Tim you are describing my youth. I barely play with electric guitarists anymore. Give me an acoustic player any day.

Davo

Seems a common feeling that one cab does it all, but for one reason or another everyone uses two.
Well YL is the icing on the cake, and he uses two ginormous cabs.

I couldn't see myself gigging in london with a 8x10 let alone 2x15 with the 8x10. That's just impossible to happen.

It was so neat the other night. I haven't done a gig without an electric guitarist for years. The difference playing with just violin and percussion was stunning. I used to do a lot more gigs without electric guitar.

Personally I manage with one cab. I'd add a second cab only to take the amp to 4 ohms and hence a dramatically higher wattage and volume but only rarely would this be useful. As I get older I seem to seek out quieter onstage set-ups (self preservation?).

Years ago I used to gig with a loud 8+ piece band in big theatres and other venues with just a small combo - that was a bit silly but we had our own sound engineer who travelled with us and ensured I got the room and onstage sound I wanted and having a small bass rig as possible helped make a better overall sound.

But I relied on that sound guy a lot!

Well, on a different side of things... let me say this about the subject of big cabinets...

Use of a large rig doesn't always mean you necessarily need to play it at ludicrous volumes. Sometimes it just looks cool to have a backline of big-ass cabinets. This, my friends, is what I call "The Aesthetics Of Rawk." I don't care who you are--those big-ass rigs just look sweet. The good thing is that those volume knobs go both up and down. The key is to be aware of the proper way to turn them in any given situation. And it is kinda nice to know you could blow the doors off of most any room if you wanted... but that's obviously not always necessary or wise.

And, not for nothing, but... for certain genres of music, you'd look kind of like a weenie playing through a 1x12 cab, regardless of how awesome it sounded.

Yeah, the big rigs are heavy and hard to lug around, but if I'm not complaining about my aching back and I do what the soundguy needs me to do with the volume, I don't see the problem with using one. If you think about it, my Ampeg 4x10 has pretty much the same footprint as my 6x10 and my 8x10, so it's not like I'm really taking up extra space onstage with the biggest one.

Two great things about multiple cabs or big tall cabs - the speakers are closer to your ears so you hear them better, the speakers are working less hard to produce a given SPL so there is less distortion.

Hence although one Acme Low-B2 would probably be fine for gigs, I've always used both of mine. Likewise the new cab I'm building is designed to get the speakers far enough off the ground and have much lower distortion at high SPL than typical cabs.

Alex

My favorite local bass player always has "The Fridge" (8-10)wherever he plays no matter how small the venue. He always sounds fab without being loud.
Now, I'm just a dumb hillbilly mind you but with both bands I'm in nobody likes bass in their monitor - myself probably least of all. I always bring enough to heat up the stage and let the sound man worry about the front. If the drmmer and guitarist can hear me the way they want and the soundman wants me to turn down, tough. He's there to reinforce the stage sound - not create it.

I'm with you on that, Matt. howzat? Phat!

Well, I played a show at a new venue last Friday night, and when I first fired up my rig it was wide open and almost blew us off the stage (man it sounded good!).. I then backed off my volume down to just enough you could hear me well by myself, and left the rest to the sound man..

We played the whole set, and I could have been playing "yankee doodle dandy" and not known any difference because I was so buried on stage..

After the set, I circulated among the crowd asking about the sound, and they all basically thought something was wrong because there was no bass at all from the house PA, and I had my rig turned down to allow the sound man to better control the FOH mix.. It's not that this place's pa wouldn't handle it. They had a nice PA, and the band that played after us had the bass just pounding out of the pa (same sound man!)..

My wife told me she only heard me on the clean parts, and even then it was pretty hard to make out. So I'm gonna work out some kind of signal system with her so she can give me a heads up that the bass is absent from the mix, and i'll crank up between songs to fill the void.. Or something..

Let us see:

One band had a good mix and another band had a bad mix.

1. Same soundman
2. Same PA
3. Same stage

Did you use your 8x10" and 2x15" cabinets? What did the other bass player use?

Yes.. But again they were turned down so low (post gain, pre was set normally) they weren't even providing good stage volume.

The other bassist was running a 1x15 and 2x10.. not sure on brand.. didn't look that hard.

And I wouldn't call their mix "good" as the bass was booming out of the pa, kinda over the top..

What was your EQ set like, both on your amplifier and on your bass?

Real world Report.

Blues and Rock

2-112 cabs and 400 watts were plenty loud with up to 3 guitarist, all using 4-10 Bassman amps. Drums, Keys and percussion too. All with no Pa support. Pa was vocals, bass drum , percussion , and Keys. Two gigs last week.

