Should bass be double tracked or just keep one track in the middle? Im pretty uneducated with bass tone when it comes to recording.

Single tracked.

Make a copy of the track, high pass it, and run it through some sort of distortion. Dial it in so it sounds like nothing but treble, then high pass it again.

Blend the two to taste. Too much is annoying, too little and the bass grind is buried.

Hmm, Ill try that. Thanks dude

Yarr, one bass track is all you need, IMO. Definitely not like guitars where a couple tracks can make it sound bigger.

I usually do one bass track, some limiter, some eq, and that is it.

Thanks Chris

Oh, also, i tend to put whatever dirt on right from the start. I just track with it. I never use more than an overdrive though. Just for a little edge. If i want fuzzier bass, i tend to aim moar for a sawtooth synthy sort of solution, just laid on top or accenting select parts of, the regular clean or OD bass.

Metalfan's method can give you more options, but the bass guitar is one part of the equation where i like to leave myself less options with, just for how i prefer to work.

This is a decent quick and easy way to do at home bass tones IMO:



For Vesication I brought the hi + lo passed bass bit up a fair bit since it's nasty grind. So there's some toothy bass tone with plenty of solid lows...

Im "friends" with taht dude Ola on facebook. Hes a badass for sure and gets some amazing tones.

Yeah, Ola's a badass. And an amp slut. Not whore, because he doesn't buy them, he borrows them.

I guess hes endorsed by DAR amps?

Yeah.

Yup! Nothing to say a bout those amps. Completely normal.

Sweet fuck.
Is that thing even real?

Ya dude, they sound pretty fucking killer from what Ive heard but at 3 grand +, I wouldnt.

Lots of metal amps sound good. Most actually sound just about the same.

I have never seen those wacky tubes for sale at any normal vendor.

Those things, in conjunction with the pricing, are more than enough to ensure that my sole response to those amps has been "ooh. pretty."

Generally speaking but eh, I dont think ALL metal amps sound the same. For one, check out the Fortin Natas amp. Incredible.

What i heard sounded nice, but seriously, i am not a five percenter at all. In my opinion, there are about maybe three or four high gain metal amps sounds that are somewhat unique from each other, and beyond that, it really is a matter of splitting hairs, and blowing cash.

Those DAR amps are fucking WTF. Apparently they run impulses into a tube power amp or some shit.

My JSX and XXX sound pretty radically different. The other 2 amps I have aren't exactly metal, although I do force one of them to be.

Back to the original post for a moment: I generally take two mics and a DI, the DI being totally clean before the amp, using the DI box as a splitter. I've either got the dirt on from the start or reamp the DI track through an amp + pedals.

I never double-track bass like you would heavy rock/metal rhythm. A second performance of bass, I've tracked as an effect, basically, playing a different part over the main bass line. The easiest way to hugeify bass is to make it huge from the beginning and cut it down to taste.

Stereo bass is a waste of time, again, except as an effect. The bridge of Garda's Graphite has stereo room mics on the bass guitar. There's six tracks of bass (incidentally, all miced. The clean DI is muted) on that song, but they're all taken from one take. Two are effect reamps and two are the room mics acting as a reverb.

I mostly prefer miced bass tracks to DI, for what it's worth. DI + duplicate track + hp/dirt seems to be the go-to method for current metal though and will give you That Sound.

I also hit the bass on the way in with a hardware compressor, at least if it's played clean-ish. Not too much, but enough to smooth it a bit and still have punch. A light touch with the compressor will bring up the sustain and still let you have attack without the occasional annoying transient spike bass is more prone to than guitar. The dirtier the bass, the less- if at all- I compress. No need to compress as supersquarewavefuzzbuzzsaw bass. It is compression incarnate.

Re: mixing, really, what to cut from the bass and what to cut from the kick depends entirely on your bass and kick sounds. Sometimes doing the "wrong" thing like dumping 150hz from the kick will both clear up the kick and make the bass cut through a lot better. (I did this on the aforementioned song.) All depends on what you're working with.