If there is anything that you may need while your here I can help.
Cheers
Slawie
p.s. I have a couple of basses I would like you to try.
75-251 4string fretless and my build 5 string fretless

Thanks for the offer Slawie, very kind of you.  And a couple nice looking basses you've got there. 

Touring in pandemic times is awkward because we're all instructed to limit our exposure to others.  No backstage guests, avoid restaurants, bars and crowds...  Ironic as the whole reason for a concert is to gather a crowd.    I don't know what the rules will be for us this time around so we'll have to take it as it comes.  Maybe at least I'll have the opportunity to say hello and talk about low notes.

Cheers,
Jimmy J

No worries Jimmy fully understand.
I'll wave to you from the crowd.
I'll be wearing an Alembic t-shirt
Cheers
Slawie

Jimmy,
I hope the road has been good and the whole team-and community here- has been happy and healthy since your last post.

I was forced to go through all my CDs/DVDs/BD's/vinyl a few weeks ago (repurposing a walk-in closet into a vocal booth), and have been rediscovering some stuff I hadn't been able to listen to for a minute. Lots of beautiful stuff there where your discography is concerned. With all that being said, it's time to treat myself to some new music.

Have you done any recording projects in the last year or two that are currently available? I know you don't like to blow your own horn, but it ain't bragging if we ask;)
Best,
Ed V

Hey Ed,

A vocal booth for Mary right?  We're all making music remotely now without ever seeing one another.    I'm not complaining, I actually enjoy working from home and spending as much time as I want dialing in the bass parts as I see fit.  It's a different kind of challenge, making it sound like the band is playing together.  But it's still music and some great things can and do happen.  Plus I'm enough of a nerd to enjoy the audio manipulation side of things as it applies to the bass track - although not talented enough to actually mix anything.

Anyway, thanks for asking but as you know I don't usually talk about it so I won't.    I'm happy to still be invited to play on some fun musical projects.  Life has been, and still is, mighty good!

Carry on now!
Jimmy J

Well... how about a little tutorial on how you go about tracking your bass parts? That's actually something I'd given a couple thoughts to trying, once I had time, and not daily distraction. Care to dish on a little audio gear, other than your bass?

Sure, gear talk anytime.  Here comes WAY more than anybody needs to know...

Protools is my DAW and has been for years.  Mostly because that's what I saw being used in most studios.  And I am not much of a composer so rarely working with midi as there is better software for that.  I also do all my work in headphones.  AKG K702s at home and my Ultimate Ears Reference IEMs on the road.

My home rig looks like this:  I run the basses at nearly line level directly from the DS-5 into a REDDI DI box.  From there XLR out into a Burl Audio B2 Bomber ADC.  The digital signal then travels via AES cable into an Avid Omni (along with a clocking signal from the Burl via BNC cable).  The Omni is connected to an Avid HD Native Thunderbolt box and TB cable into my MacBookPro.

On the road it's DS-5 into an Apogee Duet 3 and directly into the MBPro.

I can't really say how much all these individual pieces have to do with the final result but that's my current collection. As an example of what I mean ... I have occasionally done a track for somebody on the road (road bass through Apogee converter) and then gotten home and replaced notes, bars, or complete sections using my recording bass and home rig.  And nobody has ever noticed the difference.

So I have ProTools templates in 96k, 48k, and 44.1k.  These consist of a click track, five bass tracks, and one "comp" track.  I'll take any kind of files from the artist but prefer wav "stems", meaning separate tracks of drums, guitars, etc. if possible.  That way I can listen closely to what everybody is doing. 

If I get a bunch of stems at 48k I'll start a new session from my 48k template, rename it the song title, save it to and external SSD in a folder with the Artist's name, then "import" all the audio they've sent me into my session.  I'll match my click to the audio and listen down while adding some markers for V, CH, bridge, solos, etc.  Then I'll start playing along, usually fumble through 5 full passes while I'm kinda learning the song. 

At that point I'll start picking bits and pieces of whatever happened which I like and copy those moments down to my "comp" track.  I try to use my full run throughs as kind of guides to an overall shape.  Once I decide which version of any particular section I prefer I will often work on just that moment until I get it the way I want it.

