Have you ever fought a bass guitar (or any bass instrument) in your mix that was just not big enough?
Here's what you can do to compensate for a lack of low end in your recordings and add weight to otherwise thin sounding tracks.
More...
In this episode we're walking you through different methods of creating extra bottom end (or the perception of it) if the tone you have just doesn’t have enough of it.
This is why you should know about these techniques:
You can’t bring out with an EQ what is not there at all. If your track never had any content below a certain frequency, there's nothing you could boost, right? So you need to add new low end instead of featuring what's already there.
Maybe you’ve recorded a small amp, or your playing high up on the neck all the time but still want the "weight", maybe your instrument is not a real bass, at all, but you want to make it sound like one, maybe your low end is there from time to time, but not consistently.
There are all sorts of situations and reasons for why you should know how to add extra weight and low end to your bass tones.
These are some of the methods we're discussing on the episode:
- Plugins like RBass, MaxxBass or bx_subsynth
- Multiband-Saturation tools like FabFilter Saturn or Steinberg Quadrafuzz
- Other software/hardware tools and how to combine them to add low end
- Layering MIDI bass below the actual performance
- Dealing with a too dynamic, inconsistent low end and how to lock it in place to make it sound bigger
- How to avoid the whole issue in the first place
Download The Free Frequency Chart Cheat Sheet:
Book a free feedback call with Benedikt:
This episode was edited by Thomas Krottenthaler.
Benedikt's voice on this episode has been recorded with the Antelope Axino Synergy Core.
TSRB 115 - Automatic Episode Transcript — Please excuse any errors, not reviewed for accuracy
[00:00:00] Benedikt: you just can't bring out with an EQ what is not there at all? So if your, if your source just doesn't have any low end, there's no way that you could just bring that out with EQ So we need to find other ways of, solving that problem. Hello, and welcome to the self recording band podcast. I am your host Ben at a time, and I am here with my friend and cohost Malcolm Owen. How are you? Malcolm?
[00:00:37] Malcom: Hello? I'm Greg Benny. How are you, sir?
[00:00:39] Benedikt: Great. Thank you. Little sick. Like what's the word? Sick means like stomach sick, right, and ill or
[00:00:45] Malcom: No, no, no sick six. Pretty all encompassing. Um, yeah. So If you've got a sore throat, you could say you're sick? Sure.
[00:00:53] Benedikt: Okay. Just a little bit, at least a little tired and like, but it's, other than that, I am doing good. How are you?
[00:00:59] Malcom: I'm doing [00:01:00] good as well as we discussed off, we, you? know what we did, we listeners are going to be so happy with us. We talked about all the running stuff before we recorded the podcast. So you don't have to listen to literally about half an hour about running.
[00:01:14] Benedikt: Totally what'd you totally shouldn't do, actually, because we were both super swamped and like, but like, yeah, it's just fun to, to hang out and to talk things like that. But I have something else for you, Malcolm, that I wanted to ask you or share with you and ask you, did you get one of these from Riverside?
[00:01:31] Malcom: Not that I've uh, no, I don't think so, but I'm going to, I'm going to have to check my mail. No, I don't. I don't know what you're holding.
[00:01:39] Benedikt: Yeah. So apparently not. So Riverside sent me like the Riverside is the podcast software that we used to record the software, the podcast, and also the videos. And it's like, it's the platform that we use. And I got an email from them telling me that we are one of their, what they call top creators because we. One of the most consistent ones and like a certain audience size and stuff. Like, [00:02:00] I don't know, maybe everyone's a top creator. I have no idea if that's true or not, but like I got an email saying that we're one of their top creators and they invited me to like a private, private community on slack with, what they claim to be like the, the top creators, the most consistent ones with the most episodes and the biggest audience and stuff. About that, but like I'm in there and they also sent me the, uh, set that they would send me a free gift to say it for like using their platform. And as a way of saying thank you. And what they sent me is this tripod here is like a tripod that you can, you know, do
[00:02:32] Malcom: It's like a selfie sticker.
[00:02:34] Benedikt: Selfie-stick yeah. With an app that comes with it where you can, like you make, you know
[00:02:39] Malcom: Bluetooth
[00:02:40] Benedikt: Yeah. Bluetooth sort of thing. Tricky. Yeah, exactly. And like, yeah. And this little stand thing, if you don't watch the videos, you don't, you're not seeing this right now. So there's this little thing. And, uh, I was pretty, I don't, I mean, that's pretty cool. I just want to say that. Thank you oversight, but I think it's also cool that I got it at you. Don't
[00:02:58] Malcom: Yeah,
[00:02:59] Benedikt: and you [00:03:00] didn't.
