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Home 2009 December Basement vs. Reality

Basement vs. Reality

I haven’t had a chance to practice with my band for a few weeks. The holiday season is always a rough time to schedule practice. Seems like one of is always out of town, etc. That’s fine though, I set up my rig in the basement, start laying pedals and guitars out and the basement quickly changes to man-rock-cave. God awful tones, horrible licks and general ruckus happens shortly after. I like this time, it’s a way to work on some new licks for leads, maybe a new riff for a new song, truly a time of free experimentation.

I wanted to write this post, because I’m always surprised and worried/concerned when I work on new sounds/pedals in the basement. I always say “it sounds awesome in the basement, but how will it sound in reality”.  When I play in the basement, I always seem to gravitate to more low end in my tone, less mids. I’m by myself, no drums, no second guitar, no bass, and those factors need to be considered when playing ‘solo’.

As a few of you may notice, I just recently picked up the Analog Man Beano Boost, and I’ve also been playing with a new Creation Audio Labs  Holy Fire pedal and in the basement, these have been kicking my ass, but in reality, I have some pretty serious issues with the Beano Boost. I normally play with a Travis Bean guitar which are pretty responsive in the high end frequency, and the Beano Boost is generally a bright pedal (treble boost). Too much of a good thing?  Not sure, but the point of it working in the basement doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to work  higher volumes, additional instruments, etc. It’s always a crap shoot when it’s time to introduce the sound to the band, which can be exciting when it works, but a bummer when it doesn’t.

Curious.. do you have similar experiences? If so, or if not.. please comment below!

Dec 10, 2009admin

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Comments: 5
  1. Ron
    13 years ago

    What’s a good rule of thumb? More or less treble with the band vs. alone? More or less distortion? I’m sure it’s just random “hunt and peck.”

    It seems everytime I find a sound I like in the basement, my mates end up hating it when we get together.

    ReplyCancel
  2. Matt
    13 years ago

    It’s all about sharing the frequency spectrum… A nice fat delta blues style solo may sound great when you’re sitting by yourself…. but if you try to play that same solo with a 6 string bass and an oversized kick drum in the mix… it’s like swimming laps through mud.

    Likewise… my first U2 concert experience, the subs weren’t working for the first 20 minutes of the show. They run such a high decibel level, that with all of those high’s competing for space, it was like a power drill with a 1/32″ bit driving into each ear. (all you U2 haters, spare me the comments that that’s what U2 ALWAYS does to you 😉

    I bought a gibson Chet Atkins SST as one of my first acoustic guitars. When I tried to play a solo acoustic show with it, I thought I’d made a big mistake. Too thin… no booming lows that you want with a solo acoustic. I played it in the mix of a huge band (4 horns, bass, electric, keys, violin, drums, 3 vocalists) and our sound guy fell in love with it because it “cut through the mix”. Basically, I wasn’t trying to share frequency space with 12 other people.

    Bottom line… do what you (hopefully) learned to do in kindergarten… and share 🙂

    ReplyCancel
  3. admin
    13 years ago

    @Matt

    You hit it right on the head. It’s about finding your spot frequency wise. For my band, the mids need to be super prominent to be heard from the guitar point of view. I don’t mind mids.. and in fact, I really dig them, but when playing by yourself in the basement, those mids are pretty harsh so I tend to pull them back when rockin’ solo.

    Thanks for the comment!
    hank

    ReplyCancel
  4. admin
    13 years ago

    @Ron

    I don’t think there is a real good ‘rule of thumb’. You need to find out what tone works for you in the band setting, then experiment, but you’ll never know what works until you get the other instruments in there tapping at frequencies, etc.

    h

    ReplyCancel
  5. Mubo
    13 years ago

    As a synth player, i run into the same conflict… but with HEADPHONES…not basements 🙂

    using hi-end headphones makes for a much different experience than playing at the studio thru the P.A. with the rest of the band….

    ReplyCancel

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admin
13 years ago 5 Comments Pedal Talkbeano boost, guitar, travis bean192
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