Truly Great Recording Studio Bass Amp

[Saint Johnny B]

In the old days, tube amps and speakers did not require a million watts to work well. 10, 15, 25, 35 watts was enough to power an 18 or 24 inch speaker.

 

I am wondering why we don't see lower wattage large speakers like 18 and 24 inch today that could be combined with say a 12 and an 8 inch plus a little compression horn powered by a low watt tube amp. Something along these lines should be able to produce the low lows and the high highs with ease and be useful in situations where you are more concerned with control, instead of just massive, loud, volume.

 

Anybody know of any low-watt tube bass amps like this? Thanks

[jeremy c]

You could always get a vintage Ampeg B-15 or B-18.

The SWR Baby Blue was designed specifically to be a "Studio Reference Amp" and I'm sure someone else has something similar.

 

But if you are not worried about playing at band volume, there is not much reason to bring an amp and speakers to the studio. A nice preamp or a sophisticated DI will give you pretty much all the tone shaping you need.

 

Meanwhile, in the last 20 years, I think I have brought an amp to the studio once....it was a 60 watt Roland Cube with a 12 inch speaker.....and that was so we could mike the speaker which gave a sound equivalent going direct and rolling off all the highs. Nearly every other time I just used the standard Countryman that they gave me and got whatever sound I wanted out of my playing and my basses.

 

If you already have a high power amp, and if you are gigging you have to have one, there's no law saying you can't turn it down to "1" in the studio.

[...]

Originally posted by jeremyc:

But if you are not worried about playing at band volume, there is not much reason to bring an amp and speakers to the studio. A nice preamp or a sophisticated DI will give you pretty much all the tone shaping you need.

 

Meanwhile, in the last 20 years, I think I have brought an amp to the studio once....it was a 60 watt Roland Cube with a 12 inch speaker.....and that was so we could mike the speaker which gave a sound equivalent going direct and rolling off all the highs. Nearly every other time I just used the standard Countryman that they gave me and got whatever sound I wanted out of my playing and my basses.

My experience with studio work has been very similar. I very, very rarely have ever had to bring an amp to the studio. When I do bring something with me, it's usually just a preamp "just in case" the studio doesn't have a suitable preamp to use. All the stuff I did for Bob Rivers (of Twisted Tunes fame) and the two Travis Shredd albums that we recorded were done direct through a Summit tube preamp. Those were some of the best recorded bass tones I've ever had in the studio. Recently, I've used my Ashdown ABM RPM-1 preamp direct and have had wonderful results.

 

That said, a live situation is completely different. You're dealing with your bandmates, however many there are, and the house sound system. You will likely need an amp that has some serious juice just so you can hear yourself on stage; let alone the people in the audience listening to you perform. Ultimately, the best scenario is that your bass rig is acting as a monitor for you (and maybe the drummer) and the house sound system is pumping your bass through the mains for all to hear your wonderous splendor. A 50W power amp is unfortunately not going to be able to handle this task in most applications. I run my power amp bridged mono and it's pushing over 1000 watts into my cabs when I play live. I have more than enough power (usually) to completely drown out the mains. Do I always use it? No. It's a good thing to have though, just in case you need it.

 

Oh, and those Roland amps that Jeremy is talking about are great; assuming it's the one that I'm thinking of. I used one all through college when playing in jazz combos and it totally kicked ass... light weight too!