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Subject: bass

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Original Message 1/38 01-Oct-02 @ 09:11 PM - bass

Jack

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Not sure if this is the most appropriate place to post this message on this site, but it was the best I could find.

I have a question about bass lines.

I have been writing experimental electronic music for about 7 years and am mystified still by some of the bass I hear from techno and rap music. I was wondering if anyone could help clear up what is going on.

What I am talking about is easist to describe in rap music.. the bass line that comes in and goes:
Booooooooooooooom ...... ..... Boooooooooom Boooooooom

Totally fills your speakers, and sounds really warm and smoothe.

Where are they getting that sound... ? How is that being done?

I have:

RM1X
MPC2000XL
ASR-10
ELECTRIBE-R

I have tried everything I can think of myself to replicate this bass line sound.. but am unable to do so... every thing pales in comparison.

Am I making any sense? Any one able to offer any info, advice, or opinions?

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Message 2/38 01-Oct-02 @ 10:40 PM - RE: bass

errata

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Analog!!!

the RM1X has some drum hits in the lower octaves that come close... try using one of those and sample it. Then stretch it to 200%... then layer the original sample with the stretched one. Then play with a LP filter on the result, that'll come sorta interestingly close.

But what that sound is is a filtered sine wave with a lot of release on the amp envelope... and a sharp attack.

Analog goes BOOM, rom goes bump! That's really it.

e

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Message 3/38 01-Oct-02 @ 10:46 PM - RE: bass

errata

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ooooo... wait! The korg er-1 should be able to do it with no problem!!!!

Make a bass kick out of a sign wave and give it a phat decay... filter to taste. You might want to sample it and put it through the ASR10's compression.

e

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Message 4/38 01-Oct-02 @ 11:02 PM - RE: bass

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sine waves, filters, bass enhancers etc, is what i'd go for. rack the gain on an analog mixer and it really shakes.. you can get boom that way no probs also look at speaker cab sim plugins & various gainriding or overdrive etc.

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Message 5/38 02-Oct-02 @ 02:23 PM - RE: bass

99devils

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Take a sampler and plug a cable into the input. Grab the other end of the cable and sample the hum. Pitch and filter to taste, and try some distortion.

-Craig

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Message 6/38 02-Oct-02 @ 08:31 PM - RE: bass

influx

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the boom is usually an 808 even nowadays in hiphop

you know what else works great for that? stomper

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Message 7/38 02-Oct-02 @ 08:35 PM - RE: bass

errata

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Yeah... Stomper is great for the low end boom... you can drag the gate out for days... nice in ol' school D&B too

e

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Message 8/38 03-Oct-02 @ 04:12 AM - RE: bass

Meriphew

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It's sub bass. Some producers will add a sub bass track (or double the bass, or kick, track with the dbx sub bass unit) to the mix - roll the volume down till you can barely hear it, then notch it down just a little bit more - presto you sense it in the mix, but it doesn't muddy it up.

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Message 9/38 03-Oct-02 @ 10:49 AM - RE: bass

milan

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maan... Thumper! trust me, it has ridiculous amounts of sub bass. funny though... xoxos uploaded it to DT, but the link works only from his homepage. check it ut, you wont be sorry.

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Message 10/38 03-Oct-02 @ 10:51 AM - RE: bass

milan

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btw, meriphew, i checked out your website and your music last nite. both very nice and the production is 100% solid. respect.

cheers, m.

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Message 11/38 03-Oct-02 @ 11:29 AM - RE: bass

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"xoxos uploaded it to DT, but the link works only from his homepage"

eh?... step back to the main SYNTH FORUM..... select the dropdown for VSTI APP and thumper is there and d/loads fine - also it can be accessed in SAMPLES (samples & files) section via the top icon where the same classification or a name search will bring it up.

___________________________________

I had an idea for a script once. It's basically Jaws except when the guys in the boat are going after Jaws, they look around and there's an even bigger Jaws. The guys have to team up with Jaws to get Bigger Jaws.... I call it... Big Jaws!!!

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Message 12/38 03-Oct-02 @ 11:46 AM - RE: bass

milan

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right... well, i tried searching for it from the main page and couldnt find it no matter what i did. maybe because it doesnt have its own page like some vsti�s do? mebbe it should get more advertisement?

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Message 13/38 03-Oct-02 @ 02:39 PM - RE: bass

j-type

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errata, a filtered sine wave??

there's nothing in a sine wave to filter...

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Message 14/38 03-Oct-02 @ 04:39 PM - RE: bass

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well then either we or xoxos didnt add a page for it - I cant remember if the other were added.. i think so, so mebbe thumper came afterwards?

