Should basslines be in mono or stereo? When using bass synths like Novation Bass-station you can only open them up in mono. So Im wondering if when using other vst's or hardware synths when it comes to basslines. Should I be making my basslines in mono?

thanks for any advice.

There's no any rules about this. As long as it sounds good it can be stereo or mono or whatever you want.

basslines should, more or less, be firmly placed in the center of the sound field. this doesn't mean that it can't have a slight delay or a little bit of another effect on it, but for the most part the "rule" is to have the bass right in the center with the kick - to keep the track grounded.

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Originally posted by retrobyte basslines should, more or less, be firmly placed in the center of the sound field. this doesn't mean that it can't have a slight delay or a little bit of another effect on it, but for the most part the "rule" is to have the bass right in the center with the kick - to keep the track grounded.

I guess the question was about mono/stereo , rather than left/right or center Hehe that would be funny to ask a question if the bass has to be on the left , on the right or in the center Same as for kick.

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Originally posted by Liquid8 I guess the question was about mono/stereo , rather than left/right or center

Well stereo usually means it isn't exactly center. There would be no point to have a "stereo" bass, that feeds the same signal into both channels.

As for the question, I'm with retrobyte: Mono

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Originally posted by Liquid8 I guess the question was about mono/stereo , rather than left/right or center Hehe that would be funny to ask a question if the bass has to be on the left , on the right or in the center Same as for kick.

well, when someone's talking about having a mono instrument in the mix, they usually mean putting it right in the center of the track - which means having the exact same information going to both the right the left. i hope this is what he was talking about

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Mono - always. Any effects you apply to the bass should be in stereo.
In fact nearly all sound sources should be in mono, it's the mix that's stereo.

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Originally posted by Phantax Should basslines be in mono or stereo? When using bass synths like Novation Bass-station you can only open them up in mono. So Im wondering if when using other vst's or hardware synths when it comes to basslines. Should I be making my basslines in mono? thanks for any advice.

if you use other vst's or hardware, it might have some internal chorus,phaser,delay effect so it's stereo.. and you don't have to convert it to mono to sound right Even if the original sound is mono you'd better make it stereo by using some delay effect, because it sounds much better when it's stereo
But yes, of course, the original sound has to be in the center... no doubt about that.

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Originally posted by Liquid8 if you use other vst's or hardware, it might have some internal chorus,phaser,delay effect so it's stereo..

Not necessarily. Those effects can be mono also.

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Even if the original sound is mono you'd better make it stereo by using some delay effect, because it sounds much better when it's stereo

I disagree. Low frequency bass should be left alone. Using stereo delay on it will definitely _not_ sound good.

mono jigga, chillin with the kick.

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Originally posted by Chronosis I disagree. Low frequency bass should be left alone. Using stereo delay on it will definitely _not_ sound good.

maybe the sub-bass, yes... but not the mid-bass

From what I gather, sub bass is usually defined as the bass around 40-80 Hz and is usually a sine wave type synth stacked on top of (or under as the case may be) your main bass to give it extra power. This should definately be mono.

Your main bass can occupy any bass to mid frequencies I guess but in my experience this should always be mono too. I've never had much luck with stereo bass. They always seem to go out of phase too easily and can cancel each other out.

It depends though, something like a big 303 type lead, which is technically a bassline could have a lot of mid freq action going on or have stereo effects on it which might mean you want to make this a stereo signal.

I would say it depends laregely on the bandwidth that the signal is occupying. Something like the 303 example would probably benefit from 2 instances of it. One cut above 250Hz of thereabouts that is mono and one that is cut below 250Hz with all the stereo fx on it to give it more character and sparkle. Though this would really only be necessary if your bassline is a main focus of the track. Usually a lead synth would sit on top of the bassline and do all the stereo funky stuff for you.

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Last edited by Axolotyl on Jul-15-2005 at 01:19