Bi-amping bassists....

[MOONDOGGY]

I've been messing with bi-amping for over a year and slowly adding more pieces of the puzzle to my dream rig. My question for you bassists is, if you've tried bi-amping, what kind of success have you had? Did you start bi-amping to obtain a certain tone?

I love the tone I'm getting, but I'm far from my goal of the Doug Pinnick King's X monstrous sound.

Here's how I'm running my signal:

- From instrument into a Peavey BAC-2 combination chorus / bi-amping pedal.
- I send the lows into a 2-ch graphic EQ w/ the highs rolled off.
- From the EQ into an SVT-4 (highs dialed down again).
- Then into my 2x12 bass cab.
- The highs go from the splitter pedal to an overdrive pedal (EBS Valvedrive or AmpTweaker TightDrive Bass).
- Highs then to the other channel of the graphic EQ w/ the lows dialed down.
- From the EQ the highs are currently ending into a cheap Hartke 112 combo, but will soon be going through an all-tube head then through my LDS 3x8 cab.


I know there's a few more key ingredients I'm missing in this tonal pursuit, mainly compression. I'm a bit of a moron with this, and I know it takes a lot of tweaking. I'll be getting a 2-channel compressor to effect the lows and highs separately, but I have no idea where in the chain to put it and how to make the most of it.


The one great thing I've found is that I'm finally getting great distorted and overdriven tones. For the longest time I was convinced the overdriven tone I had in my head came from a magic pedal- a dirty nasty tone that distorts all notes from all the strings but still maintains full fat bottom end. The few high-end pedals I've found either only distorted the highs or left the low end almost inaudible.



So bassists, what kind of success have you had with bi-amping? Have any you done the Billy Sheehan method of sending two pickups each to their own outputs? Any other tips and tricks?

[Big Jimi Cee]

Dan,

I think of Bi-amping as a frequency split and i did that for a while with my Eden Pre into 2x10 and 1x15. I dug it but I ended up going back to straight into the 10's and 15 because of doing jobs where the sound man would not mike both cabinets and wanted a DI. The Eden has a great post eg DI so it was easier that way. But now that you have me thinking about it I may go back.

Back in the day, I was running my Ric out of the stereo jack into a MXR dual 15 eq then to 8x12's driven from one bass amp and two 18's from another. What I will tell you was that rig would loosen your fillings.

I am not sure if this helps.

BTW did you trade the Lakeland to anyone local

[MOONDOGGY]

That's a cool method of doing it. Did you only concentrate on tweaking and/or EQing of frequencies to each split signal, or did you mess with adding any effects to one or both channels?

And no, the Lakland went to a TB member in Illinois. I got myself a beat up MM Stingray 5, which is a tone monster. But it may be going up for sale soon as I could still use the cash.

[bassist_25]

I remember I made a post here a few years ago asking about signal splitting for bass and people started jumping down my throat about it.

As Jim said, when someone says bi-amping to me, I think of frequency splitting through a cross-over to multiple speakers that then see different parts of the frequency spectrum of the signal. For the most part - and I know others may disagree - I think bass biamping has largely become obsolete due to the introduction of full range cabinets.* An Eden 4x10 XLT can cover the frequency spectrum of what an older bi-amped 4x10 and 1x15 used to. Further, as Jim pointed out, bi-amping becomes pointless when you have full FOH support and the house signal is sent to the board from a point somewhere before your speakers. With that said, I often bring a 1x12 to full FOH gigs to pair with one of my 4x10s because it adds a lot more low-end presence that is not present with the 4x10s (even though the 4x10s supposably have a lower frequency roll-off than the 1x12). I don't bi-amp, though; I just daisy-chain the cabs.

Now as far as what you're talking about, Dan, it really reminds me of the Ric-o-Sound without actually using a stereo-outfitted Rickenbacker to achieve the result. I've actually recently contemplated splitting a signal into an all-tube head and a solid-state preamp. It's my attempt of compromise between what I love about all-tube technology (warmth, girth) and what I love about solid-state technology (fast transients, upper-harmonic detail). Engineers usually run a mic off of Kenny's cab and a DI from his preamp and mix them both at the board. My idea was something similar, though my stage sound would be totally provided by the tube amp. The preamp would only send a DI to the board. I have no idea how it would work. Some weird phasing issue or something may happen...or it may be totally gnarly, and gnarly in a good way.

Of course having a good engineer who cares about the bass sound and understands what you're trying to achieve is important. If the engineer's idea of good bass sound is a bunch of 125hz with no detail or presence, then it's a moot point. I know that Todd (Sapo) actually used to mix multiple preamps in his rack and then give engineers one signal.

*I'm not including in this statement G-K's bi-amping feature in which the horn of their cabs recieves its own separate power signal than the drivers.

Back in the day, I was running my Ric out of the stereo jack into a MXR dual 15 eq then to 8x12's driven from one bass amp and two 18's from another. What I will tell you was that rig would loosen your fillings.

That bass rig has more speakers than most PA systems I see around. I bet you don't miss hauling that around anymore.

[MOONDOGGY]

I guess I should have mentioned my primary goal with bi-amping! I'm just looking to get a certain sound and make the most of some FX. I'm not necessarily trying to maximize the frequency handling of different cabs. I'm not focusing on the actual splitting of the signal, but more the amps and effects used on each signal, if that makes any sense.

And I agree with the whole live thing. If you have an engineer that isn't bass tone-conscious and won't mic each cab individually or at least tap off of each amp, then it's pretty useless! For the time being, I'm stuck in my house tweaking and tinkering with my rig and not really playing out, so I haven't concerned myself with that. But if I do start playing out again, I'm fairly certain I'll immediately jump back to one amp, unfortunately!

[MeYatch]

I just kind of skimmed these posts so I'm sorry if I missed the point, but I have gotten a pretty good distortion sound with the use of a blend pedal.

Its not nearly as complicated as what you are doing, and you end up with one signal for FOH.

[chris b]

you need a digiteck bp 50 its great .that bi amping is great if you have a sound guy and lots of time. i see you r adjusting your lows and highs , but mid and hi-mid , seem to be kicked to the curb , were as mid adjustments will give you thata monsterous distortion without sacraficing tonal loss or bottom end. get the pedal ,skip the byamp, use all your power of amps combined, less to fuk with better sound. but hey this is just my opinion

[snarebear]

I used a biamp rig to use and control compression without losing volume. I ran the high and low outputs into a stereo comp unit and into a 2 10 and 15 cabs and sound was nice. never really used it playing out much cause it was a pain in the ass to haul all that stuff around. You can also get a stereo preamp or processer and run it through crossover and play with it for awhile and see what sounds you can get that you like. My biamp rig is for sale now cause it is just a pain to haul. good luck

[f.sciarrillo]

Couldn't you just use a split output from the bass and run it through separate amps? Like what Billy Sheehan does.