Same old story

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Flyjunkie

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Some friends and I went to an outdoor concert a few weeks back. We had a great time and the band was awesome. I will not tell you where it was or who was playing, but the story has been the same since I can remember.

Great songs, great stage antics, great bass gear, fast fingers, but I CAN'T HEAR ANY BASS! The bassist was right in the pocket and fit nicely due to the fact he blended right in. I know not every concert is going to be like Primus with the bass clearly upfront, but come on, lets hear ALL the insturments please! I dislike going to see a band and not hearing the bass. I had to vent and thank you for your time.
 
+1 FlyJunkie

I have had similar experiences like this one many times at a concert in which i was a spectator- or executer of the basslines. I have also been in the PA business from 1991 to 1997 and i always managed to get those basslines come to the audience :d (but what do you expect when a bass player does the mix ;))

i think many PA (wo)men are unaware of the impact a strong- and right amplified bassline has on the audience.

so i agree every time i experience something like you scetched i get the urge to tear away the FOH (front of the house) tech and do it myself :twisted: but out of courtesy i decline to do so.
 
If you use a Streamer Stage II and boost the onboard EQ's mids, no sound engineer can hide you in the mix.
It's all about the frequencies, and most of us are scared of the frequencies that make us cut through. I am pretty sure it is 99% of the time the player's fault, not the sound engineer. He (probably) likes music the same as we do, and I don't think a sound engineer will hide a strong and nice bass sound, au contraire, he will build all the sound on a bass like that.
My 2 cents anyway.
 
+ 1 to flo,

I've been working doing sound tech in uni and they will try everything to get it to sound good, its just a shame that a lot of bassists don't know how to EQ a bass, many don't care about amps all thinking that its 'guitard territory'!
 
+1 It's all about boosting those upper mids, and maybe cutting the lower mids, that bite and definition cannot be hidden, no matter what bass you're playing. Also, I'm actually quite glad now that my current amp doesn't have a 'pre-eq' setting on the DI - just so I can say to the engineer that he will have to use my settings on the FOH mix! However, being an engineer myself I know why it's done - Callum's right; most people don't seem to have a clue about eq!
 
I had the same experience as Flyjunkie when I went to the (outdoor) Pinkpopfestival in June this year... Three days of live music by many different bands (Placebo, The Kooks, Bruce Springsteen !), but I didn't hear any bass either...
If the solution to solve this problem, like Flo and Craig mentioned, is that simple, then my next question is "Why are these pro-engineers (as you might expect) not familiar with this knowledge?"....
 
had the same problems for years. until i discovered the mids :-)

i always wanted to sound like sam rivers. but look at his concerts. you never hear him. only treble and bass boosted.


so: BOOST THE MIDS GUYS :-)
 
Well in that case, it'd be interesting to know whereabouts in the crowd you were in comparison to the sound desk; obviously there's going to be a huge difference in sound in different areas of the crowd (indoors this is mainly due to the acoustics of the room - reflection and standing waves, etc., while outside it is concerned mainly with the dispersion of sound).

The main reason that we notice this effect on the bass could be purely down to the fact that we are bassists, and that's the main part of the music we are listening to, but it actually runs a lot deeper; as audible frequencies decrease, their wavelength increases, and so lower notes will be heard more predominantly at a greater distance. Therefore if you were closer to the stage than the sound man, there may not have been enough bass in the mix purely because of your position in the field. Newer, 'line array' PA systems tend to be better at dispersing sound to everyone watching the show, but these don't tend to offer much benefit for us bassists, as a hell of a lot of low frequency sound is non-directional. (Which is why subwoofer and satellite speaker systems can still portray an accurate stereo image).

This is why I consider it important to have a great deal of midrange in my tone - I know a lot of rock bassists love that scooped sound, but for me it just doesn't cut through the rest of the band. If you have the midrange there your sound will reach more people. Scientifically. In theory. :)
 
Even in studio recordings its the case. At uni i have a studio recordings module and when tought to EQ the bass we are told to have a solid sound in the 0-125Hz range then roll off everything from 2khz ish and have no bass over 7khz. - which i felt was kinda limiting and silly especially if anything other than 8th notes are played on the E string.

