A Good Bass Tone

Do you obsess over bass tones? Do you spend hours trying to perfect the McCartney bass sound? Your in luck because so does my friend Derek and he obsesses way more than you. Way more.

Here's what he has to say:

"Use medium-light-gauge, long-scale flatwounds (E string is 100, A string is 80, D string is 65 and G string is 45).

The first thing you'll notice is that the strings are a good deal thinner than what you'd expect for a bass that delivers a deep, resonant tone, especially if you have tried 105 (or heavier) E strings. Heavier strings resonate at a lower frequency than the upper-bass/lower-midrange frequencies needed to provide a punchy, fat bass tone.

Next secret: turn the tone knobs all the way to maximum dullness. The cutoff frequency (particularly for Rickenbackers) is surprisingly high (probably in the 1k-4k range), so you only want to dial in just enough of the highs to compensate for loss of clarity. You don't want to dial in any more of these high frequencies than absolutely necessary.

Experiment with using the bridge and neck pickups, either on their own or in combination. Use the neck pickup for dumpy tones and use the bridge for a clearer tone with more midrange and less bottom. Of course, the tone knobs are mostly rolled off for both pickups, so neither will provide a trebly, 'bink! bink!' sound.

Select a heavy pick. Position the pick between the bridge and neck pickups, slightly closer to the bridge than the neck. If the pick is too close to the bridge (or worse, positioned between the bridge pickup and the bridge itself), you won't get a deep, resonant bass.

Rotate the pick so that the rounded edge hits the strings. Angle the pick so that on each stroke, the rounded edge slides across the string rather than meeting it directly. This is a critical part of getting the thumpy, punchy McCartney sound. If the pick hits the string head-on, the sound will have too much 'bink!' in it. After a bit of practice, you will be able to modify the angle to adjust how much pick noise versus thump you want out of each note. As the rounded part of the pick slides across the string and the string is set in motion, you will get a 'fffuuuuppp' kind of attack on the string, followed by a deep tone. When compressed, the 'ffffuuuppp' sound blends nicely with the initial attack of the note. Interestingly, if you get the pick technique down and carefully dial in the amount of desired uppper midrange via the tone control on the bass, you can bring out a slightly bowed sound - as if you were attacking a double bass with a bow loaded with a lot of resin.

For Rickenbackers, use the built-in felt damper to get the Lucy in the Sky thumpy sound. I will adjust both sides of the damper very carefully until the strings are damped without being choked.

On the amp, dial in a lot of lows and mid-bass, with just enough midrange boost to add some brightness. Keep in mind that you rolled off the highs on the bass itself, so avoid boosting any mid frequencies above 1k.

Compress the signal with a slow attack and fast/medium release at a low to medium ratio (1:4 or higher). If you overcompress, the sound might become too thin. However, that might be the desired effect"