What's the Best Bass for Hyperpop?

[Slevage]

I don’t know the genre, but a P bass in the right hands will likely work.

Probably with round wound to maximize tonal options.

 

[KevinDBassist]

 

[Geogio]

Sort of reminds me of what my mind suggests/recalls the of Tom Tom Club.

 

[5StringBlues]

I passed gas in the vocal booth yesterday and inadvertently invented Fartcore.....where's my Wiki entry?

Too late fam...

 

[othefool]

What about a 6 string ibby like Thundercat?

I hear y'all are saying P with flats, but I hear Stingray and/or Jazz bass all over these songs. Gotta have some spank.

On a side note, my girlfriend likes the coconut song, so thanks.

 

[Spectrum]

Not sure what makes it "hyperpop" but it kind of reminds me of 80s pop with a few modern touches. Aside from the excessive autotune the examples here seem catchy so far.

As for 80s pop pertaining to the prefix "hyper"...

 

[IamJohn]

SOPHIE was a genius. We're going to be hearing her influence for years, and her death at such an early and promising point in her career is a loss to music whose significance we'll never fully understand. The first time I heard "Faceshopping" I thought, this is some amazing, cutting-edge experimental music. Then when I found out she was producing for Rihanna, Madonna, and Charlie XCX, I was like, oh wait, this is pop.

I don't know if she's hyperpop in the same way that 100 gecs or Hannah Diamond or GFOTY are, where those artists take pop production cliches like autotune, brickwall limiting, sampling, vapid lyrics, and pounding, distorted drum machines and push them to a completely absurd degree. For every "Doritos and Fritos", which might use a live J-Bass with rounds, or a bass guitar VST, or a sample, you have "Money Machine", which is probably a synth generating a square wave with generous sub-bass, limiting, gating, reverb and other FX. I think SOPHIE built her tones (including bass) from the ground up, with an Elektron Monomachine and Ableton. Basically anything is fair game.

If I were gearing up to play this kind of music live, I'd want the most versatile bass I could get, so probably not a tort P-Bass with flats. Maybe a G&L L2500, with a giant pedalboard, or a worthy multifx processor like a Line 6 HX or an Eventide H9. I'd also want a synth. I'd have to do a lot of programming in advance, generating presets that I could quickly find and assign them to specific songs. I would also find a way to sidechain the kickdrum to the rest of the band. The basslines themselves might be simple but the sound design would take a lot of thought and patience. I bet it would kill live though.

Absolutely agree with the SOPHIE takes. And you're right, she built all of her tones from the ground up. No one does or will sound like her; she went way to early.

I think the idea of a traditional bass line through the entire song isn't going to be as prominent. It's more likely going to be samples, similar to a hip hop vibe, or sections of songs that are taking heavy rock or funk influence.

Based on how varied the music is, even from section to section, it would be best to have a very versatile bass. I'm usually not the billion knobs and a preamp type of guy for my basses, but I think it would be helpful in this context.

 

[5StringBlues]

MIDI pickup on whatever bass feels good.

Then you can dial in a bass guitar tone to whatever extreme you want, or play a bass part on whatever sound you want.

 

[IamJohn]

What about a 6 string ibby like Thundercat?

I hear y'all are saying P with flats, but I hear Stingray and/or Jazz bass all over these songs. Gotta have some spank.

On a side note, my girlfriend likes the coconut song, so thanks.

Thundercat's bass scares me, lol. That thing is massive. I think we'll probably hear him doing some collabs with this style of music too. I've seen him on Kenny Beats a bunch of times, and he dips his toes in the water a bit.

The stuff he did with Rico Nasty was still primarily hip hop I think, but it's got a similar vibe and isn't that far off.

 

[IamJohn]

MIDI pickup on whatever bass feels good.

Then you can dial in a bass guitar tone to whatever extreme you want, or play a bass part on whatever sound you want.

I've never tried anything with a MIDI pickup. I'd love a chance to check one out; do you have experience with one?

 

[Passinwind]

I passed gas in the vocal booth yesterday and inadvertently invented Fartcore.....where's my Wiki entry?

Nope. I am Passinwind and have been for a few decades, so simmer down.

 

[othefool]

I was listening to the new Thundercat/Gorillaz song Cracker Island as I typed this, which I will not link to as it is OT.

I don't think it would qualify as hyperpop at all as it is rooted in Gorillaz' more classic/retro pop structure and vocalizations. It would be interesting to hear OP or someone else with understanding break down the distinctions between hyperpop, if it is a thing, and some of the pop forbearers, idk is Daft Punk too far removed? Pop is always pop, but Frank Sinatra is not the Beach Boys is not Britney Spears is not Taylor Swift. Or is hyperpop distinguished by not actually being "pop"?

Apologies for the armchair philosophizing today..I should be practicing...

 

[5StringBlues]

I've never tried anything with a MIDI pickup. I'd love a chance to check one out; do you have experience with one?

