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Stereo Rig

#2
Any amps will work, but I highly recommend a low power tube rig for the dirty side with a mic in front of it. I also wouldn't necessarily rule out using effects in the clean side, either. There are a million ways to accomplish it, though...you're really only limited by your creativity and amount of cables you have on hand.
 
#6
i'm curious about a stereo rig. how does that work live? do you monitor both, one side or send the stereo to the house? if your rig is carrying the room, how do you achieve the stereo image with bass frequency? isn't it a bad thing (usually) to split up your speakers on the backline? what do you do to make it "stereo"? is it really just a mono signal split and each routed thru different stuff? is it like E,D go to left A,G go right or something?
 
#7
I've done stereo rigs for years. Usually a mono front end into Lexicon processors and then out to a power amp and then two cabs. Two fEARfuls work great. I've also had rigs with mixers so I could separately control stereo loops along with the main stereo signal. That rig sent 4 DI signals to the house.

For off the shelf preamps, the Eden Navigator works well with a stereo rig. It has stereo outs and a stereo DI. The DI goes stereo to the house.
These days the music I play doesn't call for so much craziness, but I have been working an Eventide Eclipse into my rig after the demise of the Lexicon G2. I run a mono rig on stage, but my in ears are stereo, so I get to hear the cool stuff that way.

My main basses are stereo (Alembic Series I and '67 Guild Starfire with Alembic Series II pickups and electronics), but I haven't noticed too much of a benefit of keeping a completely stereo signal path. It makes for an odd left/right balance, although the fundamental tone of the pickups aren't that different.
 
#10
Sorry my bad on not being specific. I'm looking for a stereo rig to use with effects- like delay (headrush), phaser, etc. I always run distortion so not really looking for the one clean one distorted amp thing.

For my post metal band I use a Fender Bassman Pro 100T. I'm just looking for a midlevel rig for this noise project. Some ideas I've thrown around are getting a Carvin TS100 and splitting it into two cabs (my AMT Bass Crunch as the preamp). Not sure if that would be enough power as I have no experience with it. Another idea was to just get two midlevel comobo amps (maybe carvin 210 combos) and just splitting the signal of the headrush to each.

That probably makes things much clearer and I really appreciate your ideas :)
 
#11
bongomania said:
For live stage use it's important to remember that the lows are non-directional, so you can maximize your wattage and speaker cab needs by only running the highs and high mids in stereo.
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I've thought of this before and the closest I've gotten was using one more full range rig for one channel and a 4x10 TE combo for the other. The problem is that to do this, I needed to add a crossover (which the full range rig had, but only in mono) and another amp channel. So, to do it right, you need 3 amp channels. A stereo power amp and two fearfuls has been my compromise, which isn't too much of a compromise, once you get down to it. When creating low end impact sounds, like slapping with a delay, the low end does seem to retain a lot of directional cues compared to regular bass lines.

Fun stuff!
 
#12
edwinhurwitz said:
I've thought of this before and the closest I've gotten was using one more full range rig for one channel and a 4x10 TE combo for the other. The problem is that to do this, I needed to add a crossover (which the full range rig had, but only in mono) and another amp channel. So, to do it right, you need 3 amp channels. A stereo power amp and two fearfuls has been my compromise, which isn't too much of a compromise, once you get down to it. When creating low end impact sounds, like slapping with a delay, the low end does seem to retain a lot of directional cues compared to regular bass lines.

Fun stuff!
Click to expand...

My Lexicon has a programmable high pass filter built in, which comes in handy for this sort of stuff.
 
#14
JimmyM said:
Any amps will work, but I highly recommend a low power tube rig for the dirty side with a mic in front of it. I also wouldn't necessarily rule out using effects in the clean side, either. There are a million ways to accomplish it, though...you're really only limited by your creativity and amount of cables you have on hand.
Click to expand...

A Sansamp BD has dual outputs, one clean and one dirty, so it works nicely for dual amps.
If I was going Ampeg, I’d get an Ampeg PF500 into a pair of SVT210AV cabs for clean, then run the dirty channel into a PF-350 sitting on another pair of SVT210AV cabs.
Horizontally stacked pairs!! Now were having fun!
 
#15
jeff7bass said:
A Sansamp BD has dual outputs, one clean and one dirty, so it works nicely for dual amps.
If I was going Ampeg, I’d get an Ampeg PF500 into a pair of SVT210AV cabs for clean, then run the dirty channel into a PF-350 sitting on another pair of SVT210AV cabs.
Horizontally stacked pairs!! Now were having fun!
Click to expand...

OK, we're getting down another path here. The OP was asking about stereo rigs where he can amplify stereo effects in a symmetrical fashion, rather than a clean/dirty parallel signal path. However, I like this, too, so maybe it deserves its own thread. Jack Casady was a pioneer in this with his Versatone on a volume pedal setup.
 
#16
edwinhurwitz said:
OK, we're getting down another path here. The OP was asking about stereo rigs where he can amplify stereo effects in a symmetrical fashion, rather than a clean/dirty parallel signal path. However, I like this, too, so maybe it deserves its own thread. Jack Casady was a pioneer in this with his Versatone on a volume pedal setup.
Click to expand...

My bad...

:hiding:
 
#18
Stereo just doesn't seem to work out live. It's not much of an effect in medium to large rooms. You might be real effective with surround sound. Think big movie theater. Look at some wireless devices and self powered speakers to connect them up.

These are interesting for single point stereo sources
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This is a similar concept on how to do it with a mic
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Reverse it, experiment, and you can have rig setup to do it.
 
#19
seamonkey said:
Stereo just doesn't seem to work out live. It's not much of an effect in medium to large rooms.
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I have to disagree. I've found it to be quite effective. The very low stuff, as noted before, tends to be omnidirectional, but creative use of delays and reverbs can result in some very enveloping textures. Obviously it's better for some listening spots than others, but it's still well worth experimenting with.

Of course, it depends on what you mean by medium to large rooms. I've done it mostly in 800-1500 person venues and festivals. The largest I've done it has been Red Rocks, so maybe bigger than that might be less effective.

You might be real effective with surround sound.
Click to expand...

This is fun, too!
 

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