I think it also goes with the style of the music. Here in the UK at least you have all this indy stuff which tonally lacks any really deep strong bass its all uppermids and treble, which is why rick's are pretty popular in these bands i guess.

Slightly OT but i've recently been finding that along with bass guys don't know what to do with vocals so they although audiable get lost in the mix (for a bad singer its understandable) but i've seen bands with awesome singers just being lost coz the sound guys don't know or don't care about what they are doing!

I'm going to stop now because i could rant and complain about the situation that music, both live and recorded is in atm, and my issues within the industry but i'll save that for another time!
 
One thing is sure - the man in front will mix what he gets from the band.
He is a sound guy, not a wizzard.
A lead singer with a great voice can be very uneven too! This is a nightmare for a sound guy. In the end, he will try to tame the vocal down using compressor(s), and... yeah... it will not sound the same.
This is the case with us, the bass players too

If you really want to be heard, first thing is an EVEN technique. No even technique - the sound guy will compress your ass untill you'll be lost in the mix no matter how much you bring up the mids :-)
 
+1 Florin! I was engineering a gig the other night and the singer was incredible, real powerful, Janis Joplin style voice. But despite how great she was, she had absolutely know microphone technique- she kept her mic in the same place for her loud, high notes as her quiet ones. Result? I just had to put a brick wall compressor on her. It's all I could do to try to even it out (and protect the PA's drivers!)
 
would it make a difference if we bass players run a compressor pedal?
 
Had a gig once and during the sound check, the guy pulls out THE tone I knew was the good one to make me heard. I tell him to stop and stay there, that was the sound I was looking for. Well, just before our fist song, he scooped the hell out of my mids...

Gawd I was pissed.
 
Guybrush Threepwood said:

...... as audible frequencies decrease, their wavelength
increases, and so lower notes will be heard more
predominantly at a greater distance. Therefore if you were
closer to the stage than the sound man, there may not
have been enough bass in the mix purely because of your
position in the field. ......
Click to expand...


+1.

Not only have I never been at an outdoor event with the
bass listening problems the rest of all you all encounter,
but I've always wandered back and forth to personalize
my listening mix for my bassy preferences.

With loud outdoor sound, in not-too-huge venues, I also
where earplugs ... which is so I can enjoy the music with
auditory nerves that are not gone all numb ... and I use
ordinary earplugs, which tend to re-EQ any mix toward
bass. IOW, they reduce the highs more than the lows.

​



 
It's like everything in life - there are good and bad bands...and good and bad sound guys.

I've experienced some truly splendid sound guys who just took what we had and made it louder and others that subscribe to the view that "bass should be felt and not heard" - turning a tight, Zappa-esque band into the weirdest odd time dub/reggae band you'd ever heard!!

Having a bass like a Wick will help for sure but for some engineers, a perfect kick drum takes priority over everything else.

G
 
IncX said:
would it make a difference if we bass players run a compressor pedal?
Click to expand...
The compressors are good IF you know how to use them. They should have better compressors in the FOH...
The thing about the compressor is that it has to be set in a way that let your bass to breath. Almost like you don't feel you have a compressor.
 
It was a sound guy that taught me to boost the mids for onstage monitoring, we DI'd the bass flat, everyone said the bass sounded great through the PA (usually a Martin). He always complained he got way too much bass off the stage, I complained I couldn't hear it. He came up and re-EQ'd the amp, cured both our problems in about 20 seconds.

I've seen Sarah Brightman twice, she has a small choir, and small orchestra and a band, her engineer is a genius, he does all her shows, both I saw had the best sound I've ever heard. You could hear everything (including the bass, G&L at the first show, couldn't tell at the second show, different tours) perfectly. Good listening volume too. Rocking, but my ears weren't ringing after.
 
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