Mr. McCue revealed one of his techniques regarding bass in another thread, maybe it would help here.

He runs his bass tracks through pitch correction. I think (iirc) he said he used Melodyne.

Something about the bass sitting in the mix better when he does that. It made sense in the thread. Just did a search on Google and I can't find the thread, sorry.

IIRC, it had something to do with the bass notes being slightly out of tune and clashing with other instruments. Sounds like it may help in the case.

I've been wanting to try it when I get my DAW hooked back up.

As for EQ Automation ... I do that a lot, especially on my vocals and acoustic guitar.

If it's just a single flubbed bass note, you can easily isolate it into it's own clip and use V-Vocal to correct it

Bristol_Jonesey

If it's just a single flubbed bass note, you can easily isolate it into it's own clip and use V-Vocal to correct it

That would work. When I do that, I snip the note out of the clip, apply trimming just to that little snippit, then enable V-Vocal.

You gotta do what you gotta do to get it right.

If needed... you can split the chord out as a clip and add a new track.... set up all the FX and routing the same.... then copy that clip into the new track... set the EQ or what ever FX you need to solve the clash and you should be good. 

You do know that you can automate some of the FX as well using envelopes ...right?  

I like the split clip new track thing and have used this very method for a number of different things.

if you have Melodyne Editor (not the cheap version like I have) then you can even manipulate individual notes of a chord, so even if it's the guitar, you can change notes in the guitar chord at that point.  if it's the bass that's off then as others have said, it's an easy fix with melodyne or v-vocal.

Beagle


if you have Melodyne Editor (not the cheap version like I have) then you can even manipulate individual notes of a chord, so even if it's the guitar, you can change notes in the guitar chord at that point.  if it's the bass that's off then as others have said, it's an easy fix with melodyne or v-vocal.

Reece, Melodyne has difficulty on a distorted guitar, too many harmonics going on (at least for me). Now if you have a clean track and you're applying an amp sim, yeah, you can generally fix a chord. I'm assuming Rain is using his new amp though.

The bass note is actually right on spot, everything is in tune - both the guitars and the bass hit the same D flat.

Hitting that note higher on the bass would probably make the whole thing sound a bit weak and wouldn't work in that context. Lower, well I'd need a 5 strings. Plus, the guitars and bass need to come together at that particular point.

The bass all by itself works relatively fine - nothing unusual. Same for the guitar - I mean there is a bit more energy/resonance on that chord, but it's not unless you combine both bass and guitar that it all goes woooomf. 


Because that D flat sounds a bit fuller on the bass and the guitars have more resonance in the low mids. 

I have a hi pass on the guitars set at around 120 IIRC, and a dip in the bass somewhere between 120 and 200. That was the best "compromise" to make room for both and that balance works well for the song - but for that one chord.

But the more I think about it, the more I realize that the song probably calls for spot automation, structurally speaking.

The verses are very sparse and consist of drums, bass, and a harpsichord - so the bass needs to fill quite a bit of space to glue everything.

The bridge and chorus are much more dense - bass shifts to 16th notes, the double bass drum pattern kicks in and the guitars - 4 tracks of hi gain stuff.

Actually, it's almost surprising that I managed to find a basic static EQ set up for the bass which would (almost) work throughout the song. :s

This is interesting Rain especially if all the notes and chords etc are correct. It seems like it is on of those things where there must be some harmonics and energy present in both the guitar and bass that on their own sound perfectly fine but together are creating some extra energy somewhere.

Just had a thought too. Put a spectrum, analyser on both of those things individually and together as well. It might give a clue as to where the excess energy is coming from.

Sounds like spot EQ automation is going to be the answer in this case.

Yep. Well they do sound fine on their own and manageable in context if one of them is muted. 

I was familiar w/ the occasional louder note on the bass (perceived loudness), but in this case, it's one of those occasions where both the guitar (or I should probably say amp/cab) and bass exhibit the most density in the same spot. 

Eq'ing the bass wouldn't fix but a few seconds sweeping between 160 and 200 on the guitar and the oooomf vanished. 

I'm guessing that using a different amp or cab or maybe just a different pick up - or more or less gain - could have resulted in something entirely different.