My method goes on for quite some time ... and often means coming back the next day to see how it all hits me listening with fresh ears.  I also spend quite a bit of time shifting notes around in time, trimming levels of individual clips to even it all out, and always watching the tuner to be sure I'm in the ballpark.  (I built a signal switcher so my Korg DTR-1 tuner is either seeing the REDDI's parallel input jack or the audio from my 6 ProTools tracks which is routed to one of the Omni's outputs.)

The end result of all this is a "comp" track that looks like a total patchwork of edits.  I'd be embarrassed to show it to anybody because I edit the living daylights out of it!  But I know how to make it all work together and sound the way I want so that's my method.

Now I solo the bass track and listen loud to be sure my edits and crossfades all work.  Then I record a moment of no sound at the beginning of my comp track, duplicate the track and rename it, then "select all" clips in the newly duplicated track and "consolidate" it which turns it into one long wav file. 

I upload a copy of the resulting wav file to a folder in my DropBox, "copy DropBox link" (a direct link to that folder) and email that link to the Artist.

If all goes well they download my file, import it into their session and it syncs right up.  I used to kind of casually say "yeah I do some of that kind of work" but I am surprised to realize that I've done almost 400 projects this way over the past 17 years.  Yikes!!

Whew, sorry about the lengthy post! 

Jimmy J

Thanks for the information, Jimmy. I'm glad to see a similar pattern of working on some of the projects I am currently doing.

Quote from: JimmyJ on August 01, 2024, 10:40:22 PM
Sure, gear talk anytime.  Here comes WAY more than anybody needs to know...
[snip]
Whew, sorry about the lengthy post! 

Jimmy J

That was actually a great read this morning... sure beats deleting yesterday's status reports and today's adminispam! Only trouble is, now I've got a a hundred more questions. I'll do a good re-read and some research on some of this info.


Most of the recording I ever get to do anymore is with this drummer-buddy who runs a little multimedia outfit from home. He does run Protools, I know just from watching and paying attention. We always struggle to get the level right on my Series bass. I am woefully ignorant of what happens beyond my DS-5 but I know we sent the summed mono from it to a Demeter tube preamp with a pretty decent DI. (Jensen maybe?) I need to interview him a little to understand more about what happens beyond that, because I really want to record more up there without the drama. Eventually there's another Series bass with Series II controls headed my way...

Further questions are welcome, that's a lot of info I just laid out there...

Your pal's Demeter should sound good.  The thing to remember about our Series instruments is that the output level has no effect on the overall tone.  So you can turn down your master volume (or both individual pickup volumes) until the Demeter is happy without losing any of that big Alembic sound.  Once you find a good level make a note of it so you can put it there every time you go over to play.  I've got little tape marks on my recording bass and actually had them inlaid on my live bass (see below) for reference.  My lower mark is in case somebody is expecting a "normal" bass input level.   

Jimmy J

.  oops

Thanks Jimmy; I enjoyed reading about your recording process!

Jimmy, thanks for posting all of that information, that's quite an involved process! You must have to be pretty proficient at software and hardware to record nowadays.  Just wondering, what is the difference between your road bass and studio recording bass?  Thanks, Rob

Just like MS Office or any other software, you get used to it the more you use it and you find shortcuts and tricks as you go.  I was surprised when I thought about how long I'd been doing this "at home" work for the above post.     

So I have 3 "identical" 5-string fretted Series II basses.  Same physical measurements, woods, strings, electronics, etc.  But they're all 3 slightly different animals - at least to me. 

My studio bass, which stays home these days, has what I think is the nicest overall tone.  My road bass has a slightly stronger low-B string but also a slightly darker overall sound than the studio machine.  And #3 comes on the road with me as an emergency backup and when home serves as a practice bass.  That one is my least favorite of the 3 and I'm not sure I can describe why - it just sounds kinda stuffy...  I don't think I've ever used that bass on a recording.

So while I can identify the studio vs the road bass if I listen to them "soloed" in the track they pretty much just sound like me.

Cheers,
Jimmy J

Thanks for the background, very cool. I wonder if a new potentiometer with slightly higher value would clear up the stuffiness in #3?