This week it was my turn to perform. That’s right. It’s bass time!
Having recorded the drums last week, we needed to add an actual bass track, rather than the guide track which already existed. I had brought in my own amplifier to do the recording, which we hooked up to a speaker cabinet that was already in the dead room. After getting everything wired up correctly, making sure that we had some sound, we needed to mic up the cab. We did this using both an AKG D112 and a Beyerdynamic M201. We also used a DI Box (Direct Input) which would record the raw sound straight from my bass, rather than the sound which had been processed through my amplifier.
After we get the levels set correctly for all three inputs, we just needed to get a good mix of mic and DI. In the end we decided to not use the D112, as the majority of the group preferred the sound. After getting a good balance between the inputs, we decided to run the bass through a compressor which is used to make the dynamic range of the sound more even. Raising the volume softer sounds, and lowering the volume of the more aggressive sounds. Much like last week, having two inputs on one sound source gave the potential to produce some phase issues, however there weren’t any at all. We flipped the phase anyway to see what effect would be generated, and most of the low frequencies disappeared, unlike last week when flipping the phase generated more low frequencies.
Once we were all set up, we managed to record the bass in one take. However, as there were some mistakes in just a few bars, there was no point recording the entire track again so we just recorded over those specific bars by dropping in and dropping out.
Next week it’s guitar time, which should hopefully be just as simple to record!
– Anthony