Compressor setting for direct bass

What is the threshold, attack and release setting you most often use when recording bass direct?
I am learning about these settings,

I want the attack of the bass to come through so the bass seems punchy and not too flat but then want a fairly consistent level so I can hear all the notes.

I have found that a 4:1 ratio helps this more than a 10:1.

Your thoughts?

Rimshot

There are no correct answers really, other than 'it depends'. Arguably one of the most used compressors out there, the 1176, has a longest attack of 80 *microseconds*, which is very fast even at its slowest. And it works great on bass, one of the best bass comps ever for more aggressive rock bass. And plenty of great engineers wouldn't hesitate to use pretty high ratios on bass, or to commit to the full compression during the tracking. 10dB of compression at the peaks on more aggressive stuff wouldn't be unusual in such cases. For slower, quieter music you can often use much slower attacks and much lower compression, but it all depends. No matter what anyone says here, there's someone out there more famous than them who does it differently. And it's going to be very dependent on the type of music. In some cases as much of the punch may come from the kick in conjunction with the bass. And even a pretty good bit of compression with fast attack may not really remove too much punch anyway. It all just depends on the circumstances. Is it long and sustained notes or really attacky type notes, all that kind of stuff.
 
Ultimately you will just have to figure out what works for you with a given player, bass, type of music, and comp. I know it sucks but it's kind of the bottom line.
 

"Higher ratios (with lots of GR) produce a smaller sound. (ie you need more volume of this in your final mix) Lower ratios (with less GR) produce a bigger sound. (ie you need less volume of this in your final mix in order to still hear it well)"
 
But, there again, it depends. If what you want is a really long, sustained bass sound, and that's not uncommon in various genres for some types of songs, then lots of gain reduction will provide that, and that's what makes it hearable in the way you want it heard without having a massive, clipping peak on the initial note. You need that much GR in order to have the trailing ends of the notes brought up for lots of sustain. If you were mic'ing an amp, you might get that effect by cranking the amp up really loud, which effectively compresses the signal. For DI'd bass, the compressor is a way to make that happen.
 
And it does create a very big bass sound if you do that. Though, it also means that the bass has to be a very featured instrument because it's going to be taking up a lot of space. But that's not uncommon in rock music.
 
If you are depending on the initial impact of the bass, and not the sustain, then yeh, you don't want to choke it with too much GR. You might use a high ratio but keep the threshold up, so that it's more there to catch the occasional over-loud note, not so much for an effect. But, again, as I mentioned, if it's a situation where you have a tight kick/bass, the kick may be providing a lot of the impact, and heavy compression with a fast release may serve to keep the impact of the bass from stepping on the impact of the kick, leaving the rest of the bass note to then trail after it.
 
I posted an example of this the other day over in the how to record DI bass thing. It's the bed track for a new tune I'm working on. The bass is heavily compressed, but it sounds super-punchy because I worked really hard to learn the bass part so that it's dead on the kick drum all the way through. Well, not inhumanly dead on as would more likely be the case these days, where each part would be edited to death to be microscopically (and I say boringly) together. But, you get the point. It's sounds really punchy because the kick is providing the punch, and the kick and bass have tones that work together well, and the bass' initial impact is quite muted due to compression so it doesn't fight the kick. It's a combination that works well for this particular style of rhythm section.
 
http://www.charmedquark.com/Web2/TmpAudio/TestD.wma
 
And the compression gives a bit more sustain to a tone that would otherwise die out too quickly because it's not a heavily over-driven tone, just a somewhat overdriven tone. I'm not going for the massive, uber-sustained bass type thing here, but the kick/bass are very featured instruments so I wanted the bass to fill in between the often fairly widely spaced kick/bass hits, without being overpowering, which I think it's doing pretty nicely, though it does involve a pretty considerable amount of compression. And it was done with a pedal on the way in (while it's all still fully analog), so no more is required in the mix, and the less processing done ITB (IMO), the better.
 
There are obvious reasons why someone recording another bad would be light handed on compressing on the way in, because it can't be undone and they are doing it for money and don't want to have to do it again. But, for self-recorders, I don't get the point of not learning how to commit up front and commit to compression, EQ, and even effects. It used to be common to do this, and I think it creates a lot more 'happy accidents' that lend uniqueness to music, as opposed to the modern trend of everything sounding exactly tuned, exactly timed, exactly sample replaced, etc...
 

The bass isn't too loud in the mix, the mix isn't there now. When the rest is there, then the level you'd play it at would end up making the bass lower in volume relatively speaking. But the bass and kick are featured instruments in this tune, so they are very purposefully quite present.
 
The bass is overdriven on purpose as well, which is why you hear the distortion, it's not the compressor. And the fact that the bass is heavily compressed has nothing to do with the final level of dynamics on the overall mix. The issue isn't compression of specific tracks within the mix, it's the compression of EVERYTHING and then massively limiting the whole mix on top of that. The drums are very punchy and only modestly compressed, so the dynamics of this example are already way more than the average these days.
 
