Hey Joe! Having mixed bass guitars countless times, I always loving clicking on videos like these to try and get out of my own tendencies and try new methods and thought processes. I can easily admit - sometimes it is so easy to get caught up in all of the minute details that I forget that mixing is supposed to be fun and expressive! Thanks for teaching throughout the years, and always subconsciously teaching to always enjoy what you do. It's helping at least one person out here.
Wow.... I was just talking to my brother about what I needed to add on a beat I am working on and he said it needed more bass.... Thats wild how this video came up without me even searching...... You just gained a subscriber....
Hey joe grat advise! Wise too!!! What i do is play real hard with pick close to the bridge to get the full and controled wave and then compress the hell out of it while the mix is playing. Bass is the last instrument. First kick snare then gtrs vocals panning then bass. I use bass as the glue. Youll notice in motown records that gtrs vocals and violins etc may sound good but the queen of spades is always bassline clarity. Love joe!
Excellent video and advice as usual, brutha! I particularly like the part where you throw your voice so far out into space that it hasn't returned to our ears yet. That must be part of the VIP course. Hehe, hope you and yours are well!
Hey Joe. I'm glad that you made the comment 13:00 about the bass sounding too loud. I'm watching this while listening thru studio headphones and the bass actually sounds good to me. I think the bass players should get to shine more too. So there's that. Also, for the 100th commented time,...did you or did you not say anything significant or profound between the 11:50 and 12:11 mark? LOL! I wasn't going to address it after all the previous clever comments about it; but you know we tend to hang on to follow you like that scene in Forrest Gump when he ran cross country and crowds of people ran with him.
Guess you're giving a speedy short lip reading course also at 12 minutes 🤪. Great stuff overall in a quick vid Joe, because I wanted to mix down some bass parts next few days.
My ex bass player is THE dude in Austin Tx! He played on my first self produced cd… couldn’t get him for the 2nd cd so I played bass! He heard it and is still supporting my efforts 🌝…due to current reality I’m at it again. The bass I used on the last cd was an ancient fender acoustic. It has a super gritty sound. Not the best for everything…. So I’m borrowing a bass to track. Please wish me luck since I’m engineering, performing and praying. Joe why is your bass track stereo? Merry Christmas y’all!
Hi Mr Joe, I'm so delighted to have subscribed to your channel, u r such a great teacher, your rules of compression is still ringing in my head More wins
Hi Joe, I hope you can find my message here after two years, thank you for this wonderful video and tutorial, I'm using Mooer GE-200 as my audio interface and after recording my guitar and bass, the waveform is different with other audio interface like Focusrite, ...., my waveform is fully occupied the track, is that because of GE-200?
@@joeseabreeze true...especially because he solved three months of me *starting to try to figure out where the input gain adjustment is and getting distracted before I find it*
After 20 years of doing this job I always have the same "problem", where is the line that separates too thin and too thick when it comes to low frequencies. There are many great mixes out there, some of them being really thin, others really thick so there is no general rule about this as it all depends of the context, that is why I do not like using a referent song while mixing, such a misleading strategy. The main issue is how to choose whether to turn the volume up for the low frequency instruments (kick and bass), or to add more low frequencies with the EQ, two very different approaches. Still searching for a sweet spot though. 😃
recently I started using studio one 5,but I am not a musician,basically electronics and audio. my daughter is doing music with yamaha psr I455 ,and I am trying EQ of bass guitar,noiw I got the idea !
Hi Joe, Nice video but I would be very interested in hearing what your bass player said in relation to the changes that you had made. Couple of things from my perspective, probably wrong. 1: when you bring up the 50 - 80 Hz bass you’re going to potentially clash with the bass drum, and two it would be interesting to know if he feels you’ve taken away his mid range, let me know?