[00:03:00] Malcom: this is like typical Canada stuff. There's like all these contests and all like the guitar magazines I'd grow up reading, like when have cool Jackson guitar. And it's like only for the U S excluding Canada. Like why?
[00:03:14] Benedikt: I don't know, like, uh, I think Riverside is a us company, but that thing shipped from, or I don't actually know where they are, but that thing shipped from Israel. I think, um,
[00:03:24] Malcom: All
[00:03:25] Benedikt: Uh, I dunno. I was wondering, and it didn't say when I, when I got the announcement that something was delivered to me, like, I didn't get the email by that by then, from, from Riverside, I just got, I just got a different email from whatever service they used telling me that something that something from Israel is on its way to me. And I'm like, what did I order? Or like what? Yeah. Like, I don't know. I was just hoping for the best and then yeah, what it was a cool little surprise.
[00:03:50] Malcom: There you go. We've hit free swag,
[00:03:53] uh, podcast status.
[00:03:55] Benedikt: exactly. All right. So before [00:04:00] we dive into today's episode, um, because I can say that today's episode is about bass and, uh, I remember you telling me Malcolm that somebody said to you that we didn't do enough, like base content, or we didn't talk enough about like recording base.
[00:04:14] Malcom: Yes. What they actually said I believe was that we didn't have Any And then I was like, I can't believe that. And then we looked at the episodes, Benny and I were like, no, he, that person's just not reading.
[00:04:25] Benedikt: Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
[00:04:27] Malcom: Um, no, no, I'm sure. Honestly. And there's like, well, this is episode 115, so there's a lot to look through, but, uh, it did raise the flag of, Hey, maybe we should do, uh, the more often. So we're doing one.
[00:04:39] Benedikt: Yes exactly. We're doing one today. And, uh, it's about specifically about the low end and base and how to fix the lack, lack of low end in your base recordings. If you captured something that just hasn't enough of that. We're going to talk about that. And before we going to do that, I want to tell you about something free. And if you go to the self recording band.com/frequency chart, you can download a [00:05:00] PDF. It's a multi-page thing, actually pretty long. And. In depth that has an neat little chart at the top. And then it goes through the different ranges different parts of the whole frequency range, explaining which element of which instrument lives, where and how they go together and how we tend to perceive that part of the frequency spectrum. And so you get a better idea of what you need to elicit. For, and also look at when you use an analyzer. It's pretty self-explanatory if you'd just download the thing, but I find it really, really helpful to just get an idea of like, what's actually in the low end, what's supposed to be there. What doesn't really belong there in most cases, where is the potential of things like clashing? Where do, where does my, my base fundamental notes live? Where do those live? Where does the kick drum live? How do the two go together? And that sort of stuff, not just the low end, the whole spectrum. So. I'm really convinced that this is a super helpful thing, a super helpful resource. I also use it in my coaching. So if you go to the surf recording [00:06:00] band.com/frequency chart, you can download that thing completely for free.
[00:06:04] Malcom: Yeah, it's awesome. I actually have it saved like under the top like root folder of my Dropbox so I can easily reference it.
[00:06:10] Benedikt: Awesome. That's really, really cool.
[00:06:12] Malcom: great tool.
[00:06:12] Benedikt: Thank you. That's really cool. So, yeah. And today we're going to talk about low end part of that, particularly specifically about the base and what to do, if there is not enough low end in your base recordings, because sometimes that happens and we've got to tell you how to create extra bottom end or the perception of it. Doesn't have to be actual bottom end. We get to talk about that. If the tone you have just doesn't have enough of it. Why would you want to do that? Or do we need to, um, why do we even get into these types of situations? Maybe you've recorded a small amp or are you playing a high up on the neck, but you still want all the weight. Maybe your instrument is not a real bass. I had it often where people would use, for example, the guitar to play the baseline, and then they try to make it sound like a bass. It's an entirely doable, but there's tricks that [00:07:00] helps with that helped with that. Maybe you use some other bass instrument that doesn't have enough low end. Uh, so. Various situations like that. And You just can't bring out with an EQ, what is not there at all. So if your, if your source just doesn't have any low end, there's no way that you could just bring that out with EQ. So we need to find other ways of solving that problem. But luckily there are ways to do that. And we're going to talk about those right.
