Member Dana Nielsen
MemberForum Replies Created
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Super cool, @jlew, thanks so much for sharing this! And FREE, no less! I don’t know about this one and will check it out. Great to have @detective‘s (partially) ringing endorsement, too!
PS – are you using this in addition to your new snazzy TC Electronic Clarity M meter? 🤓💜
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Hey Drew!
Such a great question, AND a great challenge. Upright bass is a beast that can be difficult to wrangle, especially when you want sub-y low-end out of it.
For me, this process begins with mic placement. (I know … “yawn.” And prob also “too late,” as you’re working with already-recorded tracks, but bear with me. Perhaps these ideas will help your next recording. Plus, I’ll include some mixing tips that’ll help pre-recorded bass as well.
My Best Microphone? My Ear.
I always start by listening to the player in the room. This is my method for recording any instrument. I pretend my ear is the microphone (or ears, plural, if I’m placing a stereo mic). I move my head around like a weirdo while the musician plays, and I find the spots that sound the best to me, and I put the mics there. Works every time.
My Go-To Two Mic Upright Bass Technique
For an upright bass I’m usually looking for a two-mic setup: one large-diaphragm condenser near the f-hole to pick up the deepest, richest, sub-iest sound my ears can locate; and one LDC on the neck facing down(ish) around where the neck meets the body of the instrument to pick up the mid-range definition, which helps define the bass “note” especially on small speakers. As long as those two mics are in-phase with each other I can adjust them during mixing to suit each individual song. A slow ballad might favor the F-hole low-end bloom, whereas an uptempo song might favor the neck mic so that the notes pop out nice and clear, and the tempo doesn’t get weighed down with sluggish low-end.
Bass Bussin’
Regardless the tempo, both of these mics (and sometimes a D.I., too, if available) will get bussed to a mono Aux Input, where I’ll apply any additional EQ and compression. EQ’ing and compressing the combined signal helps avoid EQ phase weirdness btwn mic’s, and helps solidify the instrument’s envelope (attack, decay, sustain, release). As an added bonus it also sums things down to one fader for easier balancing and automation.
Parallel Extremes When Needed
From there – if needed – I might add a couple “parallel” processes by sending the Bass buss (via pre-fade send) to an aggressive compressor Aux Input, and/or an amp sim Aux Input, and/or a subharmonic effect Aux Input (this is similar to what @detective recommended in his helpful post – thanks, Paul!). Sending the bass buss to multiple returns using a “pre-fade” aux send, allows me to turn the original dry Bass buss fader all the way down while I dial in my aggressive parallel effects returns. I always go “aggressive” with parallel FX ’cause otherwise what’s the point? The beauty of parallel is I can add these faders to the dry Bass buss in small increments. Kinda like adding a few dashes of ghost pepper hot sauce to huge pot of chili. A little goes a long way, and its potency is what makes it so useful in a large batch– err, I mean so useful in a dense audio mix.
Hope these tips help, Drew! Feel free to share a sample of your current mix as well as a sample of one of your fav references, and maybe we can get some more ideas flying. Good luck! 🎚️⚡️
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Oh, one last thing about adding low-end EQ to stuff like bass and kicks …. try reducing the frequency above where your boost is at. This often helps me get a more focused sound and eliminates mud. Like, try a low shelf boost at 100Hz in tandem with a significant bellcurve notch reduction at say 200Hz, or wherever the mud or resonance is building up.
Hi pass is also your friend for low-end, backwards as that sounds. i.e., try boosting 60Hz with a steep hi pass filter at 40Hz for example. You’ll be able to push that 60Hz harder without the sub frequencies below 40 eating up all your mix headroom and destroying your speakers. 🤘
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PS – I love that Tedder course!
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Hey Nate! Huh… that seems super odd and no bueno. I haven’t done much bouncing out of Logic, so I can’t weigh in on that from my own experience; but perhaps @michael or other Logic geniuses here have some insights to share?
I’m “subscribed” to this thread and look fwd to hearing what others have experienced! Thanks for sharing and reaching out, man!
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Yes! I know a lot of long-time “Maschinists” on Reddit and YouTube are pissed that the v3 update doesn’t (yet) have many of the long-awaited, often-requested updates; but I for one am excited about what is included. I’ll take what I can get, right?! Haha. And at $29 it’s a no-brainer for me. … well … with one caveat: Maschine+ “standalone mode” isn’t yet supporting the v3 update.
I have a Maschine MK3 and also an M+. I’m gonna wait for M+ v3 compatibility cause I just KNOW that if I download v3 for my MK3 I’ll start creating projects and then will be super bummed when they don’t open on my M+ in standalone.
All that said, I can’t wait to implement the new v3 features into my workflow!
How bout you, @smoothygroove? Gonna take the plunge and update your Maschine?
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Stuart!!
Back from walkabout with another wonderful Roholt Reward! Love it, man, thank you for sharing this. You have a keen eye for sweet and fleeting freebies, and you are the BEST for hipping us all to them!
And yeah, I agree – All the Soundtoys stuff is excellent. Hope this freebie brightens someone’s day! 🌞
Great to have ya back, homey!
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Right on, Drew! Happy to help!
And, while I do use SubSynth quite often (love that plugin), I know what you mean … it can quickly add the wrong vibe to a natural-sounding acoustic record. In those cases I might try only using the highest frequency knob of the SubSynth (50-60hz if memory serves) as that tends to sound less like an octaver. Or I might try waves R-Bass as an insert on the bass bus, which works a bit differently – more psychoacoustic than synthetic octave.
