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WeeklyBeats.com / Music / NWSPR's music / Lost in Transmission

Lost in Transmission

By NWSPR on July 15, 2018 7:46 pm

Hope you're having a great week!

This week's composition is four tracks of unedited bass guitar with no plan. So you may like it or it could be your worst nightmare smile Unedited because I was just having fun and keep things organic... mistakes and all.

Admittedly four basses is very spinal tap, and this was not going to be the track I was going to post, but I really got into it and stopped working on other stuff. Mixing was a challenge and I could not capture the full sound in a compressed audio file. Probably why bands do not have four bass players.

Some Roland TR-505 and samples of saxophones fill out the mix and I ran everything through a single room designer reverb (not something I usually do).  The low end was shelved below 50k, compression and limiting were used to minimize the distortion that arises when saving down to a stereo file. I do use an overdrive on my bass as well as recording through an Ampeg combo that provides really good character, so that soft distortion is intentional.

The bass I use here is a 1975 Gibson Ripper. It's really an amazing instrument for rock playing (I don't think it is widely used for jazz or country, etc...). I will never sell or trade this bass like other gear!

It may not be for everyone, but I had fun and it was a good change of pace.

Looking forward to checking out your tracks this week. Got lots of good musical inspiration last week.

Joyeux Quatorze Juillet!


The bass sounds really good to me although I wouldn't have guessed there were 4 basses.  It makes me think about that 90's band Ned's Atomic Dustbin that had 2 bass players.  Also I hadn't read the description yet so the saxophone was an unexpected touch that brings a different dimension to the track.  Overall it's a fun listen.

I don't know about better specifically, but it's pretty good. The sax is a nice touch.

Also, next time you're pulling that quad bass, you could try to harmonize three of them and have the fourth do the other things.

This sounds amazing. Sounds like a bizarro version of a cool cop show theme. Love the sax and bass combo

Devieus wrote:

Also, next time you're pulling that quad bass, you could try to harmonize three of them and have the fourth do the other things.


Do you mean electronically running through a harmonizer or playing different bass lines in harmony?  Both would be interesting. The approach I took was one bass part and then two passes playing dissonant intervals. The 4th bass doesn't start until just before the drums and is noodling a melody in a higher register. I guess it all muddled together.

fun! smile

The sax was a nice cherry on top of that delicious bass sundae! I think too often bass is relegated to a single role and this confirms that it shouldn't be so smile

NWSPR wrote:
Devieus wrote:

Also, next time you're pulling that quad bass, you could try to harmonize three of them and have the fourth do the other things.


Do you mean electronically running through a harmonizer or playing different bass lines in harmony?  Both would be interesting. The approach I took was one bass part and then two passes playing dissonant intervals. The 4th bass doesn't start until just before the drums and is noodling a melody in a higher register. I guess it all muddled together.

I'd say use harmonic intervals instead, and maybe play them in canon.

Bleeoop wrote:

This sounds amazing. Sounds like a bizarro version of a cool cop show theme. Love the sax and bass combo

This is too perfect, haha.

I couldn't agree more with the cop show theme comment omg! Soooo good

Smokey bass jazz club after-hours. I like it.

Bleeoop wrote:

This sounds amazing. Sounds like a bizarro version of a cool cop show theme. Love the sax and bass combo

daniarnica wrote:

I couldn't agree more with the cop show theme comment omg! Soooo good

onlyjokinen wrote:
Bleeoop wrote:

This sounds amazing. Sounds like a bizarro version of a cool cop show theme. Love the sax and bass combo

This is too perfect, haha.

Yeah, if the cop show was bad ass and kind of sexy with all the sax and bass swagger. And had a dog side kick that could talk. #Brooklyn99  All this talk of cops reminded me that there was a NYC band called Cop Shoot Cop that had two bass players.  Some how appropriate here.

CosmicCairns wrote:

The bass sounds really good to me although I wouldn't have guessed there were 4 basses.  It makes me think about that 90's band Ned's Atomic Dustbin that had 2 bass players.  Also I hadn't read the description yet so the saxophone was an unexpected touch that brings a different dimension to the track.  Overall it's a fun listen.

Thanks! Appreciate the Ned's Atomic Dustbin reference. I was a big fan. Good heavy pop material. They had one bass go low and the other high or kind of mid. Worked well. 

Yeah this is really perfect in sound... The bass is supersweet in sound and the saxes just carried me away smile

Cool for burning down the highway in some big fat car, full of smoke, full of babes, cruising the night away smile Boom!

This is so cool, the bass tracks sound great together.  Really wasn't expecting the sax and drums to kick in but hot damn.

Podling wrote:

Cool for burning down the highway in some big fat car, full of smoke, full of babes, cruising the night away smile Boom!


Let's do it. All we need is the 1974 Fleetwood Cadillac smile

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