Recording bass - mic the amp, or go direct?

[JimmyM]

It's funny. I can usually get a great clean bass sound in 5 minutes and a distorted or effected sound within about 10. Whether it's my studio or someone else's, it's never been a problem for me. Drums I can spend hours on. But never bass. And yet I hear so many stories of people having problems. I always use whatever DI the studio has or the DI output of my SM-500 set flat and it sounds killer. Maybe I'll EQ it a little in the mix, but for a clean sound, that's about all I do.

There ought to be a sticky for first-time studio bassists about how to get a good sound.

 

[MikeM]

I have always recorded bass with a DI onto tape or harddrive with as little eq as possible ( usually none ). The time to eq bass is durring mix down when you can hear it in relation to the other instruments.

 

[gsys]

This thread brings back some bad semi-recent recording memories (see sig).

Here's my two-cents worth from what miniscule experience I've had with the recording thing.

1 - Recording engineers can't make something out of nothing, even if they say something to the effect that they can. What gets tracked is what they've got to work with, and if it sounds like bubbly mud now, it's not going to sound like flowers in the mix just because somebody says it will.

2 - Your bass is going to sound how whoever's recording and mixing you wants it to sound - no matter what. And if it doesn't sound how they want it to it will be because they aren't skilled at their job, and it will sound worse.

Moral of the day: If you care about the final product, make sure that you and the recording team are on completely the same page before recording even starts.

 

[xshawnxearthx]

the four times i recorded were different.

first time was with my rig, just one mic. sounded like crap but that was cause i had dead strings.

2nd time was better. i recorded on a 1 15" combo amp used on a lot of old school hc bands cd's. it sounded nothing like i wanted it.

3rd time i went in super prepared. new strings, new picks, new everything. bass sounded like it should, some bottom, but mainly just that stingray tone. i went in with the sansamp and mic'd with two different mic's

4th time. p-bass. both direct box via sans amp and mic'd two times. it sounded the best out of all of the recordings.

if you wanna cut through the mix, you need some mids boosted. hats what i have found when working with les pauls going to mesa half stacks.

 

[RumbleBot]

I have two little graphic EQ tweaks always set in my preamp. +3dB ~ 440Hz and another +3dB ~ 1300Hz. The 440 boost gives some extra growl in the low mids and the 1300 brings out the note definition. You shouldn't go over +3dB if at all possible. Too much EQ-ing is generally bad.