Bass sounds

[mazz]

Another sample question:In lieu of bringing a bass player in to the studio, what are folks using for bass sounds (not loops)?I'm particularly interested in solo acoustic bass and also electric bass (p-bass, rickenbacker, etc). I've pretty much got synth bass covered already.Spectrasonics Trilogy looks really nice. The demo video on their site is pretty impressive.Any other ideas out there (besides bringing in a great player.... that goes without saying)? Mazz

[davewalton]

Trilogy, Trilogy, Trilogy. As a dedicated bass module you can't go wrong. I would put it in the same category for the bass as I would put EWQL for the orchestra.There's no "Rick" but the upright acoustic bass is scary real and it has a nice selection of electric basses from modern 4-string to old school, rock 'n roll overdrive, a whole selection of fretless basses as well as a nice selection of picked and slapped basses. Plus it has tons of slides, squeaks, thumps, harmonics, etc.That's my 2-cents as their unofficial, unpaid, spokesmodel.

[davewalton]

Quote:I used to use Trilogy a lot but since I play real bass I found out how much Trilogy sucks although for a keyboardist it's really great! Gunter,I'm hijacking Mazz's thread for just a second. I don't know anything about doing midi using a bass or guitar as the controller but I've always wondered if something like Trilogy or Majestic would be really useful if you could trigger it by playing a bass with midi capability (if such a thing exists). One bass guitar, many bass guitars via Trilogy (or Majestic) seems good in theory but does that translate into reality?

[ernstinen]

I've got some great P-bass and Jazz-bass samples in my old Emu e6400 sampler. I have no idea where the samples came from, but they work really well. Maybe Emu will give you their secrets (but probably not! ).Ern

[zircon]

Is that such a bad thing? I know a lot of drummers that sequence their drum parts in MIDI. Knowing the instrument makes it much easier to mock up using samples. Plus, it saves the time, money, and effort of going to a studio to record the parts you want - or even just breaking out your mics at home. I play both piano and guitar and I have yet to record either live for anything I've written...

[matto]

Quote:IBut I am glad that Van Gogh did not hire someone else to do his sketching so that he would have a picture to fill in.I see samples and loops as tools...not as somebody else doing the work for me. While I would never dare to compare myself to Van Gogh, the man did use tools...brushes, canvas, paint...it's not like he fingerpainted on tree trunks using his own blood... (cut off ear notwithstanding...)

[53mph]

Using painting practice as an analogy to using bass samples is a bad idea horacejesse.I'm a trained artist and ex-gallery owner. Van Gogh may have painted his own canvas' but what if I told you that most artists including Raphael and Michelangelo had studio assistants who often painted large sections of the canvas for them.In the Renaissance art was a trade and many artists had workshops full of apprentices who knocked out copies of their masters work.Sometimes the apprentices were copying hands, faces and clothing from guide paintings and the Master artist, such as Raphael, would only paint the faces. This may not apply to everyone, such as Leonardo and Van Gogh, but that was usually because they were too difficult to work with and produced work in such small numbers. You have to remember that Van Gogh was a commercial faliure in his own life time and it wasn't until 11 years after his death that anyone took any notice of him.You can't compare making commercially viable music to being a loopy painter

[53mph]

Quote:Leonardo da Vinci started as a background painter in Florence. His employer's name went on the artwork even though numerous people worked on the painting. There is a famous painting in which he graduated to painting one of the angels and if you look closely you can see that his was much superior to the others. He wasn't an apprentice much longer after that. Kind of like a busy A list film composer having studio assistants, orchestrators and copyists.If this board going to start turning into an artist resourse site. Heaven forbid We already have enough problems with political activists and religious apologists high-jacking threads (* Disclaimer: all this was written with my tongue well and truely wedged in my cheek )BTW I use Trilogy and for the upright bass sounds. It's great but kind of lacking for the electric. I find it hard to get a realistic fingered, walking bass line. If I could get my hands on a bassist I would, but till then I make do with Trilogy and my wife.

[mazz]

Well, I received Majestic but now I need their specific USB dongle which costs another 49 bucks. I would have ordered it at the same time but the guy at Sweetwater said yes when I asked him if it was a Syncrosoft dongle which I already have. It's not a Syncrosoft dongle I'm in favor of companies protecting their intellectual property but the manual says that it includes the dongle (which it doesn't) and Sweetwater's website doesn't say it's not included either. I should have done more research.Both companies got an e-mail registering my disappointment.If you're going to buy this, be aware of the extra expenditure.I'm sure the sounds are great, I'll let you know early next week Mazz

[matto]

To be fair the YT website clearly states that the dongle is not included. The reason the manual states otherwise is that previous versions used to include it.They recently did away with this to avoid having to carry two different packages for each product. One with and one without (for previous owners of other YT products).The sales person a Sweetwater who mislead you deserves a phone complaint IMHO. They advertise themselves as having the most knowledgable sales people in the industry after all...