___________________________________

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Message 15/38 03-Oct-02 @ 04:42 PM - RE: bass

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well only blaster, ecs, orbiter & Utopia have an actual DT listing page - xoxos didnt create a page for any others.. but for the actual files (not review/listing pages) you should search SAMPLES (samples & files) section (click the 'samples' icon) - at the moment you are searching product listing pages.

___________________________________

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Message 16/38 03-Oct-02 @ 05:46 PM - RE: bass

errata

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run a sine wave through a low pass and roll the cut-off... I do it all the time, yo!

e

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Message 17/38 03-Oct-02 @ 06:40 PM - RE: bass

milan

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cheers k. now i know where to look

actually... i was looking for the page because i think its a bit underrated. s'all

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Message 18/38 03-Oct-02 @ 08:01 PM - RE: bass

Meriphew

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Thanks for the kind words Milan!

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Message 19/38 03-Oct-02 @ 08:51 PM - RE: bass

psylichon

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I too enjoyed your website, meriphew. Really high quality stuff. MP3's streamed like a dream. That intro made me laugh. Should it? :}

psylichon

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Message 20/38 03-Oct-02 @ 10:26 PM - RE: bass

xoxos

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i can't be bothered to make a page for all my crap, especially since no one but milan likes it *snif*

in case i haven't said it lots, the commercial v. of synthedit will allow for the gate>osc sync conneciton necessary to get the uniform attack.. paid tonight, so i'll prolly have that together fairly soon.

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Message 21/38 03-Oct-02 @ 10:56 PM - RE: bass

j-type

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>run a sine wave through a low pass and roll the cut-off... I do it all the time, yo!

when I do it, all that happens it the volume of the sine goes up when the filter is open, and down when it closes. just as you'd expect since the only component of a sine is the fundamental.

may as well just tweak the amp

unless of course you're using resonance in the filter

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Message 22/38 03-Oct-02 @ 11:40 PM - RE: bass

psylichon

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even resonance won't do much for a pure sine except make it louder when the cutoff frequency matches the sine frequency. I suspect he uses "dirty sines" however.

I hereby trademark "dirty sines" as my future band/album/dog name.

psylichon

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Message 23/38 04-Oct-02 @ 01:08 AM - RE: bass

errata

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I swears... I'll try it at home tonight. I understand the math behind your statement, and never really put any thought into it before, but I tweak sine's... I can't remember the last time I used any type of filter that didn't have rezo...

Waldorf uQ is my main source... hmmmmmmmmmm, but I'd swear I've done it on others. Could I be wrong? GASP... hehehe

could it be self rezonating filters... doubtful.

I'll investigate.

e

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Message 24/38 04-Oct-02 @ 01:57 AM - RE: bass

j-type

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if you crank the res up and sweep the cutoff over a sine, you're most probably listening more to the filter than the sine wave itself. Not a bad sound, but not the sound of a 'filtered sine' as such.

dirty sines - possible, but the uQ waves are clean as a whistle. the *filters* can be overdriven, however... (aha!)

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Message 25/38 04-Oct-02 @ 02:45 AM - RE: bass

influx

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but a distorted sine isnt a sine anymore, is it?

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Message 26/38 04-Oct-02 @ 07:16 AM - RE: bass

Meriphew

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Hey Psylichon, thanks for checking out my site. Yeah, the flash is supposed to be kinda goofy/strange, that's Mumbleboy's style.

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Message 27/38 04-Oct-02 @ 07:42 AM - RE: bass

psylichon

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I'm just jealous. Because I'm good enuff to do something like that, I just don't have the ambition. Kudos for your big balls.

psylichon

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Message 28/38 04-Oct-02 @ 11:47 AM - RE: bass

j-type

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>but a distorted sine isnt a sine anymore, is it?

it isn't a pure sine, no. it depends on the degree of distortion though - clip a sine hard enough and you get a square.

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Message 29/38 04-Oct-02 @ 07:43 PM - RE: bass

errata

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Shame, chagrin! Tried it, you're sooooo right!!! I'm wrong!

Crawling into cave... returning to the darkness...

Thanks for calling me on it.

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Message 30/38 24-Oct-02 @ 08:50 PM - RE: bass

Woggz

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usually the booming bass is simply a minimoog, or se1, se1 is in just about every hiphop/rnb studio. like people said tho lots of 80 kicks work. but analog really is best. ._.