I'm not trying to hide anything. The bass is going to be, as I said, a very featured instrument. The other stuff is going to be either fairly back in the mix, like the organ, or fairly sparse and rhythmic, like the piano, so the bass is going to be what's keeping it a lot of the time from sounding too empty. And they will be quite frequency constrained as the piano is, so the bass is really going to be providing a lot of the frequency content.
 

Squishing a single track isn't going to affect the overall dynamics of the final result. This is why we always end up butting heads. You have these apparent rules which you want to apply to everything, though they are only actually applicable in specific circumstances. That track I posted is very punchy and dynamic, because only one of the core tracks is heavily compressed. The overall dynamics of a track depend on the overall combination of what makes it up. It's been not at all unusual since the 70s to have some tracks heavily compressed and others much less so, because it provides a desired result. That's what I'm doing in the track I posted, for the reasons I enumerated. The drums are quite uncompressed by modern standards, and they are doing one job (maintaining punch) while the bass is because it's doing another job (providing a foundational tone for everything else to sit on top of without the initial attack competing with the kick.)
 
And this is a high energy, pop-rock type of song, which though I'm certainly not going to squash it (and won't do anything on the master bus most likely), it's supposed to sound punchy, but constrained. It's not supposed to sound like a singer/songwriter track. 
 
The right tool for the right job. No one set of rules applies to everything, which was my whole point in the my original response. You seem to have a tendency to want to apply a fixed set of rules, which is where we've butted heads in the past as well. But there are no fixed rules that work for everything.
 
Unfortunately, I can't hear anything on Soundcloud because I don't allow tracking cookies in my browser and Soundcloud shares your information with various other companies. If you don't allow them to do that, the player won't play.

Certainly listening to good mixes is useful. I have a good CD collection, and I study songs in my collection regularly.

Rimshot, here's my opinion for what it's worth.
 
There are no starting points to use because of so many factors man.
 
1. The bass used
2. The player and how they execute (meaning, how hard the pull, fretting, cleanliness, sloppiness etc)
3. Pick, felt pick, fingers or pop/slap
4. The action of the bass
5. The pick-up height
6. Is the sound driven like Dean's or smooth like Jeff's
7. Amount of eq used (example, more low end will require more compression the same as more high end percussiveness. The more smooth and neutral, the less compression)
 
All the above stuff will dictate how to set your compressor. For someone that knows how to play, you'll need less compression. For example, in Jeff's piece, I'd guess the ratio is probably around 3:1 taking a wild guess. You can tell the bass sound is beautiful and what *I* personally strive for in my bass tones. No drive, it's clean, it's precise and there is enough percussiveness in the tone as well as good low end that works with the kick drum. (excellent mix Jeff)
 
In a sound like Dean's, the drive usually adds some compression to the sound so you may not need much...however, some feel the need to squash the sound good for effects purposes. I personally do not like driven bass sounds like that because to me, they just sound un-natural and like a bass synth. That's no offense to Dean...it's just not a bass sound I like when people come to me and go for something like that. It is a common sound of "today" though...but the compression used will depend on how you (Rimshot) decide to drive it. That said, he's nailed the "now" bass sound and has done it well to where it's not sub low and a problem child. (Well done Dean.)
 
Now, if we had a pop/slap type song going on, everything in the game changes. You will use way different attack, release, threshold and ratios on a bass like that. There is so much force on a pop/slap that the eq plays a vital role in the outcome as well as the compressor. So as you can see, it's near impossible to even have a starting point for any of this because there are just so many variables that make up a bass sound. It's just one of those instruments that is a per experience type of deal in my opinion, Rimshot. Best of luck.
 
-Danny

Just want to mention something about synth bass. There is that type of synth bass that has every note plucked at a precise volume with each ADSR being exact etc. Filter ADSR or attack transient the same for every note. But not all synth bases are like that though. The other is the type of bass sound with huge dynamics. I have a new Kurzweil synth with the most amazing bass sounds (electric and synth bases) and massive dynamic ranges have been programmed in and the sound can now continually change depending on how hard you hit the keys. All very exciting to play so synth sounds can go into live bass playing territory now that is all I am saying. (dynamically at least) The good thing about synth programming like that is you can create the compression within the sound itself by limiting ranges here and there. Editing note velocities is important here too.
 
Heavily compressed bass sounds can have a form of repetition to them in terms of dynamics. But that sometimes works really well too in the Aggressive Hip Hop Dubstep bass drops concept! That sort of sound can sit really well into a hard full on mix. I find automating heavily compressed bass sounds can work very well too.
 
 

I made some good progress mixing my latest song today. I set the compressor at 4.1 and did not push it hard at all. I then put a limiter after it and was much happier with the punch.
I have been squeezing it way too much while playing live bass.
Thanks all for your great input. It helps.
Listen to my new song and tell me what you think.
https://soundcloud.com/ji...en-i-will-sing-for-you


Rimshot

Hi Danny. Much thanks for the listen. I will try that.

Jimmy