How to get lower notes to stand out when picking on a clean tone?

BrickGlass

BrickGlass

Inspired
What is the secret sauce that gets lower notes to stand out more if you are picking across big chords? All the higher notes jump out at the ear really well, but the lower notes just seem to get washed out to some extent. I'm using a compression block as well as lo cut and hi cut features in the cab block. I've tried several different clean amps with varying degrees of success. Just wondering what eq settings in the amp block might help get a little more balance across the full range of the instrument when picking and sustaining all the notes on clean tones? Thanks in advance.
 
Lower your bass on the amp. Try lowering your pickup on the guitar. Try a little less depth too, or try lowering the depth frequency on the amp. For example, I tend to put the depth frequency down between 100-150, and then increase the depth until I'm happy. Really helps clean up the low mids. Or, you could take just a touch out of the low mids in the EQ settings of the amp (250 Hz). You could also mess with the LF resonance in the speaker page if you feel like the cab is giving you too much on the low end boom side of things. So there's a few ways to attack that.
 
compression will even them out so if your standard tone is skewed towards the high notes you can compress it and you will get a more even sound across all the strings.
 
Or try a different IR.

In my case, I use a little compression at the start of the chain. When I like the high-end response but find the lower notes a little dull still, then I tend to lower the treble a little bit and turn up the bright control to around 1 o'clock.
 
A lot depends on the amp and cab model you've picked because there are a lot of real amps that have this problem. You've got lots of points to boost and cut both lows and highs. You're going to have to experiment. But sometimes you just need to pick another amp or cab.
 
Reduce the bass frequencies. It also depends on what else is going on in the mix, if anyone else is also playing those lower notes, conflicting with yours.
 
I never had a formal education or mentoring on this stuff, but in my own mixing projects I discovered the ostensible paradox that bass parts stand out better when you increase the treble frequencies. And if the overall mix is too muddy or the bass instruments are delivering a lot of energy in the low frequencies, you can also reduce the bass frequencies.

The magic is in the high-frequency transients that shape the start of the bassy notes, when your fingerprints or fingernails or pick brush across the string, and the snap when the string is struck or pulled or slapped hard.
 
If you'd describe your bottom end as sounding kind of blurry or too "bloomy", then yeah lower the bass a bit OR check the speaker tab and raise the low frequency a hair to see if it speeds up the response. It gets a bit tricky when you've added a compressor too, because low frequencies will usually drive the compressor.

Try cutting until you've got the nimbleness you want before the compressor, or at the amp blocks speaker tab, and then add some bottom back in an EQ or your CAB blocks EQ. Actually, you might fix the whole thing by paying special attention to the proximity effect you've added if you're using a but CAB block too

6stringscott said:
but in my own mixing projects I discovered the ostensible paradox that bass parts stand out better when you increase the treble frequencies.
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This is SOOOOO true, I mentioned this earlier in a thread about adding "thump" and I got jumped on but it's absolutely true. Someone says "can you add more bass to the kick drum?" and I'll put more gain on the eq band where I've found the "click" and without fail they say are happy. Bottom end just naturally has an airy quality, without much force. It's slow, pillowy and there's a lot of energy but not as much push as you'd expect. You gotta add some snap from the top end to get it to pack that wallop.

Maybe try sweeping frequencies with a wide Q up past 2k-4k and see if that helps, low pass around 7k or higher if you've got ice picks.

Also, this is a long shot, but try slightly backing off your mids if everything still feels too round/soggy. If it doesn't help, put em back, haha. The midrange bands can often take over and "cover" other frequencies, and boosting other stuff to deal with it can make a mess.

My bet is that very small amounts of all the advice given so far will give you the results you want
 
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Thanks for all the responses. I don't think the problem was pickup height. I have a handful of guitars, some with mounted pickups, some adjustable. It was just a general need for a bit more clarity on the low end, though I do understand that pickup height can certainly impact things. I spent some time messing with the bass and depth settings, also some adjustments to the bright and presence on a few presets. I'm getting better results. Honestly, just seems like more trial and error than anything. It is always tough in my band because the keyboards take up so much of the eq spectrum. Constant battle with the keyboards.
 
When you say washed out, is the apparent volume of the notes okay relative to the higher notes? Or is their a general unbalance?

I try to get a good string balance by slowing arppegiating a first position G chord. I listen closely for the volume as I slowing pluck each string; low to high.

I use the basic tone stack, spkr page low res and IR to balance this out (assuming the pickups are setup as you want).

Don't be afraid to crank the bass too. On my real Princeton I dime the bass. In the Fractal, to match, it's not quite dimed but cranked high.

On my SLO patch for my Strat the bass is dimed too. I got that from Clapton's real SLO settings.
 
GotMetalBoy said:
I adjust all the poles on my pickups, so I get balanced levels from every string. When I first did it, I thought it sounded weird because I was so used to an unbalanced sound but once I start tweaking amp tones I noticed how easy it was to get clear tones and cut through the mix.

Here's a post I made about it: http://forum.fractalaudio.com/threa...-be-most-versatile.111673/page-2#post-1336469
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The Joe Walsh youtube guitar setup series has a simple height adjustment segment that covers the basics:
 
barhrecords said:
The Joe Walsh youtube guitar setup series has a simple height adjustment segment that covers the basics:
Click to expand...


That's how I used to adjust my pickups but the G string always sounded too loud and the D string too soft. The way I do it now makes all the strings sound even and makes different guitars sound similar. I'm not trying to sound like anything or anyone else. I use the Axe-Fx II to make my own signature sounds.
 
barhrecords said:
When you say washed out, is the apparent volume of the notes okay relative to the higher notes? Or is their a general unbalance?
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Volume doesn't seem to be the issue. It is more just the fact that the high notes have more pop and simply cut through more. It is more noticeable a problem when playing fast on the lower strings. Play a faster picking part that stays on the higher strings and you can hear each note quite clearly, but do the same thing in a lower register and things are a little muddier. It isn't horrible by any means, just hoping to find some settings that allow the lower notes to be heard more clearly when they are being sustained.
 
BrickGlass said:
Volume doesn't seem to be the issue. It is more just the fact that the high notes have more pop and simply cut through more. It is more noticeable a problem when playing fast on the lower strings. Play a faster picking part that stays on the higher strings and you can hear each note quite clearly, but do the same thing in a lower register and things are a little muddier. It isn't horrible by any means, just hoping to find some settings that allow the lower notes to be heard more clearly when they are being sustained.
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I fight this same issue myself on Fender cleans. I don't get much string snap from the E,A,D strings. Most noticeable for me when I'm playing a single vamp type of figure on the low strings.

New strings helps me with this issue.
 
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