Very helpful video. I'm mixing a song and about to mix the bass track when I discovered this. One (tangential) question: I don't see the input gain / polarity controls at the top of any of my channels. I've tried to figure out how to make them visible and can't. I've been messing with clip gain & clip gain envelopes to boost sound levels for a track. Using input gain might be a better method if I can find it. Thanks.
broooo joe i love your fender amp behind you is that a champ? i got a tiny one just like yours except my sounds like it’s got a broken speaker (although i replaced it with a new one) lol
Joe, is Bass mixed in mono or its better stereo, I have a romantic track which is mainly piano, cello live , and bass played with midi and some deep electro beats as an ambient. Is it better to mix the bass in the default stereo mode or to change it to mono ??!!
awesome...iv been mixing bass this week.i can't make it comprressed in balance..bass like funky and slaps have high notes and low , soft and hard attacks..tonal balance plugin shows under compressed but ocassionally over compressed.i did automate..what am i missing?
Maybe you need a Dynamic EQ so you can compress certain frequencies only when those particular frequencies cross the threshold. That way everything outside of those particular frequencies won't be compressed.
You could also try going into a tape saturation plugin on a darker sounding tape format. Play with the input level until the bass transients start to saturate and you might find it rounds off the problem spikes just enough for a standard compressor to start making a better job of the rest. I would then parallel compress it - set a first compressor to deal with the average volume of the playing (the pops will overcompress) then set the mix to 50/50, now add a second compressor to deal with the pops (the average will undercompress) and set that to mix to 50/50 too. You have to dig deep with problem audio, there is rarely a magic plugin that will solve all your problems! Lots of small steps will sound better than one processor going bananas...
I was thinking parallel compression / eq on a duplicated track would work well on this bass part...it's quite a one dimensional sound in a single track
@@SadhanaKhawas it may well do yes. Was just thinking the original bass line is so bass-light that something closer to its original frequency might be more in keeping with the kind of tune it is while also giving a bit more bottom end
Hey Joe! What did you mean when you said pushing the fader up changes the resolution of the track? I don't think I've ever heard anyone talk about that. Thanks!
He's referring to the resolution of the fader itself, not the track. It's easier to make small adjustments when the fader is positioned around the 0 mark.
Yeah you made it sound great. And that's a good bass track for this video too. 'Cause if the guy played a Precision instead of a Jazz you wouldn't've had to do all that, and then you wouldn't've had a video! (But be kind, don't let the bass player see my comment.)
Often when I record bass (And Synth Keys) one or two low notes are visibly louder. The low note is great and I am concerned that compression will shape that low note such that it loses it's timbre. How do you address that and make the other notes fatter?
try using a multiband compressor as opposed to a traditional compressor! This way, you can focus the compression on the low end and low mid freq bands independently, giving you the luxury of controlling how much low end, low mids, and/or whichever frequency band needs to be more (or less!!) present in the mix!
Sometimes bass notes resonate at certain frequencies, making them sound louder. I often notice this around 100hz. I put a dynamic EQ there to cut that frequency when it gets too loud, without affecting that harmonic on other notes.
Is it me or the bass is clipping from the recording? Also, why to play a bass line with the bridge pickup, that provides a lot of wonderfull mid range and crispiness to finally take the mid range frcuencies in the mixing? All in all, I should have recorded the bass line again.
Now I'm confused...you have half the internet saying that just turning up the bass is not the way to do things and now you're saying that just turning the bass up is a good thing. Uhm....
I'd like Joe to address this as well because in my experience EQ often is applied before compression, to specifically avoid compressing (and possibly boosting into the mix) unwanted frequencies.
Ahh yes the old question: do I EQ before compression or compress before EQ 🤔 It’s purely up to the material - if you find the source is too uneven in dynamics there would be nothing wrong with levelling out the source first
As I have no doubt this has been reiterated a countless amount of times, but there's NO RULES to editing/mixing audio! There's practical reasons, and pros & cons inherent to every strategy of approaching audio production, but it will always come down to what SOUNDS GOOD! Always ask yourself, "What do my ears tell me??"
11:50 Lip reading skills required...😎
Vip only members can hear it 😅
The last cut you made around 500Hz made it sound so sweet! It cleaned up some of the grit & made it sound more like a true bass.
I'd have to say I learn by far the best from you than any other youtuber, the way you explain the material is just clear.