[00:07:27] Malcom: Yeah, absolutely. It's kind of like a little tips and tricks for, for solving this specific problem episode. But I, I do want to say that while we're talking about. I think bass guitar really a lot of these tricks are really useful on other instruments for the same, same issue. Um, so it's like we're talking in A kind of a micro setting, but take it as a macro concept.
[00:07:48] Benedikt: A hundred percent. If your kick drum is lacking the weight, or, I mean, there's other tricks with kick drums, we know that with drum samples and stuff, but you could still beef up a cake or a sample. Or if any, any source is lacking low [00:08:00] end, you can apply these, these tricks. Definitely.
[00:08:03] Malcom: Absolutely.
[00:08:03] Benedikt: Cool. So, um, let's start with like, the, I would say the easy fix, the quick fix sort of thing that oftentimes works. And I think that is plugins that are designed to do exactly that.
[00:08:14] Malcom: Yeah. Yeah. These are great because like you said, they were designed to solve this problem. It's why they were created. So they, they tend to work. And I think sometimes. We, yeah, maybe me, sometimes I am skeptical of plugins that claim to solve problems. I'm like gimmick, but, uh, in the case of like, I got a couple on our list here they're they they're so tried and true. They've been around for so long and, and they're, they're just like spot on very useful. And I'm big fan of, um, at least two, I haven't used the third one. So that the three that Danny wrote down and out loud outline here where our base max base and BX substance our base max base are legendary at this point. They're [00:09:00] pretty old waves plugins at this point, but they just work really well. BX, substance, I'm not familiar with, but any VX plugins seems to be great. Usually.
[00:09:10] Benedikt: Yeah, we can talk about the differences real quick. So I have used. A lot. And I use B acceptance a lot. I don't use Mac space a lot, although I have it and I don't really know why exactly, but like I'm to this day, I'm still not entirely sure what the difference is between our base and Mac space. Like when it comes to what's going, what's going on under the hood. I know that they both use the, the wave smack space sort of technology that you have, this max based trademark thing that they use in both the plugin. so they are kind of similar. I know that max space gives you more control and I know what both of them do, but I never, I was never sure if max space is just a more sophisticated version with more control, or if it's doing something entirely different that our base doesn't do, because I just liked the simplicity in our base, but I know people like it for different, for different applications that, so there must be some sort of a difference [00:10:00] other than just being able to have more control.
[00:10:02] Malcom: Yeah. So, so essentially both of those plugins are creating artificial Okta of low end, right? Like they're creating harmonic content or boosting it. But it feels like they're creating like another Okta of like our base in particular, I feel like can add like a lower Okta, um,
[00:10:19] Benedikt: But it doesn't, it doesn't actually does it, does it overtones harmonic content, which
[00:10:23] Malcom: Yes. It gives the illusion of one You're right. You're absolutely right. Um, but the difference between our base and makerspaces that are bases band specific, you know, so you set it at whatever hurts you're looking to create. Uh, you could say, and max space is multi-band, it is like a wide across the whole thing. Um, so both the, Yeah. they, they both can really work for different reasons and have jobs. And. For our base. I tend to grab it when I'm wanting it to like really, really sound like there's like more low end, um, where max bass, I actually grab it [00:11:00] to make the low end kind of appear to be fuller. And I work better on like small speakers and stuff like that. And, and which is still creating more low end, even if it's not actually creating more low end. Again, the illusional low end is just as good as low as low end. If it works.
