Live (in studio) Blues Recordings with Mixbus 3

[GMaq]

Yeah, here are 2 nice episodes by Dave Pensado:

Ok, this is a cool youtube resource. I've looked at several of his videos, and some good stuff there.

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GMaq, a couple of questions for you on the bass setup you used for this recording:
1.) Does that bass have flatwound strings? If not, how did you keep string squeak down so low?
2.) Was the bass direct or through a mic in front of an amp? If an amp, what amp?
3.) (Sorry, I know I said a couple of questions....) What brand of bass is this? It has great tone.

You may be sorry you asked, I love discussing gear :b

The bass is an early 70's Fender Precision with a badass bridge and roundwounds on it, it's tuning is a bit unorthodox, Pete basically has it set up as the bottom 4 strings of a 5 string so it's tuned B-E-A-D. We're both a bit weird that way as a side note on both songs I'm also tuned down playing baritone Fender Tele's tuned to 'C' and 'B' respectively, now back to the bass..

We miked his amp, he has a nice old roadworn Traynor Monoblock head and a homemade ported cabinet with a single 15" speaker (I think it's a JBL). I close miked it with a Shure SM57 with the mic perpendicular to the cone roughly in the center of the cone between the coil cover and the outer flange. In our experience the SM57 has the perfect rolloff and just naturally strips all the unwanted subby bass away. To control string squeak we played around with the EQ's on the amp to balance between clarity and 'squeak' and Pete also is mindful of that when he plays. There is no EQ on any of the tracks on these recordings other than the kick drum however I used the linuxDSP DYN-500 as a compressor on the bass channel, I have no beef with the Harrison Compression I just know how to get instant good bass sounds with the linuxDSP stuff since my Ardour and Mixbus use is about 50/50.

Anyway that's about it... considering these were originally some live test recordings to get acquainted with our new studio I'm also pleased (in the context of my own little world) with the sounds we ended up with and the bleed control we achieved.

I'd love to hear some of your bluegrass productions, now that IS tricky stuff, got a link?

[lowen]

...
GMaq, a couple of questions for you on the bass setup you used for this recording:...

You may be sorry you asked, I love discussing gear :b

Me too, sometimes to a fault!

The bass is an early 70's Fender Precision with ... the bottom 4 strings of a 5 string so it's tuned B-E-A-D.

Well, I just almost spewed my tea..... when I was getting ready to buy my 5 string (Epiphone EBM-5, love the two-full-octaves neck) I did exactly that with my Epiphone P-Bass copy (I forget the model). That in and of itself explains a lot about the sound. I detuned the normal EADG strings down to BEAD, rather than put proper BEAD strings, which created its own interesting vibe. Interesting enough that I dropped the cash on the EBM-5.

...
We miked his amp, he has a nice old roadworn Traynor Monoblock head and a homemade ported cabinet with a single 15" speaker (I think it's a JBL). I close miked it with a Shure SM57 with the mic perpendicular to the cone roughly in the center of the cone between the coil cover and the outer flange.

Nice technique. I have a BETA 57, which has a bit different response, and now I can't wait to try using it that way with my Hartke 2115 Combo, which adds enough good color to the sound to be more desirable than a direct box.

...
I'd love to hear some of your bluegrass productions, now that IS tricky stuff, got a link?

I'll shoot you a link by PM or e-mail. I can do limited private demo distribution.

Incidentally, I'm still using a PC with 'Tube' on it. Even when I upgrade to the AVL 2016 I'm going to pull 'Tube's' background over to it..... (Then again, research the tube I use as my avatar......)

[lowen]

... It's the artist's decision, and panned bass is just one of those artistic choices...

Amen.

... LF being using the highest amount, you better distribute the load between both speakers. ...

Over the holiday I listened to rips of some old vinyl I have, and I came across an old JD Sumner and the Stamps recording (before Elvis asked them to back him, so late 60's maybe). The song was 'Roll on Jordan.'

Guess what? The upright bass was indeed panned dead center, but guess where JD's voice was? Hard right. JD Sumner was consistently able to hit the basso profundo notes in the bottom octave; for years he held the Guinness World Record for lowest sung note at G0 (24.5Hz). The mix was very heavy on the bass vocal (after all, the group is called J D Sumner and the Stamps, and there was an astonishing amount of right channel LF energy.