Hey Joe! Having mixed bass guitars countless times, I always loving clicking on videos like these to try and get out of my own tendencies and try new methods and thought processes. I can easily admit - sometimes it is so easy to get caught up in all of the minute details that I forget that mixing is supposed to be fun and expressive! Thanks for teaching throughout the years, and always subconsciously teaching to always enjoy what you do. It's helping at least one person out here.
Wow.... I was just talking to my brother about what I needed to add on a beat I am working on and he said it needed more bass.... Thats wild how this video came up without me even searching...... You just gained a subscriber....
top 2 Joes in my life right here. Thank you Joe
Hey joe grat advise! Wise too!!!
What i do is play real hard with pick close to the bridge to get the full and controled wave and then compress the hell out of it while the mix is playing. Bass is the last instrument. First kick snare then gtrs vocals panning then bass. I use bass as the glue.
Youll notice in motown records that gtrs vocals and violins etc may sound good but the queen of spades is always bassline clarity.
Love joe!
I love a good smashed bass too :)
Joe, you are such a great teacher. I learned so much from you. Thanks
I'm your fan Joe!
Thanks Joe, keep up the energy, I love it.
Excellent video and advice as usual, brutha! I particularly like the part where you throw your voice so far out into space that it hasn't returned to our ears yet. That must be part of the VIP course. Hehe, hope you and yours are well!
That's a hearing test 😆
Hey Joe. I'm glad that you made the comment 13:00 about the bass sounding too loud. I'm watching this while listening thru studio headphones and the bass actually sounds good to me. I think the bass players should get to shine more too. So there's that.
Also, for the 100th commented time,...did you or did you not say anything significant or profound between the 11:50 and 12:11 mark? LOL! I wasn't going to address it after all the previous clever comments about it; but you know we tend to hang on to follow you like that scene in Forrest Gump when he ran cross country and crowds of people ran with him.
Beeing a Bass player, I love your love for the bass;)
Guess you're giving a speedy short lip reading course also at 12 minutes 🤪. Great stuff overall in a quick vid Joe, because I wanted to mix down some bass parts next few days.
My ex bass player is THE dude in Austin Tx! He played on my first self produced cd… couldn’t get him for the 2nd cd so I played bass! He heard it and is still supporting my efforts 🌝…due to current reality I’m at it again. The bass I used on the last cd was an ancient fender acoustic. It has a super gritty sound. Not the best for everything…. So I’m borrowing a bass to track. Please wish me luck since I’m engineering, performing and praying.
Joe why is your bass track stereo?
Merry Christmas y’all!
Cheers to the Family.... what would we be without it. ✌️💕😊
its 4am and I'm having trouble mixing the bass... go to joe!! love your videos dude!
Hi Mr Joe, I'm so delighted to have subscribed to your channel, u r such a great teacher, your rules of compression is still ringing in my head
More wins
Yes, thank you for sharing your knowledge . I appreciate you sir. 👍🏼
Capo Joe. Saludos desde Argentina
Jajsajsh es un mundo pequeño amigo!!
Tenes ig? Pasalo man asiscuchamos!
what happened to the audio at the 11:35 mark?
Very helpful as always! Thank you Mr. Gilder!
Nice job, Joe. So helpful. Thank you :)
3rd time upload coming? The 11:50 to 12:12 mute is brilliant. :D
When in doubt, mute it out
i have been learning a lot from your videos... thanks a lot... God bless you...
Never stop learning :)
Thank you so much Joe!
Hi Joe, I hope you can find my message here after two years, thank you for this wonderful video and tutorial, I'm using Mooer GE-200 as my audio interface and after recording my guitar and bass, the waveform is different with other audio interface like Focusrite, ...., my waveform is fully occupied the track, is that because of GE-200?
Hey at 11:52, your voice isn't there at all, I see you speaking, but no audio at all. Guess you'll have to refilm it again. xD
I think he explained the concept after he realize he was muted XD
It was actually the best advice you could get for mixing bass
Third time's the charm
@@joeseabreeze true...especially because he solved three months of me *starting to try to figure out where the input gain adjustment is and getting distracted before I find it*
Happy new year Joe thankyou for you help in 2020 regards Stephen Fell
After 20 years of doing this job I always have the same "problem", where is the line that separates too thin and too thick when it comes to low frequencies.