[00:11:16] Benedikt: Yeah. So, yeah, exactly. So the thing is, and we need to, to say that, to explain in order to be able to explain the difference to things like the substance, for example, They create overtones, which means they, in a way they saturate the low end and he created, they create overtones that they add something to the signal that was not there before. And our brain adds the fundamental to those overtones and thinks that there's a lower octave when there's actually not a lower octave. This is called the F the missing fundamental effect. I've talked about this before on this podcast. It's pretty fascinating where if, if our brain recognizes a certain series of overtones, we. We just fill in the fundamental, even if it's just not there, we just hear it or perceive it just because we're familiar with this series [00:12:00] of overtones. And, um, so both, I think both of those plugins and the whole RBA or max based technology was our algorithm was designed to make low low-end more audible on smaller systems, as you said. So the overtones help there because we can't recreate the actual fundamental. Uh, or like a reproduce the actual fundamentals on a, on a very small speaker. But with, uh, with that sort of trick, you can, it sounds like there is one, it has more weight to it. So both of those are pretty fascinating, but still the. Actually like they add something that wasn't there before. So you can't do that with, with ACU alone. And even if you look at it and I'm on an analyzer, there is a lower content frequency content below what you have before. Um, and I just, I just think it's not an Okta. It's not like they generate a sense, whatever it sounds. But it's like, just from saturating, it there's whatever was there, whatever minor thing was there just gets amplified or I don't know how to exactly what it, but, but what it does is it creates overtones. It creates harmonics. That's the two [00:13:00] of them and they work in different ways. And you're totally right about the band specific thing. Like with our base, you just pick the frequency and boost that, or, or saturate that basically, or bring out the overtones and with max bass, it sort of does it across the whole thing. Now be ex. Is different BX sub since actually creates that octave below, or it's not only, it's not even the octave. You can set it to whatever interval you want. Um, but it creates additional. Low-end content that wasn't there before, but not by saturating it. I mean, it can do that too. Like if you can work, you can make it work like our base of space. But like, actually it's a synthesizer that just in real time adds an octave or whatever you want below, whatever you have, but it does it in a way that that sounds really organic and really cool to me. And it's just different to our base and Mex based. So I use that a lot, actually, sometimes it's almost like it saves you the work of having to program a middy line to layer in Oxford, below the actual base or something like that. It's just a, you can, you can have it [00:14:00] work. It's just a sign wave, basically below the actual baseline, or you can make it more sophisticated and complicated and you can saturate it, but it's very easy to use. It adds a ton of weight if you want it to, it has a lot of control and it's just. Tool and approach, but I really like it to fill in that lower octave. That for me is the tool that works best for in the scenario where I said like, maybe you, you playing high up on the neck all the time on the base, but you still want the, the weight, but there's just, the fundamental is just not there. Or it's like higher because you're not playing the low note. That sort of thing adds the low note. It's almost like you're playing an octave, but in a very subtle, heavy sounding way.
[00:14:40] Malcom: Very cool. I'm gonna have to try that one on.
[00:14:42] Benedikt: Yeah, I like, I love that. So the interesting thing about all these, uh, about the art base and Makerspace things in particular is that you can create similar effects without those tools. Because if you use a multi-band saturation tool like fab filter, Saturn or something you can do, you can create a [00:15:00] similar effect. If you saturate the. And you have to be careful. You don't want to distort it too much so that it, because then it becomes smaller. But if you can create the, the overtones with a two like that, you can make the low end sound fuller and more audible on smaller systems as well. And you can create a very similar effect or you can just help the signal if it's like not thick enough. So with Saturn, I think it works really well. If you're just focused on the. Part of the spectrum and you saturated and you boost it, bring it up and you just add harmonic content that wasn't there before. It really helps in like beefing up things I feel like. And so you, if you have something like that and maybe your dog has a stock, both multi-band saturation tool, maybe you don't even need to buy our base or Makerspace space and you can do it with a tool like.
[00:15:46] Malcom: Yeah, it is yeah. More of a manual approach, but there are can be really great. And it it's a lot of fun if there's something on this list that I said, like I said earlier, could be used on other, other instruments for like the same purpose. Uh, [00:16:00] multi-band saturation is probably the one it's, it's really a useful tool. Like thinking thickening the low end of, uh, your guitar tracks, for example, this can be like such a, a life saver as well. Yeah, very fun. It's kind of like a new hobby for me, saturating stuff.
[00:16:18] Benedikt: Absolutely. Absolutely.
[00:16:19] Malcom: Uh, I do think maybe I'll, I'll mention just some suggestions on that because we did give some plugging and examples for, for this specific problem solvers, but, um, you mentioned fab filter Saturn. Um, if you're looking for like a more Option, you can look at like the nectar series with, um, isotope is the company there. And that stuff is actually quite, quite great. Uh, easy to use,
[00:16:40] Benedikt: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Then if you're in Cubase, there is Quadrafire has this, it's a stock Cubase multi-band situation. Plugin. That
[00:16:47] Malcom: Yep.
[00:16:48] Benedikt: really good.
[00:16:49] Malcom: Oh, and, uh, keywords to, you could use as an exciter, um, that it might be labeled as an exciter and then you can look for that because like, again, you might already know.
