Want to start recording two different basses/bass tracks

[Matthew_84]

I’m thinking of composing and making some songs with two different bass tracks (for example: one will play a deep bass line and the other will play something higher and more melodic).

I’m sure i’m not the only one here thats done this, so I’m curious how some of you went about this.

I have two basses - a fretless 5 with Chromes (flats), and a fretted 4 with rounds.

I would like to make some orchestral/classical sounding stuff (which i know i can use the fretless 5 to do everything with), but I’d also like to make some harder, rock instrumental kind of stuff and my favourite bass tone for that is on my 4, split into two channels (clean lows and distorted highs) to sound like a growly Ric, but I don’t think the fretless would work too well to accompany it most of the time. So now I’m wondering if I should get an octave pedal, or perhaps a separate bass and string it with piccolo strings, or a cheap 6’er, etc. Any thoughts on this stuff would be great, or just general other tips would be helpful.

For what it’s worth, i don’t so much have a DAW as i have a 12 year old lap top with a USB interface, FL Studio (which i’d use to sequence the drum tracks and maybe some other stuff), and Audacity. My laptop is also pretty weak, so i’m not sure how well it’d run any modern, or extensive, software.

edit to add: I don’t care that much if my recordings don’t sound very professional in quiality and I don’t have the budget to buy a new computer and a bunch of software and things... I could probably swing a couple of pedals (such as an octave pedal, reverb, etc) or a cheap bass

 

[DirtDog]

I’m thinking of composing and making some songs with two different bass tracks (for example: one will play a deep bass line and the other will play something higher and more melodic).

I’m sure i’m not the only one here thats done this, so I’m curious how some of you went about this.

I have two basses - a fretless 5 with Chromes (flats), and a fretted 4 with rounds.

I would like to make some orchestral/classical sounding stuff (which i know i can use the fretless 5 to do everything with), but I’d also like to make some harder, rock instrumental kind of stuff and my favourite bass tone for that is on my 4, split into two channels (clean lows and distorted highs) to sound like a growly Ric, but I don’t think the fretless would work too well to accompany it most of the time. So now I’m wondering if I should get an octave pedal, or perhaps a separate bass and string it with piccolo strings, or a cheap 6’er, etc. Any thoughts on this stuff would be great, or just general other tips would be helpful.

For what it’s worth, i don’t so much have a DAW as i have a 12 year old lap top with a USB interface, FL Studio (which i’d use to sequence the drum tracks and maybe some other stuff), and Audacity. My laptop is also pretty weak, so i’m not sure how well it’d run any modern, or extensive, software.

edit to add: I don’t care that much if my recordings don’t sound very professional in quiality and I don’t have the budget to buy a new computer and a bunch of software and things... I could probably swing a couple of pedals (such as an octave pedal, reverb, etc) or a cheap bass

Not sure what your question is here, but given your tech setup, I'd try to offload any processing before it hits the computer (pedals, preamps, whatever) so that you're not having to use processor hungry software plug-ins for FX. Audacity is perfectly capable of doing sequential multitrack recording like you describe...and has a few native plug-ins for tone shaping, FX etc.

With the basses you have, you could lay down tracks in lower registers and higher registers (on the same bass for that matter) to achieve what you describe....maybe a touch of EQ when you're mixing and there you go. I know a few guys who are very creative when it comes to looping and using one bass. Sounds like a full band. Don't need to go crazy here with guitar equipment is what I'm saying.

I've recorded some half-decent sounding stuff on an old laptop (well, it was new at the time...15 years ago), a super cheap interface (M-Audio MobilePre) and modest outboard gear and guitars. One tune actually ended up on a compilation album of songs local artists back in the day. And my tune was one of the better produced tunes on that compilation!

Funnily enough, I started with FL and Audacity on that laptop circa 2003/2004. Didn't know what an audio interface was at the time - was trying to get my guitar into the computer using some sort of yamaha acoustic guitar preamp. You can imagine how that worked out - so I then bought GuitarTracks Pro (was a Cakewalk product at the time) and the M-Audio interface...then I was hooked. Ya gotta start somewhere!