There are many great mixes out there, some of them being really thin, others really thick so there is no general rule about this as it all depends of the context, that is why I do not like using a referent song while mixing, such a misleading strategy.
The main issue is how to choose whether to turn the volume up for the low frequency instruments (kick and bass), or to add more low frequencies with the EQ, two very different approaches.
Still searching for a sweet spot though. 😃
Have no idea what you said around 12:00 🤷♂️😂
He was talking to the raccoons, telling them to plug the cables back in.
Yes, this was the most brilliant thing he ever told. Too bad the cable was off :P
It's a lip reading test. Also part of the mix challenge.
recently I started using studio one 5,but I am not a musician,basically electronics and audio.
my daughter is doing music with yamaha psr I455 ,and I am trying EQ of bass guitar,noiw I got the idea !
Nice video..thanks joe..
Excellent, thanks for the tips!
Awesome.. thanks.. as always... Btw.. audio dropped at around 11:46 for a few seconds... fyi
hi Joe will you pls repost this video with the good audio around 12:00? really appreciate that!!
Man... I love the bass up alittle too loud too.
Hi Joe, Nice video but I would be very interested in hearing what your bass player said in relation to the changes that you had made. Couple of things from my perspective, probably wrong. 1: when you bring up the 50 - 80 Hz bass you’re going to potentially clash with the bass drum, and two it would be interesting to know if he feels you’ve taken away his mid range, let me know?
This!!!
Big Thanks!!
Very helpful video. I'm mixing a song and about to mix the bass track when I discovered this.
One (tangential) question: I don't see the input gain / polarity controls at the top of any of my channels. I've tried to figure out how to make them visible and can't. I've been messing with clip gain & clip gain envelopes to boost sound levels for a track. Using input gain might be a better method if I can find it. Thanks.
The stereo bass track is triggering me.
Hmm.. When should you normalize audio vs using the trim?
Using Only EQ and Compression is enough plug-ins for bass guitars? I’m fairly new to producing and I am having troubles with my low end mixing
You need saturation and the most important multiband compressor
you are good bro
Great video. I loved the whistle-esque high melody on the track. What Patch is that?
broooo joe
i love your fender amp behind you
is that a champ?
i got a tiny one just like yours
except my sounds like it’s got a broken speaker (although i replaced it with a new one) lol
cool
Joe, is Bass mixed in mono or its better stereo, I have a romantic track which is mainly piano, cello live , and bass played with midi and some deep electro beats as an ambient. Is it better to mix the bass in the default stereo mode or to change it to mono ??!!
Most applications you want to keep bass out of your stereo field because this can cause mud. Bass, kicks, snares and vocals should normally be mono.
Hey, Joe awesome vids, I wonder, whats that buzzing fres ? Should that be taken out? in the bass
Dont think so!
Youhou!
3:28 Watch out for the raccoons Joe!!!! lmao
awesome...iv been mixing bass this week.i can't make it comprressed in balance..bass like funky and slaps have high notes and low , soft and hard attacks..tonal balance plugin shows under compressed but ocassionally over compressed.i did automate..what am i missing?
Why not separate the loudest slaps and pops into another track, compress and treat each track appropriately then bus them together?
@@joelonsdale thanks for the suggestion.but it's inseperable .it's all messed up in short phrases .
@@driftingmelodies It's edit time! Anything is possible in digital audio!
Maybe you need a Dynamic EQ so you can compress certain frequencies only when those particular frequencies cross the threshold. That way everything outside of those particular frequencies won't be compressed.
You could also try going into a tape saturation plugin on a darker sounding tape format. Play with the input level until the bass transients start to saturate and you might find it rounds off the problem spikes just enough for a standard compressor to start making a better job of the rest. I would then parallel compress it - set a first compressor to deal with the average volume of the playing (the pops will overcompress) then set the mix to 50/50, now add a second compressor to deal with the pops (the average will undercompress) and set that to mix to 50/50 too. You have to dig deep with problem audio, there is rarely a magic plugin that will solve all your problems! Lots of small steps will sound better than one processor going bananas...
i have a question mr.gilder . can you explain about key filter on fat chnnel? i can't understand perfectly about it.