So I checked, and in the Southern Gospel genre I found a number of recordings with the bass instrument in the center and the bass vocal panned hard right (tenor vocal hard left). Many of the SG quartets featured bass vocalists with the full basso range. And even though some of it is in the vocal fry register, the extreme LF impulses would be murder on vinyl, one would think. But these groups targeted vinyl, and I never saw one of those LP's cause stylus hop in my days spinning vinyl at WGCR.

Some modern basso vocalists are also panned off-center; some of cuts by Pentatonix, for instance, have lots of off-center LF energy down to E1 courtesy of Avi Kaplan, who has one of the smoothest low ranges out there for a vocalist. Another with extreme low range would be of course Barry White. A page with videos and note references (some even stating that some of these super low notes are not vocal fry) is at http://www.vocalistonline.com/tag/bass/

Just another data point.....

[madmaxmiller]

Just another data point.....

Hah! Cool. At least vocals have no steep transients...

MMM

[lowen]

Just another data point.....

Hah! Cool. At least vocals have no steep transients...

MMM

:-)

You have listened to Pentatonix before, right? I think the beat-box stuff that Kevin Olusola does is mostly panned to the center, but I haven't analyzed it closely. Avi's basso goes off-center frequently, though. Their 'Daft Punk' cover is on Youtube, but you can't judge the CD's panning by the video track. It's hard to believe that Pentatonix is a cappella (for the most part; 'Radioactive' with Lindsey Stirling being one of a few exceptions), as they sound like they have percussion and other instruments... and they haven't (yet) targeted vinyl.....

Even beat-box isn't as steep as a real or synth kick, for sure, though.

GMaq, you can certainly say that your production, in addition to being a couple of very nice blues mixes, has garnered quite a bit of interest from at least a few on bass panning techniques....

[Frank]

Hi,

During some recent rehearsals our we set up some mics to experiment with live recordings in preparation for a new album of original material to be recorded throughout the summer. We decided to document a few arrangements of some of our favorite artists and number one on the list was the immortal Freddie King. http://www.freddiekingsite.com/
Glen

Hi Glenn

your Freddieking caught me off hand.

How comes i never heard B.B. being called Freddie ? I worked quiet a few times with B.B. at the days where he had his guitar lead on a reel so he could enter the hall from the back.

I remember we when we first met he showed me: unreeled and I noticed that the connections at the plug were dying.
He smiled and never forgot my name, when he saw that i had taken out my soldering iron, and a high quality new jack.
It was always fun to have him on stage..


By the way: looking op who is Freddie , and catching up old memories made me forget to listen to your Not not from BB tune

sorry

regards

[GMaq]

@lowen

Haha and here I thought I was doing something really old-school and boring... apparently so old-school that people forgot it was a thing

@Frank

Wow, really cool story, you should write a book with stories like that, I'd buy it for sure!

I revere all the 'Kings' of the blues... Of course B.B. is best known, probably Albert King next and then Freddie who like B.B. had some crossover potential and worked with Leon Russell on 2 albums, for those who aren't as fanatical as I am Freddie has faded from memory a bit since he passed away in 1976 decades earlier than either Albert or B.B.

I am always astounded how these 3 completely unrelated guys named King could all play a simple I IV V blues progression and sounded infinitely different and unique

[tedma]

Hi,

During some recent rehearsals our we set up some mics to experiment with live recordings in preparation for a new album of original material to be recorded throughout the summer. We decided to document a few arrangements of some of our favorite artists and number one on the list was the immortal Freddie King. http://www.freddiekingsite.com/

These were tracked live (warts, glitches, flubs, flurbs and all) to a Presonus 1818VSL and recorded in Harrison Mixbus 3 using AV Linux 2016. For good measure I whipped up some cheesy faux 70's Live album art in GIMP.

Going Down: https://soundcloud.com/rated-blue/going-...king-cover
Yonder Wall: https://soundcloud.com/rated-blue/yonder...king-cover

In 'Yonder Wall' I dropped a bass solo on Pete without warning and he didn't let me down :lol:

Glen

Nice!