Subbass vs __ bass

T

theblackbelted1

New member
I understand sub bass and I know you cannot hear it on your average laptop speaker but what is the bass you do hear? Are there different types of bass that I should use in a track? I've heard the term mid bass so maybe that's what I'm thinking of? Also how would you create it?
 
By Eqing each bass into its own area of the frequency spectrum

Your sub bass might be low cut at 20-25hz and then high cut at 60hz. In other words band passed from 20-60hz. Then you will have your next bass that sits on top of the sub. Usually this is going to be the bass that you hear and gives your bass its body or character, I always call it my Body Bass but whatever. It'll be low cut/high passed at about 60hz or depending on the first harmonic of it(the first bump on the frequency analyzer starting from the left) and then it all depends on the sound where you high cut it.

But either way thats the idea. You just use an EQ and separate each bass into individual areas on the frequency spectrum. Sometimes you might even have another bass on top of the 2nd bass..its all layering and EQing.
 
theblackbelted1 said:
thanks. two questions though. Does the body bass have a maximum frequency and do you create it with a sine wave as well?
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I mentioned up there that the max frequency depends on the bass you're using. once you separate the sub from the body bass you can pretty much do whatever you want with the body bass. Some bass harmonics will reach all the way upto the mids high/mids. If you have room in the mix you can leave it there, if you need to make room for something else you can cut it. We're getting more into mixing now in general rather than bass layering. There is a area where bass would usually sit in, but i wouldn't even worry about that. Just base your decision off the sample you're using and use common sense EQing to make everything fit. Lots of time if you listen to the body bass by itself and start cutting the highs out you won't like how it sounds cuz it'll start taking away harmonics from the bass. But if you turn the rest of the instruments on and start doing the same thing, high cutting the bass, you won't even notice you're removing the highs from it if you have other stuff there.

And there can be a sine wave in your higher bass. Doesn't have to be. Sine waves are good for creating clean low frequencies which is why they're used for sub. More about feeling and less about character. You can add in a square or a triangle to a sub as well to give it a little more character. Again it just comes to production decisions based on the songs. Lots of times every bass with have some sort of smooth sine wave or square/triangle in it to give it that low end without creating too many high harmonics but it doesn't really matter once you get past the sub bass if your sub is doing its job.
 
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It depends alot on the style and mood of your music as well. To add on to the already great advice given in this thread the first thing you should always do when mixing or producing is to have a plan. Even if it is a simple one, at minimum you want to know, where is this song going to be played THE MOST? If the answer is laptops and earbuds then after your mix you need to listen to your song on laptops and earbuds. If you not that your song lacks audible bass on those systems then you just have to go back to the mix and use some techniques to get your sub bass more present. The way most of us do that is by adding distortion to subs...Just slap the best distortion plugin you have on your bass track and adjust it untill you start to hear your bass become present in the low mids, bounce, and re reference. Keep doing this and you will get that bass to sound great in all systems, once you do this for yourself in your own productions you will find a goto method that works for you and you will be unstoppable!
 
Sounds like someone is struggling because their basses don't sound as impressive as skrillex's do. :D

How do you create bass? Open up your synth, choose a wave and play a note somewhere between E1 and C1. That will create a bass. It might not be the bass you want, but it'll be a bass nonetheless.

Making basses is a creative process. Watch some tutorials to see what kind of things other people do and try and understand what's happening. If you're a fan of the aggressive dubstep or dnb type bass, seamlessr does a great series of youtube tutorials called how to bass- I think there were about 100 last time I checked.
 
Just use dimension expander and your are there. LOL joking here.

Do as scrapheaper says: watch some tutorials and begin to experiment with different settings. If your case is what scrapheaper said (wanting basses like skrillex), then you must use some FM (FM8) synthesis for them. Not massive. At least that's the way he does.
 
To reply to scrap no I don't mean growls just I guess "body bass" as Yumid said. You find it in a lot of genres not just EDM. I'm not even sure if there's a proper name for what I'm talking about but thanks for the replies.
 
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I think you're talking about lows, kinda 100-200Hz range.

It it a whole band of frequencies, there will be multiple frequencies in there (As opposed to sub-bass, which only really has room for one: the lower the frequencies the more they need to be spaced out) so I think using sine waves sounds a bit overly complicated.
As long as you start making your bass with a note in the bottom octave (E1-E2) you should have some content in that area.(Unless you decide to highpass your bass, lol)
If you find that you don't have enough, grab an EQ and boost that region. One thing to try is to put a compressor over the EQ when boosting to keep the volume consistent, which always tricks people into thinking they're improving the timbre of the sound when in actual fact they're just making it louder overall.
 
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