METAL MIXING BASICS: How to split your bass guitar
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- čas přidán 23. 07. 2024
- Bass guitar is the foundation of mixing metal guitar tones, and splitting the bass guitar tracks is often the first step to great bass tone that balances aggressive distortion with massive low end.
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Classic and essential trick to make the bass happy. One thing I would add is to add all bass tracks to a buss and compress them together so as to glue them and make them move as a singular unit.
yeah, I use DoubleTap on the bus for that and then a bit of limiting
"Just play with the knobs until it sounds good"
that's my whole workflow
Also works with the wife
I urge EVERYONE to check out Joel's Bass Buss plugin, because this is exactly what it's doing in one simple plugin
This is the most clear informative tutorial I’ve seen in the subject, thank you for the info.
Nice way of notching out the mids too.
One if the many reasons I loved my Ampeg SVT 4 Pro was the on board crossover allowing me to send high and low signals separately into the board and into my cabs. That way they could be processed how i wanted in the live mix, and the high went to my on stage ported 4 x 10" Celestion and horn cab loaded cab while the low went to a sealed 1 x 18" ElectroVoice loaded cab. I always do this when recording. Good vid.
Love this trick, originally heard Acle Kahney from TesseracT using a similar approach on their mixes and had to give it a shot myself. Having that control over the bass is so nice!
I've been doing this for a long time, but I take things a step further depending on the project. Currently, for example, I'm working on a metal project where the 'sonic picture' of the band places the drum kit center, with overhead bleed out to 43-45% L/R. At the fringe of that 43/45% L/R sits virtual SVT stacks. Those 'stacks' were originally an Ampeg BA-115HPT combo amp close miked with an MXL tube mic and a Shure Beta 52A bass drum mic, and a clean line-in from the bass output. The bassist was already using the Dug Pinnick Tech 21 DP-1 pedal to drive the amp, so the clean line-in became important for countering the overdrive in the lower tones. Then it was just a matter of duplicating the three recorded sources and offsetting them just a millisecond in the grid so that when both sources are panned opposite each other they clear the drum kit, sitting on either side of it with a little bleed into it, as if you are looking at and hearing them on stage on either side of the kit. Sure, most folks tend to throw the bass down the middle with the drums and be done with it. But you should hear this. It's awesome and it works.
Where CAN we hear it, buddy?
@@endlichjura I would love to show an example of the 'SVT split' I wrote about above, but the project it's involved in is 2 months out from release (Band name: Remnant). But I used a formula very similar to what is described in this video on many projects including this latest Ov Moros album from which this song is included: czcams.com/video/wwpWTx1hYx0/video.html
FabFilter Saturn can do all this in one track with one plugin. You lose some flexibility, of course, but it's SUPER easy and sounds killer.
Really ? Might have to check it out. Do you use clean bass tone as a starting point. I’m a guitar player but make some of my own stuff and I’m now good enough at getting good enough tones that sit right with drums but I’m looking now to try get bass sounding good in there. I play through helix and iv been struggling when using heavy and OD patches
@@ItsBigJC Yup. DI bass, VST on the track. Super simple.
Was gonna say, just use Saturn. Saves you a ton of time, and you won't screw yourself with L/HPF crossover points causing phase shifts either.
@@PaulEubanks Yup. Fantastic plugin!
Excellent. Haven't tried this before but it makes sense. Will be giving it a test run on a mix I'm currently doing.
Great video. Thanks.
Fantastic.Thank you
awesome video!!!
2:30 "see we got some meat back as i slid"☠️☠️
Excellent!
This sounds just like bi-amping, where you send your bass signal to two separate rigs, one to handle the low end, and the other to handle the overdriven signal without ruining the tight low end. Billy Sheehan, Chris Squire, Doug Pinnick, I think even Les Claypool used this technique, just to name a few. Nowadays I think the same thing is accomplished with more sophisticated gear that includes a knob to adjust the "wet/dry" ratio, but I prefer the trick you are talking about, to split them up and adjust individually. Thanks for the info!
Well its funny this is EXACTLY what Joel's Bass Buss Glue plugin does, which he doesn't even try and upsell or promote here... which is a shame because when I first tried that plugin several years ago I haven't done a mix without it since! Are you aware of it?? It's genuinely a brilliant bass plugin that can be almost all you need to mix a final bass tone
this trick has become so popular that now bass plugins are incorporating this method of mixing straight out of the box. you could use a multi band distortion like Saturn by Fabfilter which is an expensive option but is used on more than just bass. most recently Parallax by Neural DSP have been the most popular option but to me it still sounds boxy at times so i prefer Mammoth by Aurora DSP for the clanky modern tones but they all have these options built in and will give you the best tones imaginable for any heavy mix. this is a tried and true method if you choose to split your bass and manually mix it, it’s always the better option if you wanna go the freeware route but these plugin options are just too good to pass up.
EDIT : Aurora DSP has a Halloween sale and the Mammoth plugin ($80) is listed at around $27, i’d take advantage of that while you can 😉
been doing this for 10 years + not a new idea lol
@@amfk8079 i never said it was a new idea, i’ve been learning how to record and produce since i was 12 and this technique has been around much longer than both of our times mixing combined lol just saying that in this digital era there are now multiple plugins dedicated to this technique rather than cloning bass amps and pedals and having to split channels and do the filtering yourself, the idea of dual processing or just simply multi band distortion straight out of the box instead of having multiple bass channels with long plugin chains
@@jackclay9145 been doing something similar to this split approach in one signal using Darkglass Infinity into Darkglass A/O Photon. Sounds pretty damn good to me.
Even pedals do this since some time
Great tricks. It would be amazing to have videos of sascha paeth in Nail the Mix. Sacha is the mix enginner from Avantasia. Great metal band.
"We got some meat back as I slid"
I felt that one yeah
It feels like seeing the internal of JW BG Bass!!! Rock on Joel!
EXACTLY! Is noone aware of that plug?!?!?! It's killer. I've used it on every mix since it came out... it takes all of this scrappy multiplugin nonsense away
Nice tips as usual from you guys..
I have a question:
If I use parallax in one bass channel, do I get the same results? As i’m treating bottom, mid and treble frequencies separately?
Thanks!!
in my experience
it's marvelous!
i usually make 4 duplicate but not like joel do but the practical are same
(i use parallax for top and bottom)
yes same idea, packed in 1 plugin. sometimes it's enough, sometimes you need more control and do the splitting & processing. Also linear phase filters lets you place the crossover wherever you want
the more i'm doing bass split thing, what i'm getting at is to use less top end distortion on more dynamic bass parts, whereas use more on more static parts.
Gettin that GANK
Great tips Joel!🙏🏻🔥🔥🔥
Hey man! Do you feel the need to flip the phase of one of the tracks?
try it, if it sounds good, keep it. if it sounds bad, turn it off.
I too put Compression,EQ,Distortion and Excedrin because it gives me a migraine
what song is this ?
czcams.com/video/hc449MVJep0/video.html
It's from the band ERRA , i forgot the name of the track tho
Saosin - Silver String
Paralax one stop shop lol But ya a little boxy
Imagine the days when engineers got a great bass sound without splitting bass tracks into five or six different tracks and using 50 plugins . . . just to get the same exact bass sound everyone else is getting.
😆 🤣 😂
I don't like too much this kind of bass tone, it's too much acid, i prefer a warmer and richer bass sound in metal. More mids, less distortion on the High end and powerful bass frequencies. Because the bass is for providing solidity and low end. So i agree with you
Remember when they had to record though a master tape with a limited channel.