[00:16:58] Benedikt: Absolutely there [00:17:00] was this. I don't know if it's still available, but I remember the effects. I think it was called apex big bottom or something like that. It's a very old plugin and I think it was also a hardware device. I don't know. But like, I just know that name, um, was, was, uh, popping up when I was starting out. I saw that a lot. I dunno if it's still around, but yeah, these are all like exciters. And, uh, centuries and tools. Yep. And then I, it brings me to the next thing here. And that sort of goes along with what you mentioned there. Um, in addition to what I put in our show notes in our notes here, which is multi-bank compression, or like controlling the dynamics, because sometimes it might be that the. That there is some low end, but it's just not consistent enough. So some notes are sticking out and others are barely audible. And if you, if you prevent your, um, the notes from sticking out, the other ones sort of get lost. So you don't have overall, um, enough weight in your, in your track. So maybe just making the low-end more dense and [00:18:00] controlling the dynamics more with multi-bank compression, for example, where you're just compress the low end, which is very common for bass guitars, then. It can even out the low end more, you can bring up the stuff that's quiet. You can turn down the stuff that's loud. And maybe that creates an overall more consistent and heavy sounding, full sounding, low end. So maybe there is enough, but it's just inconsistent. Or maybe did you have to do both? Maybe you have. Add additional overtones or low end, a little bit of it, and then compress it to make it more consistent. So the two can go hand in hand. I do that quite a bit. Actually often use our base and then compress it or I compress it and then use our base because our base then reacts better and work in a more consistent way to the overall low end. So the two can also be combined.
[00:18:45] Malcom: Absolutely. Yeah, they, they, a hundred percent can yeah, like you hear about people slamming bass with limiters for that reason as well. We're just trying to lock it in and make our low end consistent and not disappear on certain notes. Once you hear [00:19:00] that, like it's kind of something, I think you have to train your ear to be listening for if you're new to the game of, of listening to low end, that you might not be noticing like the fluctuations of the fundamental of the bass guitar, for example. But once you're tuned into it, you'll start picking it up all over the place and be like, I gotta fix that.
[00:19:15] Benedikt: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And that's actually called tricky, brought up there too. You gotta be very careful with it, but he can work if you really slam a base with, with eliminate or something like L one, like a really like. Not really transparent limiter, but some something that just makes it completely flat basically at one or the BX limiter or some simple limiter that you have, if you do that, you have to be careful because it can distort the low end really quickly, and then it gets smaller and stuff, but, and usually you lose a little bit of low end if you do that. But a cool trick can be too, like really. Wash it with a limiter like that. And then after you've done that you boost the low end with a very broad shelf for, so to bring the overall low end up again, and that can make it more consistent and you can still keep the low end in a way. It's [00:20:00] you gotta be careful because low end tends to distort a lot with cheap limiters like that. But, um, that's a pretty common trick that can help as well. And sometimes it works better than multi-bank compression because it's super quick. And the, the limiter is super quick and it really makes things super even.
[00:20:14] Malcom: Yeah, incredibly locked in for sure. I'm actually a big fan of, of doing that.
[00:20:19] Benedikt: Yeah, yeah, yeah, me too. I'm just saying, be careful and really listen for what you're doing, because the reason for the whole you know, in metal, we've talked about that as well. There's this technique where you split the base two into two different parts. So you're treating the low end and the top end separately. And the reason you do that is that you want to compress the low end without distorting it, but you want to distort the top end for all the grit and the. I'm just saying that because you don't want to distort the low end too much, because otherwise you could just throw distortion on the whole base track, but you don't want to do that because the low end tends to get smaller. If you do that and you want to keep the full, low end that is present in the DEI. For example, if you do that. And, uh, so we do that to not lose. Sent the whole signal, [00:21:00] including the low end into a limiter like that. And you go too far and you distorted because those limiters the store, the low end, then you might lose some of the weight in the fundamentals that you can't bring back after the fact. So I'm just saying that to be careful there, because you can easily destroy your base tone to.
