John O'Callaghan's bass!

[gregaaron89]

I've heard that bass should always been told that bass should always remain mono for many reasons. That it prevents phasing, it creates an upfront feeling in a mix, anything other than mono is really bad for playing in a club because it's disorienting, that the human ear has trouble distinguishing the direction of low frequencies in an open environment (rather than through headphones), etc. Some of those I might of pulled out of my ass but I swear I think I've heard them somewhere.

Now I do hear plenty of stereo basses but I assumed the formula was this: You either have a totally mono bass or you have a 2 part bass, the sub bass and the bass. You keep the sub bass 100% mono (of course) and the bass you can give more stereo freedom. The higher the frequency the wider you can pan it. Pads, synths, high hats, and stuff like that are panned widely. Songs with widely panned low frequencies usually really bother me through headphones. To get an idea of what I'm talking about, I consider this song to have a standard stereo field and represent the above formula perfectly.

BUT! I've been listening to some of John O'Callaghan's stuff and I'm wondering, what the hell does he do with his bass?! It's huge! His songs are like 90% bass and it's VERY stereo. Sounds like it's completely surrounding you. In fact it seems to be lacking a bit in the middle and the kick fills up the space there. It's not just the higher bass either, it seems to be all of it, even the sub, is pushed off to the sides? Here listen to this song The way he mixes is like totally different from anyone else's. He doesn't follow the formula I wrote above. He does the opposite. In fact the higher frequencies are more or less pushed towards the CENTER. He's breaking like every rule I use to try to give my songs a good stereo field, but it sounds so freaking GOOD.

When you compare the two songs, it's obvious how very different the two mixes are! Like night and day! Which do you prefer?

So what is going on here?! How does he prevent phasing? I can't even prevent phasing with a 100% mono bass! How do I get the bass this huge? What am I doing wrong? What SHOULD you do with bass?

[gregaaron89]

Holy fuck I should proofread better. Make that horrible first sentence:

"I've heard many times that bass should always remain mono for many reasons. "

[AlexCo]

IMO He just EQ's really well. So the Frequencies don't clash. Maybe you could clone the bass and Assign it to two different Inserts on a mixer, pan one clone say 50% left and the other 50% right, with a mono sub under it.

Just a few idea's, but It's probably hella more complicated than that.

I prefer the Rolling Basslines or simple Sidechained ones in House and Trance anyway. C:

[gregaaron89]

At 7/4/09 10:35 AM, AlexCo wrote: IMO He just EQ's really well. So the Frequencies don't clash. Maybe you could clone the bass and Assign it to two different Inserts on a mixer, pan one clone say 50% left and the other 50% right, with a mono sub under it.

Just a few idea's, but It's probably hella more complicated than that.

I wish I could just ask him myself :C

[Rig]

From what I hear, he has a sub in mono and a stereoized saw-wave arp in the same octave. The saw wave has a high-pass filter on it, just enough so that it doesn't interfere with the sub. Try it out.

[Envy]

Also remember most pro songs have been mastered by a third party usually (when the album itself is mastered). So The quality of a track on an album can be different from before it's released (i got a pre-release rob mayth track and the quality is a huge difference)

But for the most part rig is right. It sounds like he has a sub bass in mono layered with another bass. Thats usually how I make basses when fooling around so you can get the fat feeling of the saw in stereo, while still having the deep bass given by the sub.

[Steven-Polley]

BAM

What now mother fuckers?

Alright, the multiband stereo imaging is the perfect tool for adding stereo width to your bass.

Throw that on the buss that your bass is routed to, and set the lower bands to mono, and slowly more stereo as you go up.

[Darren-M]

ok so for a long time i have conformed to the centered bass type, but the more and more music i hear today especially within electronica, i am hearing wide basses.

to get something like this sound i have started doing some new things. now yes it is true that making the bass more stereo can cause problems in the stereo field mixing and with eqing and stereo imaging. but you have to consider a few things.

the positions within the stereo field either left or right are specific locations, and when a sound is allocated or directed to its specific space the other sounds wont mess with it as much. this is also why we pan some things slight left and others slight right.

so if we apply this we could take something like a bass and pan it hard left and make a second channel for it and pan that one hard right, this keeps them wide but also out of the way. it gives you the big bass sound, and due to psycho acoustics we think it is centered. it still sounds mono but isnt.

be careful, dont do this for every instrument