker emulation, so that I can have a similar tone no matter what I plug into, also have the option for drive, and also have the option to split the signal into DI. None of that would be possible with just my tone knob, that's why I, and many others, choose preamp pedals and similar devices. Sure I have a Sire Jazz bass with a pretty complex EQ, but when I'm not using that exact bass, I need some tone shaping through another way. Sure I have an amp with pretty complex EQ, but if I'm not using that, I need some tone shaping through another way. See the point I'm trying to make? Redundancy is always great, but a preamp pedal for example can give you incredible amounts of flexibility, without ever having to fear that you might miss something. Just in general a good pedalboard will do that for you. My pedalboard and bass is all I ever really need to have full control over my sound.
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Preamps, Tone, and so much EQ
- Thread starter Matthew Frazer
- Start date
Your bass doesn't really have active and passive pickups in it. It has pickups that can be utilized with either passive or active electronics. The preamp built into your bass is a active preamp, but it can be used in passive mode, in which case none of the active EQ sculpting is available. Very commonly in passive mode the only controls working in passive mode are the pickup balance knob and the volume knob.
I have a 1982 Jazz Bass that I bought in '85 and also had owned a 1965 Jazz Bass that I bought in 1966. The '65 Jazz was stolen in 1976 along with all my touring gear. Those are both passive basses. There's not a circuit board inside them and no battery powering them. I also have Made in Korea Rogue LX405 Pro (not the Pro II or III, which are Chinese made). It is an active bass that can play in passive mode. In active mode (controls run by the battery) it has volume, pickup blend, bass cut/boost, and treble cut/boost. It has a large-pole Jazz bass-style neck pickup and a Musicman-style double bar humbucker for the bridge position. Top two controls are volume and blend, bottom two are bass and treble controls.
I usually play it in passive mode because I don't have to change the gain control on my amps when I switch between basses. Active controls with a battery powering them have a more powerful signal and will have way too much gain saturation (not in a good way) unless you drop the gain level from where you had it on your passive bass mode. Usually there's a "pad" button or an "active" input which drops the signal by 12db or so to compensate for the hotter signal from your active bass.
Since the bass and treble controls are active controls, without the battery powering them, they don't work. HOWEVER with any bass that has a separate neck pickup and a bridge pickup, the blend control for those pickups will let you control your sound a bit - enough to find a decent sound. The farther you turn that blend control towards the Neck Pickup, the darker and warmer your sound will be. The more you turn it towards the Bridge Pickup the brighter and more treble your sound will be. You can usually get a good balance to your sound just by using that balance control.
ALSO, you can control your sound with the fingers of your plucking hand by moving it around in the same manner between the pickups. If you need a little darker sound than you get in your default plucking position, pluck the string a little closer to the neck or even right over the frets at the heel of the neck. If you want a brighter sound, move your plucking position towards the bridge pickup. There's a wide difference in the sound you'll get from your bass just by changing the plucking position of your hand.
The main difference to keep in mind in the controls of your bass is that in active mode it can actually do both boost and cut that EQ. With passive controls, it can only cut the signal it's getting from the pickups. There's noway to boost anything with passive pickups. Still you can get a wide variety of sounds out of a bass with two pickups by altering the blend of the pickups (cuts the one one you're not moving the control towards) in various degrees.
Personally, since I use my 4-string passive Jazz for everything that doesn't require using a low B-string, I set my two volume controls and one tone control all the way up, to get every bit of signal out of those pickups with my passive controls. Then I adjust my sound with my plucking hand in its default position by adjusting the EQ on my amp. I typically run my EQ on my amps with a little boost in the low-mids (anywhere between 250Hz and 550Hz will work) to give my sound good presence and definition and everything else is set flat.
Then, when I use my 5-string I put it in passive mode and adjust the blend of the pickups and possibly my string plucking position, to get a decent or good sound out of it while using the same amp's EQ that I already have set up for my 4-string bass.. That way I don't end up needing to adjust the gain, amp EQ, and or Bass EQ every time I switch basses back and forth. I set that 5-string pickup blend once during the night and leave it there for the rest of the gig.
My Rogue bass was very inexpensive back in 2009 (~$200), when I bought it and I bought it on a friend's recommendation. When these basses were made in Korea, the fit and finish was spectacular. Not nearly as comfortably as the 60's Slim C-shape neck with 7.25" radius on my Jazz Bass, but well enough. The neck is wide like you'd expect for a 5-string, and its radius of 12" is very flat, but it is a slim neck and I can comfortably move around it just fine. Although the sound is fine and I can get a good sound out of it, it's not in the same league as a number of the top-quality basses out there. Some of the active electronics on them can produce a very wide variety sounds as well as subtlety.
So often folks with high-end 5-string basses use them for all their songs, not just the ones that require notes on the B-string. I'm not one of them. My '82 jazz with its all-maple neck and 70's era pickup spacing (4" center to center instead of the standard 3.6") is the best sounding bass I've ever played or heard. I would love to have my 1965 Jazz back again, but even if I did, it would play second fiddle to my '82. Now, somewhere down the road if I ever get a Dingwall Leland Sklar model 5-string, I might use a 5-string for everything. But I've played my '82 Jazz now for almost 40-years and I just love the sound of it. So I didn't opt to pay top dollar for a bass that I would at most use 6-times in a 4-hour gig. And I haven't used it at all for the last 2-years - just no songs we play than need it right now.
I hope that helps you understand your bass a bit better as well as how to use the pickup blend in passive mode; how active mode allows you to not only cut sounds but also boost them; and how once you have everything set that sounds good to begin with, you can instantly change it to make it darker or brighter, a little or a lot, by just where you pluck the strings.