[00:21:16] Malcom: Right. Yeah. we don't normally do this, but I'm going to give a teaser for our next episode. We're talking about how knowing too much can actually cause harm. Like you, you might think you've got like this, this technique that is the bee's knees, but it. It might not apply to what you're trying to do and, and stuff like that. Like at like, oh, splitting base, um, or, or the starting base makes it cut better. Like, but like it's do you need the low end to be distorted to, or, or vice versa? There's this is like A very good example of all these trends. Are are great and are the solution to the problem, but which, which one of these you go with is all based on your, uh, like it's all based on the material. So you have to [00:22:00] really think about it. You can't just be like, okay, I know that I can do this. You have to think which one is the right solution for this specific circumstance.
[00:22:08] Benedikt: A hundred percent. Yeah. All right. So the next thing on our list here is a manual approach. And I wonder, do you ever do that? Do you ever manually program middy to, to like, um, to get an octave below the base or to layer in additional base instrument below, below the base? Whatever is.
[00:22:27] Malcom: I think I have done it one time that I layered a committee-based below. The the real base, I think more often than not, I've just swapped and gone, like entirely middy. Um, and, and sometimes it's for the whole song or sometimes it's just for the, like the one park kind of thing or whatever is needed. and then one other time it was, uh, like a sign wave re uh, like to reinforce just a really, really low note. Um, that that'd be it. And then I will. I can't, I say that, but like sine waves, like sub bass song sound waves. That's a [00:23:00] whole nother conversation where it's just like, that's another instrument to me.
[00:23:04] Benedikt: Yeah, but that's actually what I, what I meant also with this. So I'm in the same boat. I, I rarely programmed the, I almost never programmed the same performance just to get a little octave. I'd been decades. I just used BX substance or something like that. But I quite often add a little bit of weight in like a chorus to just make it feel heavier or bigger than the verse, for example. And in that case, I do the middy quite a bit, or I don't program it. I have a small keyboard in front of me where I just play the root. And then I quickly quantize it and it might just be, as you said, like sine waves playing the root notes to just add more weight to the chorus, but that can be done if let's say. A typical scenario would be in band. Sometimes don't think about it when they arrange their songs. And the actual base tone has enough low end, maybe, but in the verse, they playing low root notes and it has all the low in and the weight. And then in the chorus, they go up on the bass and play an octave above or something where they do some base runs and it, they completely lose the [00:24:00] fundamental funder fundamental the foundation, basically. And they don't think about, about the consequences that it has. So the verse can sound really full and the lot, the low end is there. And then in the chorus where they want it to sound bigger, The low end is not there anymore or it's like thinner. And in that case, I try to get that extra weight back in by just. Adding the sideway, for example, or, um, or something also very common. And that's a pet peeve of mine. I don't know if you've ever had that is where, when people write really rhythmic choruses, where it's like, In in, uh, let's say they have a verse where the it's sustained chords and it's just, you know, the, the course just ring out and then it comes to chorus and it's a rhythm part with a lot of gaps in between the chords or the, the, the hits basically. And it kind of just doesn't have the size because there's no sustaining element, no sustaining sort of. To it, but it's like, they have this, oftentimes they have this, this big vocal arrangement and it should sound like really epic and big. [00:25:00] And, but all the guitars and bass are doing this choppy, rhythmic sort of thing. That just doesn't sound as big, you know? And when that happened, I sometimes program their foundation of like sine wave or whatever root notes just below it. That just might be very subtle, but it's just one sustaining weight thing that keeps going on below the rhythm throughout the chorus. That makes the whole thing sound bigger in a way. I th that's something, I dunno if I, if I explained that correctly, but, but you know what I mean? When, when, when you, you know what it's supposed to sound like, but it just doesn't because there's no sustaining, wait there.
[00:25:34] Malcom: Yes, absolutely. Yeah. I'm, I'm totally on board with that. That that's the same, same reason I'm doing a second. We need some glue. We need this, this like buzzing low end just to like sit under it and it feels good. And it drops into that part. It's always like the solve the course feeling smaller than the verse kind of thing. Yeah. Right.
[00:25:54] Benedikt: Yeah.
[00:25:55] Malcom: Um, but again, like that sounds like a, oh, we should always do that, but it's, it's [00:26:00] something that doesn't happen very often. So don't get confused by that. It as, as much as it is like such a cool fun, creative fix, it is not a, not like a, a tool we reached to very often.