I don't. Been trying really hard to get buddy of mine who has a decent studio to invest in one.


His son has been doing hip-hop production and I'm dying to learn to use it and contribute to sessions.

 

[Passinwind]

I've never tried anything with a MIDI pickup. I'd love a chance to check one out; do you have experience with one?

I’ve had a Roland guitar synth since the late 90s and used to gig with it regularly. With bass as the trigger you need to play higher up on the neck or latency can be pretty problematic. In the vast majority of cases the pickup doesn’t actually output MIDI data, it’s actually analog. Once it gets to the brain MIDI conversion often happens, but it’s not mandatory. I ran an old school EMU rack sampler with mine a lot and would’ve loved to sit in with some pop bands, but had to settle for hippies for the most part.

As far as the music you’ve posted, I see a solid slide bass opportunity, but I tend to see that in many things!

 

[IamJohn]

I was listening to the new Thundercat/Gorillaz song Cracker Island as I typed this, which I will not link to as it is OT.

I don't think it would qualify as hyperpop at all as it is rooted in Gorillaz' more classic/retro pop structure and vocalizations. It would be interesting to hear OP or someone else with understanding break down the distinctions between hyperpop, if it is a thing, and some of the pop forbearers, idk is Daft Punk too far removed? Pop is always pop, but Frank Sinatra is not the Beach Boys is not Britney Spears is not Taylor Swift. Or is hyperpop distinguished by not actually being "pop"?

Apologies for the armchair philosophizing today..I should be practicing...

Cracker Island is nice track; I dig it. For the record, I'm no authority on what is or isn't Hyperpop, I'm just a fan. I'm mostly a metal guy more than anything strangely enough.

@jschulman pretty much nailed the distinction in his earlier post.

"those artists take pop production cliches like autotune, brickwall limiting, sampling, vapid lyrics, and pounding, distorted drum machines and push them to a completely absurd degree"

When you push the limits to absurdity like these artists do, they yield interesting musical results in their own rights.

I guess my metal roots would point to the differences between hard rock and metal. Metal is a subset of hard rock, and often times the two are one in the same. But if you dime out an HM-2 and make your guitar sound like a Buzzsaw because you wanted more distortion a la Swedish Death Metal, you've created something different than there was before.

There's been a lot of videos about what Hyperpop is on youtube; I think the PBS Soundfield video does a good job, but I haven't seen all of them to say which describes it best.

 

[kevmac]

Tbh, the only reason I'm making this thread is that the genre of Hyperpop has never been mentioned on this site (look it up, 0 results). Seeing as it is one of the newest genre's of music with growing popularity, it seems like a good idea to get TB to start thinking about how the bass guitar is and can be incorporated, starting with what gear to use.

For those of you who don't know, which is apparently everybody based on the search results;

"Hyperpop is a loosely-defined music movement and microgenre, characterized by a maximalist or exaggerated take on pop music"

Some of the bigger artists in the scene would be 100 Gecs, Bladee, SOPHIE (r.i.p), Charli XCX, and Slayyyter for reference.

Even though the genre is heavily steeped in electronic music, there's still a role for the bass. Recently 100 Gecs released the song Doritos and Fritos which contains a very prominent bass line.



So in classic Talkbass fashion, I'd like to begin by asking the question that will definitely be well received with an objective answer we all agree on; what's the best bass for Hyperpop?

What difference does the bass make, really?
Can one only use a J or P bass for blues or classic rock? I've heard many different basses used in playing most any style.Does the bass sound good? If so then that's the right one.

 

[IamJohn]

I’ve had a Roland guitar synth since the late 90s and used to gig with it regularly. With bass as the trigger you need to play higher up on the neck or latency can be pretty problematic.

So it's a little bit like an octave pedal where its usability can be limited? I'm still interested, but that's a bit of a bummer.

 

[5StringBlues]

I’ve had a Roland guitar synth since the late 90s and used to gig with it regularly. With bass as the trigger you need to play higher up on the neck or latency can be pretty problematic. In the vast majority of cases the pickup doesn’t actually output MIDI data, it’s actually analog. Once it gets to the brain MIDI conversion often happens, but it’s not mandatory. I ran an old school EMU rack sampler with mine a lot and would’ve loved to sit in with some pop bands, but had to settle for hippies for the most part.

As far as the music you’ve posted, I see a solid slide bass opportunity, but I tend to see that in many things!

Have you seen this?


I don't even want to know how much this costs.

 

[ColdEye]

Get a seafoam green Ibanez headless.

 

[Passinwind]

So it's a little bit like an octave pedal where its usability can be limited? I'm still interested, but that's a bit of a bummer.

Yep, low frequencies tend to take a while to parse in the pitch converter so real time staccato lines down low are a pretty big ask.

There are some non MIDI solutions that work a lot better if you just want synth bass effects but I’ve been avoiding that rabbit hole for the moment. I’ve been doing the slide bass thing onstage for a very long time and it just suits my playing opportunities a lot better right now.