To figure out what sounds you like in passive mode, set your gain up first and then set the rest of the EQ on your amp at flat. With your hand plucking the strings in your most comfortable position start playing a pattern and slowly moving the pickup blend control towards the neck position. Usually you'll find a spot that is just too muddy. Don't bother going beyond that but move it back to center and then start moving it towards the bridge pickup. If you move it too far you'll get a lot of string noise and fret clank. So don't move it that far.
Now go over to your amp and dial it just a little bit of boost in your low-mid control. When playing in a group, you own the low-mids part of the frequency spectrum. Guitar and keys own the hi-mids and highs, and the drummer's kick drum owns the lowest bass. Adding a little boost to the low mids gives you presence and definition in your sound while playing with a group, without the need to overpower them with volume. I run my low-mid boost just up to 1:30, which isn't a lot of boost, but it works. If you boost the low-mids too much, your sound will honk at you. If that happens just slowly reduce it until the honk goes away.
To figure out what sounds you like you're going to need to spend some time with your EQ on your bass and in your amp. With your bass in active mode, start with your EQ setting on your amp flat and the EQ controls on your bass flat. Then slowly adjust one variable at a time. Start with the bass control in its center notch and move it a little at a time until you like the bass sound you're getting. Then adjust the treble by boosting a little at a time and then cutting a little at a time. You'll probably find a spot you like with that. Then go back and change the bass a little bit in each direction boost and cut to see if you find an even better spot for your bass EQ with your treble set where you like it.
In passive mode, it's even easier. Just pull the knob or flip the switch to put it in passive mode (whatever method your bass uses to toggle back and forth), turn the volume up full, and then with the balance set in the middle, start playing a pattern. Continue to slowly move the blend towards the neck pickup until it just sounds too bassy (boomy or muddy). Then go back to the middle and slowly turn it towards the bridge pickup until it gets too bright for you. Odds are you will pass a sound that seems balanced to you along the way, so again, turn slowly back to that position until you're happy with it.
If your sound seems a little weak - it should after playing in active mode first - raise the gain on your amp up slowly until you reach the sweet spot where it goes from muted to suddenly alive. If you have a gain set light on your amp, you want that light to flash and dance on your lowest, loudest notes. If it comes on and stays on, you need to turn the gain down. If it doesn't come on at all, you need to turn it up. All these adjustment movements should be small movements so you don't turn past it in one direction or the other. Again, in passive mode, you have a weaker signal and will need more gain in your amp to reach a good level. In active mode you will need to engage the pad on the gain (typically drops gains sensitivity by ~12db) to be able to find that sweet spot. Without doing that there's just not enough granularity in your adjustments to find it easily and too much gain will wreck your sound if it's not the gain in an overdrive or distortion circuit.
The long and short of it is you'll need to spend a few hours with your bass and your amp's EQ to find what really sounds best to you. Then...WRITE IT DOWN! If you don't remember that, it can be tough to find again at first.
One other thing if this is the first "active bass" you've had. Do NOT leave it plugged in. Your instrument chord or wireless transmitter plugged into your bass turns on the active circuitry in your bass and if you leave it turned on all the time, you'll drain the battery. So if you keep your bass on a stand at home, don't leave it plugged in. When you stop playing it, unplug it. If you only plug it in for your gigs and practice, the battery will probably last a year or so. Nonetheless, you'll want to carry a spare in your gig bag because when it goes out, it will just suddenly cut off.
Short answer: yes, some would agree that it's just different stages of eq and gain staging.
Long answer: well...
If you're viewing your bass 'tone discovery journey' from the perspective of a sound engineer or PA guy, then many of the perspectives shared here on TB may seem a little counter intuitive. But don't worry, it's just different perspectives on the same thing ultimately: do I like how that bass sounds?
All the foundations of sound theory apply to bass, but many bassists won't refer to them. They'll use 'bass specific' terminology.
For example, bassists will refer to their bass amp and cabinets as their 'rig' rather than their personal on stage monitor. Which is fair, because it's often more than that: it also imparts eq, compression, drive, and speaker colouration that results in the 'tone'.
This differs drastically from a PA or sound engineer approach, where the playback systems are preferred to be as neutral as possible and not impart anymore colouration to the signal. For many bassists, everything from string through to speaker cabinet IS 'the signal'.
However, if FOH are taking a DI signal pre amp/rig, and not micing the rig, doesn't that render the bass rig solely as an onstage monitor system for the band? Yep. For players doing gigs at this level, they'll often downsize their rigs and ensure their 'tone' comes from pedals prior to the DI signal. That's why the Noble has been a hit.
Lastly, I suggest you seperate 'tone chasing' into 2 categories: playing solo at home vs live. They are not the same. Live veterans have already shared in this thread the necessary utility of eq when playing live. It's a very different context.
I shudder to think how many threads on TB exist of bedroom players first experiences taking their little Rumble to their first band rehearsal and reporting back 'omg I couldn't hear myself my tone was completely different '. I have a lot of respect for the live playing veterans who hang out here and share their insight!
I'm responding here hoping you don't feel like your 'doing it wrong' and you stay on your bass playing journey. There is no wrong, just different perspectives and different methods to get vibrating strings amplified into sound waves.
All the best on your journey.
I found that the bass player/instrumentalist in me is searching for one ultimate tone (and I think I have actually achieved it, still the never ending search continues, alas such is the way of the GAS), while the composer/producer in me wants as many different tones available as possible.
This is of course from the perspective of someone who almost exclusively does original music, rather than a primarily cover musician.
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