Wouldn't it have been possible to put another click track out of phase on top to save the original track?
Do you really think mixing the bass like this to increase the low end better than layering the bass parts with a separate sub bass?
I was thinking parallel compression / eq on a duplicated track would work well on this bass part...it's quite a one dimensional sound in a single track
Yes. Complicated doesn't mean better.
@@JohnnyF71 Yup that could work but don't you think layering a separate sub bass would be the best option?
@@sweetsilversongmusic so you are saying both are equally good ways?
@@SadhanaKhawas it may well do yes. Was just thinking the original bass line is so bass-light that something closer to its original frequency might be more in keeping with the kind of tune it is while also giving a bit more bottom end
Hey Joe! What did you mean when you said pushing the fader up changes the resolution of the track? I don't think I've ever heard anyone talk about that. Thanks!
He's referring to the resolution of the fader itself, not the track. It's easier to make small adjustments when the fader is positioned around the 0 mark.
Thank you for the bassist shoutout at the end
Yeah you made it sound great. And that's a good bass track for this video too. 'Cause if the guy played a Precision instead of a Jazz you wouldn't've had to do all that, and then you wouldn't've had a video! (But be kind, don't let the bass player see my comment.)
In my experience the best bass sound you get by using a Fender Precision played with fingers.
Why is the Bass in stereo on two channels?
Often when I record bass (And Synth Keys) one or two low notes are visibly louder. The low note is great and I am concerned that compression will shape that low note such that it loses it's timbre. How do you address that and make the other notes fatter?
try using a multiband compressor as opposed to a traditional compressor! This way, you can focus the compression on the low end and low mid freq bands independently, giving you the luxury of controlling how much low end, low mids, and/or whichever frequency band needs to be more (or less!!) present in the mix!
Sometimes bass notes resonate at certain frequencies, making them sound louder. I often notice this around 100hz. I put a dynamic EQ there to cut that frequency when it gets too loud, without affecting that harmonic on other notes.
Now you have to do it... again
Is it me or the bass is clipping from the recording?
Also, why to play a bass line with the bridge pickup, that provides a lot of wonderfull mid range and crispiness to finally take the mid range frcuencies in the mixing?
All in all, I should have recorded the bass line again.
11:49 Whadya say Joe?!!
You missed it? It was probably the best bass mixing advice I've ever heard
1:26 How to Mix #Bass
Thank you Joe 😒
1:30
Should have got it right at the source
Now I'm confused...you have half the internet saying that just turning up the bass is not the way to do things and now you're saying that just turning the bass up is a good thing. Uhm....
At 12 mins volume went off, sadly
It's the pick. Lost the low end.
It's a thing apparently.
I’m deaf at 11:50 it’s Tanner again
6:15 Don't let Davie504 find out!
Not epicc
Slappd 'like' anyway ;-)
ghost
You did not mention anything about the order of your plugins. Usually, EQ is after compression. Why are they reversed?
I'd like Joe to address this as well because in my experience EQ often is applied before compression, to specifically avoid compressing (and possibly boosting into the mix) unwanted frequencies.
Ahh yes the old question: do I EQ before compression or compress before EQ 🤔
It’s purely up to the material - if you find the source is too uneven in dynamics there would be nothing wrong with levelling out the source first
Sometimes I have EQs on both sides :)
As I have no doubt this has been reiterated a countless amount of times, but there's NO RULES to editing/mixing audio! There's practical reasons, and pros & cons inherent to every strategy of approaching audio production, but it will always come down to what SOUNDS GOOD! Always ask yourself, "What do my ears tell me??"
@@hendrix5757 Yes
Wouldn't it be far more entertaining for everyone to intentionally ignore the muted audio issue? Hehe
😂
I liked it more before the 500 hz cut, to be honest.
Alas I have had to suspend my vip membership as I no longer have an income ☹️
:(
2.38 seconds of talking and no work. Maybe I come back next time and watch.👍
Your loss.
talks a lot, does little
Joe, you are such a great teacher. I learned so much from you. Thanks