Music videos featuring Fat-Bottom Girls (Rippers, Victories, etc)

[Granny Gremlin]

But who takes care of the low end in that band?

Which band - Dino Jr?  Lou Barlow, see the reverb bass demo vid a few posts up.

He was also in Sebadoh and Folk Implosion, both of which are more funky/melodic in the bass area than Dino.  Kinda started the lo fi indie rock thing in the 90s.

[4stringer77]

It's dirty bass but it's there. Their bass sound works for them pretty much like Lemmy's did for motorhead.

[Granny Gremlin]

I'm quite sure he was taking the piss, but yeah. 

That's a great cover.  Bass is a bit clanky but not lacking any low end.  I mean it ain't dub but most of the stuff posted here isn't like super subwoofy - it's not the EB thread ;P

I mean Uwe said it himself

For some reason, Grabbers invite punkish bass playing. It's the inherent slight nastiness of their sound! 

And yeah that's a Ric he's playing now (vs the insta vid I posted that started this off, which was a Grabber), but the thing about Rics is that even though they can do a more full bodied bass sound, they also got dat clank if you want it.

[Basvarken]

I was referring to Lou Barlow of Dinosaur Jr. strumming the "V" Bass. I couldn't detect any low end in that video.
Someone should maybe explain the concept of a blend knob on his overdrive pedal

[Granny Gremlin]

Yeah - that's what I meant by taking the piss. 

The thing about chords on a bass with distorion is the low end makes it mud up real fast so that's likely intentional to a degree.

Also, the youtube vid probably doesn't capture all of the actual low end that is there.  He does sound bassier in that Cure cover.... and the lack of lows could be in part due to the V bass itself.

Like I don't see people ragging on Jaco for not being very bassy when he goes through a whole song above the 8th fret.  Or "solo bassists" [shudder].  Or Lemmy.  Like in a power trio config sometimes it's cool to leave space for boomy drums - especially if it's a tommy number (vs ride or hatty). 

[Basvarken]

Like I don't see people ragging on Jaco for not being very bassy when he goes through a whole song above the 8th fret. 

That's an entirely different story. But even above the 8 fret there's plenty of low end with a clean bass.

Or Lemmy.

Yeah, Lemmy's sound didn't have that much low end either. He dialed in lots of mid. And overdrive of course

Lack of bass is just what happens if you dial in that much overdrive (and when you mainly play chords).
In studio recording that can easily be fixed with a dubbed bass track.
But in a live situation you really need to mix the clean signal with the overdriven signal to get a solid low end.

Like in a power trio config sometimes it's cool to leave space for boomy drums - especially if it's a tommy number (vs ride or hatty).

In a real power trio there is space per definition. It is almost impossible not to leave space.
Unless they play with Taurus pedals and keyboards etc.

[Granny Gremlin]

Lack of bass is just what happens if you dial in that much overdrive (and when you mainly play chords).
In studio recording that can easily be fixed with a dubbed bass track.
But in a live situation you really need to mix the clean signal with the overdriven signal to get a solid low end.

No I do it all the time.  The trick is to use power chords and probably skip the octave or the root note - just root and 5th (or 3rd for those pedantic guys who insist on 3rds, but then it's not a power chord but you get the idea).  Not all overdrives suck bass either - tube amps don't (if anything tube amp overdrive exaggerates bass).  In pedals it's the input filter cap that rolls off the extreme lows - they do that to make the pedal sound 'tighter.'  The blend knob is not always a good solution because it dilutes the distorted tone and can be not what's desired (I personally hate it when your sound has a clean bottom and distorted highs - I like the dirt spread around more evenly).  You also forget the inherent basslessness of the V which Uwe has spoken of so many times. 

I hear all what you said but there have been soooo many top 40 bands where the bass tone is lacking low end, which (especially if clean and little bass) is not something I am into usually.  As for the power trio thing, I meant like on the odd song not all the time - I love tom-riding numbers, but it gets messy with a dubby bass tone.

The point is maybe he just likes it that way for that type of thing, and that's ok, just like it's ok if it's not your thing; it's not got anything to do with him being too dense to figure out how to use a dirt pedal.