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Message 31/38 25-Oct-02 @ 03:55 AM - RE: bass

JX3P0

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sine+env. = goodness too

H

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Message 32/38 25-Oct-02 @ 09:05 AM - RE: bass

Pongoid

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One thing you folks are so sadly not mentioning to is the high-pass trick. So one of the things that makes that sick stuff work is that the bass remains in the USEABLE frequencies of most speakers. I am what most call a bass technician, and especially for recordings (also for live sets, depending on the system's capabilities on which I performing) you HAVE to make sure that you're not just wasting headroom and efficiency in your sound by pumping subsonics that are nothing but energy eaters for most speakers.

I'm playing on some 21-inch woofered Beyma cabinets Saturday night, so I'll tell you about the realities of that after, however even 18's in most configurations can only accurately reproduce freqs so low, and after that, it's just loose speaker wobble, and everything else flubs out.

One of the reasons why the Mini sounds so damn fat is that it's output only goes down to a certain frequency, and then it just does't bother wasting energy. I actually contaced Big Briar about modifying the filter to actually put out those serious subs, and they told me to get a different synth. Efficiency.

Another perfect example....The MS-20. Why doe that thing sound so sick? because it has a hi-pass after the lowpass, and it strips out the unuseable sound and just leaves you with a thick dirty stinky sound that puts the available ow end to use, and doesn't waste it on ULFs.

I've also learned to stand back from my monitors when actually checkin the bass in a mix, listening for ghosts nad dead spots in the sound, cuz the waves just don't come alive that close to nearfields. Physics. Anyhoos, yeah so try using a high pass, like a 12-db around 20-30 hz, and watch what happens to your mix, how it compresses, etc..

Good luck.

Good bass.

Ape

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Message 33/38 25-Oct-02 @ 09:26 AM - RE: bass

milan

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^^that guy really knows his bass, let me assure you. listen to him.

and yeah, i�ve noticed that hipass@ 20-30hz never damaged my low end, since it usuall resides in 50-80hz area. true.

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Message 34/38 25-Oct-02 @ 12:53 PM - RE: bass

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notch filters, bandpass too. and also removing the top end with a lowpass on the kik is another one, alot of people use the top-end on a kik way beyond anything useful which once in the mix just muddy's up the midrange & lower top-end. You can knock your kick down to pass below 300hz or something depending on style (unless you need a real clicky kick.)

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Message 35/38 06-Nov-02 @ 07:50 AM - RE: bass

jesse

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goa kicks are clicky... but i think a kick with out high freq. lacks presence. Yet I am of the school that drums should bang as hard as the can. Every kick, a kick in the nuts and every snare a slap in the face. I hear too many tracks, including tracks from the masters like hallucinogen and AP, were the drums lack presence and the synths do all the work. I thought that Joe Meek taught us that the old saying, rythym parts should be felt and not heard was untrue.

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Message 36/38 06-Nov-02 @ 10:19 AM - RE: bass

Steve Webster

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So if I got this right then.......... The bass should live at a lower frequency than the kick, so...... on the kick, if I use a high pass filter at 40 hertz and a low pass at 2k and then and on the bass, if I use a high pass at 20 hertz and a low pass at say 1k then that would get rid of any unecessary usage of headroom? Is that what you all mean?

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Message 37/38 06-Nov-02 @ 05:00 PM - RE: bass

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the bass should live at a lower frequency than
the kick if that's what you choose. it could live
at a higher frequency if that's what you choose.

as far as that high-pass/low pass shit goes,
the low E on a bass guitar (for reference here)
has a fundamental tone of 41.2 Hz, if you drop
that to a D it's 36.71. what you hear as the note
has a lot to do with the harmonics and
overtones, but if you run a filter up over the freq
of the lowest note, it'll start sounding thin. but
you can safely run you HPF up to 35-40 Hz
with no ill effect at all and getcha some
headroom.

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Message 38/38 07-Nov-02 @ 01:04 PM - RE: bass

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I'd go lower than that tho (1k) - i'd drop the bass very steeply at 30hz or so (20-40hz)

Look and experiment with narrow frequencies around 80hz and 110 hz for the bass where alot of the 'tone' of the bass lives... personaly unless a clicky kik is required i'd shelve off the kik top end at more like 200hz or so... But I like my kiks more thumpy, I dont like clicky tops on my kiks much... anyways to HEAR what frequencies are going on, add a bandpass filter inserted into your kik or bass and Q it tight and sweep it around the frequencies and listen to what they are and what they are doing. This can give you more of an idea what's happening in various frequency bands & get you more familiar with the characteristic's of various freq' bands.

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