Sounds like the other band was playing a lot quieter on stage, allowing the sound man to actually mix the band.

Maybe the soundman liked the other bassist more. It is possible to make friends with the soundman and have a rational discussion with him. That can be very helpful in getting the sound mix that you want. Of course, if he says that the guitars are so loud in the room that he really can't do much, then the problem has nothing to do with you or him.

"I can't hear myself" is a common complaint. There is a certain singer who one of these days will find himself onstage in the middle of a song with no bass player because of that. In his case, "I can't hear myself" means that he can hear the rest of the band. His monitor is already turned up to an excruciating level, high enough so that no one else will go anywhere near it. If someone needs to be louder than everyone else in order to hear themselves, maybe that is the problem.

EQ on the head is always flat. Bass EQ is set with a slight boost to lows, slight cut to mids, and highs flat. Keep in mind this is a Smith, which is mid heavy already, so the tone I get from this isn't the scooped tone you would normally associate with these settings.

A slight boost and a slight cut wouldn't suggest a scoope tone. The problem could be the bass, actually.

Can you try to gig with a different one which may be better suited for live use in a band setting? The 2nd order harmonic that is so strong in a Fender-style bass usually works wonders for live use.

Another perfect example of a pissy or inattentive sound guy. Did you buy him a drink before your set? Rule #1 - schmooz the soundguy.
One of us will always try and talk to the soundguy before sets at showcases and let him know what he can expect from us - not what we expect from him, but very diplomatically we let him know what sound he is going to have to deal with. Consequently we have only been screwed over once. The guy tried to get me to turn down and when I wouldn't he just blared the bass until the crowd complained. Jerk.
Time is crucial at showcases and of course sound makes or breaks the crowds opinion. Any soundman worth his salt will let you set your stage levels (quickly) and have you dialed before the middle of the first song.
I was in a great band (The Modulators) who had a tech that went with us to all our festivals and showcases. We never had any problems and remarkably enough there was never a conflict between him and whoever was running the board for all the other bands. Most of the time they were gratefull to get a break.

Nothing cuts through the mix like that Smith.. Cutting through the mix is one place the Smith shines, but it has to be turned on to have any chance at cutting through.. I think he simply didn't have my channel running in the pa at all.. If he did, he had me running almost all the way down.

At our last gig on 12/29 the sound man had us mixed really well with the same gear, so I don't think the bass is the problem..

I couldn't buy the sound man a drink because this venue was owned by a church group or something.. no drinking, no smoking, no cursing.. etc..

That sounds like advertising copy. It makes the person stating such things sound like a fan-boy, even when they have vast experience gigging and using various equipment.

If it cut through the mix like that, you wouldn't have trouble hearing yourself on stage.

Sometimes cutting through the mix means staying away from the frequencies that other instruments are using. That's why the P bass that you hate has been successfully used on so many recordings.

Today's modern basses have a lot of highs which are right in the guitar range. As soon as the guitars start, those highs get covered up.

.....

I have no problem hearing myself at all if I use my amp at any respectable level on stage.. At those last 2 gigs I intentionally left the post gain turned down to sub solo practice levels. At the 2nd to last show the sound man did his thing and I was heard just fine.. At the last show, the sound man just never turned me up to any appreciable level.. I don't care what kind of bass you're playing, if your channel is turned off on the PA and you're not pumping out any real power on stage, you're not going to be heard in a metal band..

Maybe when you first fired up your rig and nearly blew everybody off the stage you created a bad first impression with the sound guy. Even if you turned it down after that, he probably thought...

"what a tosser! I'm going to bury him"

...that's what I would have thought.

And by the way......



I'm betting you're the only one that thought so.

yourlord:

I think there have been some legitimate questions asked and some possible solutions proposed. If the goal is to solve a problem (not being heard), then perhaps disattaching yourself from some absolute beliefs (e.g., the Smith shines at cutting through -- which really depends on instrumentation, how others are EQ'd, venue, etc.) would be valuable at this juncture.

So, honestly, while it's easy to blame the soundguy, and fault might really lie there, you'd be better served identifying an array of plausible explanations for why you couldn't be heard and figure out whether any of them are things you have control over. Various suggestions in that direction have been made -- trying a different EQ setting, making nice with the soundguy, watching your stage volume from the get-go, etc.

What role can you play in solving or preventing the problem in the future? If you honestly are doing all you can do, then you can start pointing fingers. And, for real, you've got to let go of some pretty strong beliefs and let yourself explore whether you might have headed down the wrong track on some things.