Happy bass-boosting! 🔊
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Wow, dang… scenario B! That is a head-scratcher then! Keep us posted if you continue hearing this issue (um, without trying to psych yourself out too much lol)
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Ah, yeah I get it! And true, none of these features are new to me either, as I’ve been making “digital stems” for years now using iZotope RX’s Music Rebalance. Ditto on the other “new” instruments added to Maschine V3.
I think what I’m realizing, however, is that unlike most users, I’ve always used Maschine outside of my main DAW (pro tools, Ableton) and so these V3 updates for me are like, “ok cool, thanks NI!”. In other words, even when I’m composing or beatmaking in Pro Tools, I prefer to run Maschine software as a standalone DAW rather than a plugin within Pro Tools. I just find it to be much more fun to use maschine when it’s untethered from my DAW. This is also why I’m loving Maschine+ lately, cause now I’m LITERALLY untethered from my whole computer! lol.
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Oh, that is an important follow-up question for Nate: @nategomoon, when you notice the difference in high end punch on your bounces, are you listening on the exact same system, using the exact same outputs and speakers?
Scenario A: If you’re bouncing mixes out of Logic, in your studio where you mixed it, and noticing a sonic difference while listening to the bounce in your car or on your home stereo, then room/speaker calibration might be the solve, as @michael suggested.
Scenario B: Let’s say you’re mixing in Logic, in your studio, using a UAD Twin, outputs 1-2. You do a bounce of your mix using UAD 1-2. Then you open your bounce in Quicktime with your computer output set to UAD Twin 1-2. If you play back that quicktime using the same exact interface outputs, listening on the same speakers, does it sound any different from when you click over to Logic and play the live mix session from there? …. if so, the culprit may be in the Logic bounce settings and/or the youtube/gearspace/tedder conspiracy is real 😲😂.
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Love the video, homey!! And excellent question.
As @-PT mentioned, what you’re discovering is gain staging (🥳), which refers to how we manage gain as it is applied (or reduced) at many different points in a signal path on its way to our ears.
Your video example shows one sound source with one send and one return in a digital audio workstation, where we don’t have the typical analog issues to contend with such as Signal to Noise ratio (S/N as commonly abbreviated like in Paul’s reply). As such, the answer to your specific video question is: there would be no difference. Kinda like, “do you get a different answer adding 1+9 vs. 9+1?” Nope. In a perfect, zero-noise digital world, they will both equal 10.
However, even in the digital world, here are 2 caveats that come to mind right away:
- When you’re sending multiple tracks to the same return, each with their own unique send level, the gain staging balancing act becomes much more complex. As a starting point, keep your return faders at 0db / Unity Gain and use the send pots/faders on your individual tracks to achieve the sound you want. Later on, if you feel you like the sound of the reverb but would love a little less of it overall, you can easily turn down the return fader for a quick win. Just be mindful: if you do that over and over your gain staging will get F-d up lol, as you’ll end up wanting to add more reverb to a track whose send is already at 100% cause you’ve turned down the reverb return fader too far over time.
- There are certain situations when I deliberately keep my send levels high and my return level low, even in the digital domain. Any time the effect(s) on the return path have some kind of harmonic distortion element or compression element I want to feed them lots of signal (via the sends). But maybe I don’t want the resulting effect so loud in the mix, so I will turn down the return fader — Or, if the final plugin inserted on the return has an ‘output’ knob I might utilize that instead or in addition to the fader … again, gain staging.
Hope these tips help!
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💜🤓 Woo!!
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My pleasure, @DrewB!
1) Do you pan the reverb send towards the pan of the instrument? For example ‘Follow Main Pan’ in Pro Tools or something like that?
- That’s a great option and solid starting point! That said, I don’t follow that as a rule. In fact, sometimes I LOVE panning the direct signal on one side of the stereo spectrum and the reverb on the other side (great trick for delays too). Or whatever panning floats your creative boat! If your goal is realism though, then yeah, ‘follow main pan’ is a great choice.
2) Do you generally send the same levels of the instruments to the room reverb?
- No way, man! I mean, you certainly could do that … and it might end up sounding perfect. But … don’t miss out on additional creative options by applying a unique amount of verb to each instrument, giving the listener a sense of depth. For example, maybe the lead singer has very little room verb (send level very low), and the tambourine that enters in the chorus is tucked into the mix at a low volume but with lots of room verb (send level very high) to give the illusion that it’s farther away. You could magnify that effect even more by setting the tambo’s verb send to ‘pre-fader,’ which will allow you to tuck the direct tamb signal way down low (via the main mixer fader) yet still have plenty of signal sent to the verb (via the send fader). This is because, when sends are set to ‘pre-fader’ (aka ‘pre-fade’) they have full access to the dry signal before (aka ‘pre’) that dry signal gets turned down – or up – by the mixer fader.
Happy verb-ing!
Dana
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One last thing .. I should also clarify that I almost never ever insert reverb directly on the source track. I always send individual tracks to reverb via an aux send, with the reverb inserted on an aux return track (with the reverb’s mix/blend knob set to 100% wet). This will give you the most control over the sound of each track, and will be the most efficient use of CPU-hungry reverbs. 🤓
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