[00:26:12] Benedikt: Exactly. And the main takeaway for you should always be here in these. When we talk about things like that is. That you have to just make sure that it feels right. Right. If the chorus really is big enough and feels big enough, then you don't have to do any of these things. But if it doesn't feel big enough, that could be one possible solution. It's just about being intentional and thinking through how you arrange things and if there's enough of everything. So, because some bands, just a lot of bands just don't think that through entirely. So. Yeah. And then the next one. I'm letting you go first here, because that's something I almost never used where I use it creatively to create a certain sound sometimes in the form of a pedal or something, but I rarely use it. I mean, you could say be a substance is something like that, but not really. So [00:27:00] I'm talking about the classic October thing. Do you ever use.
[00:27:03] Malcom: You know, I think the way I use an October that applies to this is only actually been the other way around making a higher Okta, which I think in turn kind of does create that same, like harmonic illusion of a lower Okta a little bit. Um, because generally the Okta. Version is distorted. So is this creating more of a full picture of the base tone kind of thing? And, um, and that's, that's really all I've done. I don't think I've ever just ad used like an of software or, or title or anything to create a low walked of just because the base seemed thin. I don't think I've done that.
[00:27:39] Benedikt: No, I use it as a creative tool more and more often. I just wrote it down here because it can do that. There are pedals that give you an octave below or whatever you said it to, and it can be a quick fix for a certain part, for example, where you just need an extra. Bottom or whatever, or you know, so I just want to put it there. I don't, I rarely use it that way too. I use it as an, as a [00:28:00] tool to get creative sounds, but sometimes even with the octave below, actually sometimes above, sometimes below, but not for that purpose. You're totally right. I just want to throw it out there. Maybe someone in the audience has great success with that because it can do that chop. So you can just punch it in and in a certain part to create an extra extractive and that can do.
[00:28:18] Malcom: Yeah. And actually that did give me the idea that I am not afraid to record a low Okta. If the, if there's a high base part, why not record a low bass part under it? It does work. I know like we're all afraid of having two bass guitars going at the same time, but if it's a full octave apart and that's the one Okta is, you know, in guitar land is going to be totally fine. It's the same as guitar and a bass player in the same roof, pretty much. Um, so that, that totally works. You can just fill those holes. With a basic guitar performance, um, really careful and your intonation and all that. Of course.
[00:28:50] Benedikt: I thought about whether or not I should say that because we definitely do have to sit
[00:28:54] Malcom: Yeah.
[00:28:56] Benedikt: like yeah, exactly. Intonation [00:29:00] keep yourself in tune. Yeah. And then, uh, finally, if you have a good deal, So maybe because I've added this year, uh, if you have a good DIU who have all kinds of options, of course, and I've added this year. Often when I had this problem and I had to fix this problem, it was when people were recording their amps and, um, and they didn't have N a D I, and then I was stuck with whatever base tone they sent me and S and if it's small combo, for example, that just can't reproduce the low end and the low end is just not there. Yeah. Or if they make their, even their big bass amp in a weird way, or sometimes, you know, calves in general have this roll off. So like even the biggest caps don't go down all the way down sometimes, but it, depending on the genre you're working in, you might need the 40 Hertz, 30 Hertz fundamental or whatever. And it's just not there because it's a cap and a. if people don't send me the, I have to do some of the things we've been talking about today in order to fix that. And the best way to fix it is just to always record a [00:30:00] Dai along with whatever amp you're recording, because that way you have all the options. If you sent me your bass amp tone, and I think it's cool, but it's just like in low-end I don't have to pull up any of these things or like try all these tricks. I can just grab the. Filter it so that I I'm just, I'm just getting the low end. I can compress that. Do whatever I want with that and blend it with your amp and we'll that we have the low end, right? It's and it's in the actual performance. So If you capture a good clean DI, there's nothing complicated about that. It just has to be clean and full. If you do that, then you have all the options to fix the lack of low end problem in your mix. You can reamp it, you can just use the DI, as I said, you can do all sorts of things. So, just keep that in mind.
[00:30:43] Malcom: There's no reason not to record a DI, especially with a bass guitar. Just please, please do it.
[00:30:48] Benedikt: Yep. A hundred percent. All right. So I think that's it, that could be a fairly quick episode because this is really all I do when it comes to, to fixing the problem. It can be done is better, but it can be done.[00:31:00] and yeah.
[00:31:00] Malcom: Yep. And as always reverse engineer these so that you're taking care of it before you're handing it to a guy like Benny or me to mix it. If we don't have to do these things
[00:31:13] Benedikt: All right. Talk to you next week.
[00:31:15] Malcom: okay. Thanks everyone. Bye.
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