Peace.
--s-uu

There is way too much comedy here to even comment on it. I agree with The Funky Doctor's assessment of the situation.

yourlord, what I've heard from your band's demos that you have posted I am inclined to believe that your tone has a lot to do with how well you can hear yourself in the mix. That's not supposed to be a slam on you, I just hear what you have done for yourself in the mix and I hear a very low end heavy sound with very poor definition. Basically the kind of sound where you need to crank the hell out of your amp on stage to be "heard". It just doesn't cut through the mix like a more mid range defined tone does. Take that for what its worth.

Sweet Willie the voice of reason!

You're the reason.

Whenever I first play at a new venue, I've learned to go in and talk to the sound man before hauling any amplification into the room. This way I can find out his expectations and also scope out the sound system and potential house rig. I go in understanding that he is there to make the band(s) sound good and I try to make him feel confident that I'm willing to do whatever he needs me to do towards that goal. I've found that by doing this they are usually far more willing to work with me in getting me what I need.

I do occasionally deal with an incompetent and/or arrogant sound man who has their own strange idea of what sounds good (which usually means burying bass or making it really loud and boomy), but in those cases I figure I'm not going to get a good mix reguardless, so I just try to maintain a good attitude and make the best of it. What else can I do? Using a loud bass rig as a weapon never has good results.

I find that my single 4x10 is more than enough when there is good PA support. There have been times where the PA would only handle keys and vocals so my rig has to carry the bass in the house. In these cases I run out of headroom really fast, I blame that on my Behringer power amp and not the potential of my cab. If I know I'm going into this situation ahead of time, I try to borrow a better power amp and then I have no problem.

Since when did we ever expect the FOH guy to supply stage volumn for bass in the monitors? I've never heard of such a thing. Mayby if you are playing stadiums but not in any bar or club.

However i can't figure out how anybody would want a 810 and a 2-15 on stage. But then again I don't understand why you would play loud enough that they needed ear plugs either.

By the way you want to give the soundman your loudest volumn you will be playing at when he does the sound check, otherwise how can he possibly know how loud you need to be in the mains?

I usually wear them to avoid hearing damage. Wearing hearing protection does not mean you are playing "too loud". Cymbals alone in a non-jazz settings are enough to cause damage, especially if you are on a tight stage and have to be within a couple of feet at ear-level. This is not me just talking out of my ass, there has been plenty of discussion regarding deciBel levels and hearing damage.

A typical cymbal crash is about 125dB, which is the equivalent of a pnuematic jack hammer. 85dB is the point at which extended exposure causes damage.

Here's a nice article.

Big Daddy I'll qualify my remarks, up till now I've kept away from the YourLord argument.

In December I played with the originals band, a cross between Metallica and Foo Fighters. We are VERY LOUD. We play a couple of Metallica covers and a Faith no more tune to keep the punters happy.

I used my 1x15 Trace combo, not very rock, fairly but not VERY LOUD. Next time I will make 2 8x10 stacks out of cereal packets, or bring some washing machines, just to look good. We had a 5K PA rig with 1500watt monitor system into individual 15" monitors, we had whatever mix we wanted in our monitors.

We are all experienced players all have played many different venues in many different bands for at least 20 years each. Talking with the soundman was the first thing I did before even unloading my car. We took less than 20minutes to soundcheck.

It took the bass player from the other band 20 minutes just to EQ his rig! Experience is the only thing that will teach anyone in this situation. I am playing 4 gigs this week (unusual for me granted, no thrash or pop, its panto! which gives a whole new set of problems), YourLord won't learn from any advice here, other than talk to the sound guy, who will hopefully have experience and know what will sound good in each respective venue.

There's only so much sound you can get into a venue until it becomes incoherent. I think we were just below that threshold. My combo would not have provided enough stage volume on its own in any event.

A few years ago I played at a few theatres in a 10 piece soul band, like Phil describes. Again I had bass in my monitors, so did the drummer.

I believe David is playing on outdoor event in front of several hundred people. Rather than spending money on a bigger rig for one gig, I think he's better hiring in a soundman with the right equipment.

Tim we have our own PA and the soundman is one of the guitars and I have a fair deal of control, last gig he said that he wanted the bass to be pumping out and "tried" to dial some settings on my ampeg, so my bass was stupidly loud, I then turned down the bass on my ampeg so it was a good sound on the stage and because it was a pub and i only needed a little bit of presence on the pA's, that was what we got. We sounded good.

Again I play some gigs where we have a soundman, I usually turn up early before everyone else and try to chat for a bit with the soundman so h gives me what I want and vice-versa