[uwe]

That is an issue when you play constant rhythm guitar bass, just as it was with Motörhead. Distortion and chording as a combo are a sub-lows killer (you can't expect the chords to be heard unless you dial away bass). Not that an 80ies short scale Flying "V" offers anything approaching real sub-lows, Jake is right. Frankly, I believe that these people would be better served with a baritone guitar and some Taurus pedals!

I chord quite a bit, but not with distortion or even overdrive. And I tend to do it in more subdued parts of the music, not to increase power. When I want to do that, I sometimes double a fretted note with an empty string of the same note, either doubling the root (eg E string fretted at fifth fret, A string empty, downstrokes) or as an octave (eg E string empty, A string fretted at 7th fret, downstrokes). E, A, D and G get you through a whole lot of rock songs. 

[amptech]

But in a live situation you really need to mix the clean signal with the overdriven signal to get a solid low end.

Too bad Dino Jr. didn't know that!
I think a couple of their mid 90's albums sound good, but seeing them live... Probably the worst band I ever saw. Usually a venue with great sound, it was just so much guitar you could not hear vocals or even snare drum. I walked around trying to find a spot with better sound, but even in tiny spaces where you could hear some drum or bass it was clear they did not play together. Just three guys in their own world.

[Basvarken]

(I personally hate it when your sound has a clean bottom and distorted highs - I like the dirt spread around more evenly).

Thats not how a blend knob works!
A blend knob does not discriminate frequencies.
It just mixes the clean signal with the distorted signal. You choose how much of the clean signal you want.

[Basvarken]

By the way, talking about clean low end and distorted highs:
A couple of years ago I got to test the Tech21 VT 1000 amp.
I was impressed by the options this amp offers.
It's basically two amps in one.
One channel for the clean (low end) and one for the distorted part.

I really like the sounds you can get out of this amp.




So I guess it's all a matter of taste.
I personally don't care for the bottomless bass of Dino Jr. (but you guessed that already  )

[gearHed289]

I have become a huge fan of the Tech 21 VT series of pedals and amps. I've never heard anything sound and react so similar to my old SVT. And being able to send that tone to FOH through a DI is a godsend. All analog for those keeping score. 

[Granny Gremlin]

Thats not how a blend knob works!
A blend knob does not discriminate frequencies.
It just mixes the clean signal with the distorted signal. You choose how much of the clean signal you want.

Not technically, you are correct about that, but in the net effect because a) the dirt usually has a HPF on it,  and b) the lows take a lower clipping threshold (or more drive going in depending on how you look at it) to distort as much in the first place.  The sum of those things is cleaner lows (which some people actually like and some pedals advertise this as clarity or conserving your tone).  There may be exceptions to this of course in cases of specific pedals or signal chains in general.

[uwe]

By the way, talking about clean low end and distorted highs:
A couple of years ago I got to test the Tech21 VT 1000 amp.
I was impressed by the options this amp offers.
It's basically two amps in one.
One channel for the clean (low end) and one for the distorted part.

I really like the sounds you can get out of this amp.




So I guess it's all a matter of taste.
I personally don't care for the bottomless bass of Dino Jr. (but you guessed that already  )

I hate it. There I said it. I know it's low pc in bass quarters and unfashionable, but I abhor that abrasive sound this thing emits. I don't know what's worse, the guy's Austrian accent or the amp's sound. If you gave me that thing, I'd probably return it to the shop and say something is horribly wrong with it! 

In the 70ies, for years I clamored for an amp with huge headroom for low-end and zero - and I mean ZERO - distortion, I wanted it loud AND clean. Sometime in the mid-80ies, amps appeared that could actually deliver that. I'm not reversing gear now.  I never want to sound again like I had to when I started out and had to compete with guitar amps so much louder than my bass amps. Distortion to me was the sound of failure trying to keep up.

And for the record, I never liked Dug Pinnick's bass sound either, it was the one thing about King's X that never appealed to me at all. (Nor did I like Jaco's sound. His playing was exquisite, but his sound an acquired taste.)

Not to be misunderstood, I don't mind a little overdrive and even some background noise, but for me a bass needs to have ultimate torque in the sub-lows, like here:

[Basvarken]

Can't remember if this was posted earlier in this thread. But here's the late great Paco de Lucia. In his accompanying band a bass player with a Ripper