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what comes first eq your rig or your bass

bogie1519

bogie1519

Feb 25, 2012
373
490
Beaumont Tex
#1
Kinda a newbie on this so hope this question fits on this forum.

when you are tuning in the sound for the room you are playing or even outside. and leave the sound guy out of this question.

do you start from your rig and work toward your bass or the other way around... i know guys that turn the controls on their
bass all the way up. then tweak the sound from the amp...

shouldn't you try for a happy in between. by that what i mean adjust the controls on your bass to about 5 to 6. and fine tune the sound your looking from your amp.. just wondering how most tune in their sound they are looking for.
 
#2
Start with the rig just to control any boominess you might be experiencing on the stage and to account for how the room reacts to sound. From there use your bass to get your tone. You may have to go back to your amp some to fine tune it more, but I find that plan of attack to work best.
 
#6
It's different for passive vs. active, for me.
Active instruments get set flat, EQ at amp.
Passive instruments get all the controls dimed, then EQ at amp.
I don't typically use the tone controls on the instrument. Pickup selection/blend, sometimes. Tone/EQ, very rarely.
 
#8
I typically EQ at the amp and set flat or close to flat at my bass. On rare occasions, I make small adjustments at my bass during a song
However, coming from someone who has also mixed live sound for many years, I would say let your ears be the ultimate judge. Play around with different configurations of EQing at the bass and the amp. If your amp has more EQ controls than your bass, then you may find it easier to dial in the desired sound at the amp.
 
#9
In general I use the amp EQ to adjust to the room, and my bass EQ/Multieffect EQ to adjust my tone to the song I'm playing. I only use the amp EQ for tone for more extreme changes (Like the song where I'm supposed to be as low and boomy as possible, so I killed all my treble on the amp and gave the bass a bump).
 
#10
Whew...this is a tough one! I have 4 points along my signal chain where I can tweak the EQ response:

*Active bass / 3 bands
*Compressor / "doubleback" feature
*Active DI box w/ 3 bands
*Rackmount preamp

As others have professed, I start from the rack and work backwards. I've used more than a handful of components where the EQ freq. points were horribly voiced and more of a hindrance than of benefit.

Riis
 
#13
ggunn said:
That's the same thing. Passive controls are cut only, so all the way up is flat.
Click to expand...

Of course... but when I hear/read "flat", my mind fills that in as "halfway between 0 and 10". I know that isn't technically correct, but most EQ's aren't truly "flat" when everything is on 5 anyway (mostly amps; active instruments are usually pretty good about it), so that's how I think of it in my head.
 
#14
I actually do the opposite.

In the studio I learned that not every bass sounds its best when set flat. In fact, some basses don't sound very good at all, especially active basses. So I spent some time in my studio finding the "sweet spot" for each of my basses. I define sweet spot as the tone I would use for 90% of what I play on that bass as opposed to a great tone for one particular song.

Passive P and J basses are easy. Crank everything and go. If they sound good wide open they will most likely sound good when you roll the tone back. Active basses are more tricky. My Sadowsky doesn't start to sound like a Sadowsky until the bass/treble controls are boosted at least 30%. The flat eq sound is well...flat. My Ken Smith likes a slight bass boost and a slight treble cut with the mids set flat and the pickups in parallel mode. But again, when set flat it sounds less than its potential, less like a Smith. You get the idea. Each bass has a voice which includes the preamp and I find that voice in the studio and use it as a starting point on stage.

When I go to a gig I set the basses to their sweet spot first and then I use the amp to calibrate that sound to the stage/room. Sometimes this requires adjusting the instrument again if the stage/room is problematic but I try to keep the bass as close to its sweet spot as possible. Once the bass and the amp are set I test my pedals to make sure they play nicely in the sandbox. YMMV
 
#18
The advantage of P basses is that they basically sound best wide open. So your bass EQ is taken care of ;) This isn't completely true, I will roll off the tone from time to time, but I would always sound check wide open.

But I almost exclusively use the volume as an on/off. Every once in a while I will use the volume to cut down a bit when I am too lazy to walk over to the amp to turn down. But sooner or later I walk over to the amp to turn down and turn the bass back up.
 
#19
I like to keep my instruments at the same place every time, and my EQ as well since that's an integral part to the band's sound.

So active instruments: EQ flat, volume wide open, pickups to taste (I generally run an even mix of front and rear)

Passive: Flat out on everything!

And then I'll go mess with my amp to get a tone that works, and my pedals I don't mess with very much because once I get a sound that works the best I don't want to change that right at gig time.

Peace,
Greg
 

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