Need help with Bass guitar settings

I'm a guitar player who loves to play bass on my own recordings. But I've got one problem that I just can't seem to solve.

My low 'E' string always dominates when I record. Anything played on the 'E' string is so deep and powerful that during mastering I have to turn the bass track down like 9 db just to keep the thump from the E string from over-powering the rest of the recording. All the notes from the A,D and G strings then get lost, which totally defeats all the main and harmony notes I play on those 3 strings. Not being an experienced bass player, what am I doing wrong? I really want all 4 strings to be equal in volume.

I use a preset I downloaded from this forum called Basic Bass.syx, and I can't find the post using 'Search' as I would love to ask the guy who posted it. It is really a beautiful sounding preset on the AXE FX III - - but my problem occurred BEFORE and AFTER I downloaded this preset. Even WITH the preset, my problem is still as described above. So there must be something I don't understand about the Bass guitar.

On my Fender Elite Jazz Bass guitar, my knob settings are

Volume 10 (max)
Pan 5
Treble 7
Bass 6
Midrange 6 (as I type this, I wonder if this is a problem?)

And I use the Active switch for Rock, Fusion, etc. and Passive for softer songs. I go straight into the AXE FX III and then into my Babyface Pro computer interface and straight into Pro Tools with no extra signal processing at all.

Anybody know where I'm going wrong?
 
Post in the bass section and you may get better results.

I would start with a setup and making sure your pickup is balanced volume-wise. It may also be a case of only using your low E when you have to.

Does the problem persist if you turn bass down to 3?
 
Good advice on the setup. It would be interesting to hear a bass tech's perspective when you take the instrument in. Maybe it's technique - most of us develop that to play evenly over time, but what you describe sounds too extreme to be just that.

One of the most useful tricks I learned from one of Leon Todd's videos was to put a looper at the beginning of the signal chain, and tweak your tone while the loop plays (doing this while re-amping with a DAW is ideal, because you get to hear it in the mix). This keeps your hands free to tweak while you play the loop, and your ears won't be confused by string noise.

I've attached a simple bass preset I built last week using the SV-bass preset and cabs. Scene 1 - very clean, lots of headroom. Scene 2 - applies a drive to the highs only, so the lows remain clear and punchy. The drive varies from 33-100%, using an expression pedal so I can tweak it in the context of backing tracks. I dialed this using a Roscoe LG bass with active Bartolini pickups, so you'd probably need to do some level/eq setting. This preset has a looper at the end, but I always keep a blank block just after the input so I can swap them easily with a drag/drop.
 

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  • Bass.syx
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May be a stupid question, but do you have a compressor in there before the amp block? If not, put one in and it'll level things out for you. Also, the 60, 125, and 250 EQ settings have this general effect with bass.

60 too high will make the bottom end smooth, and boomy.
125 too high will make the low A louder, more present, and somewhat harsh sounding.
250 is the mud frequency on the EQ. I usually keep that one set around -3, and I generally keep 60 and 125 at 0, and make whatever adjustments I need to on the bass itself. I have the same bass as you, and your settings sound generally ok. Certainly nothing outrageous there.

Best suggestion is to use a compressor before the amp block, and I think that'll solve much of your problem right there. Then just adjust your EQ on the amp block where you need it to be, and tweak the bass EQ to fine tune it.
 
A few things to try.

First check this: lower the bass side of the pick way down. So the pickup is angled closer to the higher note strings and further away for the thicker ones. You want an even response but th string thicknesses mean more energy hitting the pickup from low E, so move pickup away from it to smooth that out.

Next, go into Cab Block and find the LO CUT and set that to 80Hz. Better? Try 100Hz. Better?

Last, go into the amp block and to the Input EQ page there. It will probably have NO cut off. Raise it from 10Hz to 40 Hz. That help? Now raise it to 70 Hz. Better? You get the idea. You are trying to cut the deep wooly lows but retain definition for the E string note.
 
When it comes to recording bass, this is a usual problem.
There are two ways to solve it in my opinion.

One is to put a multiband compressor after the cab block, set the first cross over (or low band compressor) to around 300Hz, and do some hard compression on the lows. This works good for pop or jazzy sounding bass, where the bass needs to sound like an actual bass.

The other one, which is my personal favorite for rock or heavier tones, is to split the signal into a low path and a high path.
The low path will the add the thump and foundation (that bass tone where u can’t really hear the melody but adds a strong, heavy, bassy groove to the song ), and the high path provides clarity for the actual melody.
To do this, use a low pass filter in after the cab block in the low path, and a high pass filter in the high path.
Also, try to EQ the high path’s amp block as if it was a guitar, this is, focus on the mids, treble and presence.

I sometimes use a plexi or a bassman 59 for the high path.

Finally, u can use the RTA block to visually check the output’s frequency balance.
 
I would strip things down to the bare minimum before I started adding things that may just be a bandaid but not actually fix the problem. I would take the Axe down to just input & output block, set the preamp on the bass flat & see how it sounds. Also make sure there is nothing on the channel or master fader that is effecting the tone. Check to see how close the pickups are to the strings. Alnico bass pickups don't need to be that close & the bass side of the pickups should be lower than the treble side.

Also, you don't mention if you are playing with a pick or fingers but where you pluck the string can make a big difference, especially with fingers. You have a huge amount of tone control depending on how close to the bridge or how close to the neck you pluck the strings. On a jazz bass, my right hand is almost always between the 2 pickups, usually a little closer to the bridge pickup.

Bass frequencies are a pain to control so it could also be an issue with the room you are in. How does commercial music you are very familiar with sound played through your recording system?
 
Budda, when I turn the bass knob down, everything just sounds thin. DLM, the old Basic Bass.syx that I was using does have a compressor in the front. Thanks for the great info on those frequency levels! JoeW-NC, I'm playing around with your Bass.syx preset right now, and Wow what a difference from the one I was using and ones I created on my own. It is really great and right now it seems to be solving the problem - perhaps your compressor in the front is doing a better job than the ones I had before, plus your EQ settings. Also like all the other things you are doing with the signal. The SVT Clean Scene is just the kind of all-purpose tone that I need, and I really like the SVT-vari-drv as well for a more driving sound! Will keep you posted while I test this out further. Thanks to you all!!!
 
HPF!!! It’s absolutely necessary for bass players especially in live venues. I normally keep mine set at around 60hz and then tweak as the venue needs to get rid of the muddy boomyness. When recording you’ll need to turn the bass down and usually the mids up. I also second putting a compressor in the chain. I always run mine at the end. I’m a 5 string player so the low end is even more difficult to tame but using a HPF and compressor locks it in.
 
Wow, I re-recorded my bass tracks on the song I just completed, this time using the preset downloaded from JoeW-NC. Problem is over, problem solved. Every string is so balanced compared to the others and you can hear the real timbre of your instrument. The bass is crisp, clear and clean, sits in the mix like a dream, and this is a rock song. Because its got so much headroom, you can attack it and it responds in kind. My gratefulness and genuine gratitude to JoeW-NC!!!!!!!!!
 
There are some good bass presets in axechange, audition some and see what sticks. I found one for relaxed clean stuff, will check after work.

Glad things have improved!
 
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