Bass into guitar cab without octave up?

[gg69]

Hello djentle people! Let me hear your ideas!
This is the deal: I am currently on a djent/stoner/instrumental project with a drummer, only on this one I am playing a 8-string guitar dropped to E. It sounds delish but we often miss a bass to accompany.
I have both guitar and bass stacks, and was thinking about splitting the signal into both cabs, "Royal Blood style". BUT! I prefer to play bass. And, since I want to replace the 8-string guitar dropped to E, I wouldn't be using and octave up into the guitar amp.
I would like to hear your opinions on how to accomplish this without blowing the guitar speakers. Don't be afraid to get technical =]
Opinions on tone are also appreciated.
My guitar amp is a Peavey 6505 into a Marshal AVT412XA (4x12 for moving air) and a Harley Benton 212 Vintage (2x12 Celestion V30 for the nice crispy tone). I use two noise gates, have several overdrives as boost to try, compressor and a 10-band EQ. Also I have a simple high-pass filter which could be useful.
If plan A fails, plan B is using the guitar and trying to make it sound like a bass.

 

[beans-on-toast]

I did the six string guitar into an octave down pedal into a bass amp to derive the bass. I used a fuzz on the bass so it didn’t need to be as low end pure as a real bass guitar.

 

[gg69]

Cool. Thanks for the reply!

I intend for my bass sound to have a lot of dirt on it. I love overdrives on bass. I own a couple of fuzz pedals, too.

But any thoughts on making a bass sound like a tight metal guitar (as much as possible) without octave up?

I did the six string guitar into an octave down pedal into a bass amp to derive the bass. I used a fuzz on the bass so it didn’t need to be as low end pure as a real bass guitar.

 

[HaphAsSard]

Cool. Thanks for the reply!

I intend for my bass sound to have a lot of dirt on it. I love overdrives on bass. I own a couple of fuzz pedals, too.

But any thoughts on making a bass sound like a tight metal guitar (as much as possible) without octave up?

You're on the right track already, in that you're aware you should split your signal into a bass and a guitar path (sorry I can't be of help re splitters), and that the guitar side should be high-passed. (Is your HPF adjustable? A little over 100Hz, if the slope is steep enough, should be enough to protect the Celestions; higher up if not. Do some trials with clean tone, and verify when they start farting out.)

As I mentioned in this recent post,
HOW DO I MAKE MY BASS SOUND LIKE A GUITAR(DISTORTION!)
IMO the missing ingredient in these discussions is gauges. They should be comparable to what you use on guitar, in order for the tone to be similar. This of course presents potential playability problems (but possibly not to you, thanks to your experience with the 8-string), but also ones of tone at the bass side of the signal chain: it may need some pretty radical EQing in order to restore bass. OTOH, if the bass signal is kept clean, you could also boost some high mids at the bass side, right where the freq response of the Celestions at the other side has gaps. This may create an interesting effect.

 

[gg69]

Great insights! Thanks a lot. My HPF is indeed adjustable. I got it because I want to mess with E0 on bass, but I think it should be of great help with this project too.

Cheers!

You're on the right track already, in that you're aware you should split your signal into a bass and a guitar path (sorry I can't be of help re splitters), and that the guitar side should be high-passed. (Is your HPF adjustable? A little over 100Hz, if the slope is steep enough, should be enough to protect the Celestions; higher up if not. Do some trials with clean tone, and verify when they start farting out.)

As I mentioned in this recent post,
HOW DO I MAKE MY BASS SOUND LIKE A GUITAR(DISTORTION!)
IMO the missing ingredient in these discussions is gauges. They should be comparable to what you use on guitar, in order for the tone to be similar. This of course presents potential playability problems (but possibly not to you, thanks to your experience with the 8-string), but also ones of tone at the bass side of the signal chain: it may need some pretty radical EQing in order to restore bass. OTOH, if the bass signal is kept clean, you could also boost some high mids at the bass side, right where the freq response of the Celestions at the other side has gaps. This may create an interesting effect.

 

[beans-on-toast]

Cool. Thanks for the reply!

I intend for my bass sound to have a lot of dirt on it. I love overdrives on bass. I own a couple of fuzz pedals, too.

But any thoughts on making a bass sound like a tight metal guitar (as much as possible) without octave up?

An approach is to use a stereo bass such as a ric, neck pickup goes to the bass amp, the bridge one goes to the guitar amp. A treble booster on the guitar channel will boost the high end coupled with EQ on the amp. HPF is part of the answer as well but not the same as a treble booster.

When Lemmy recorded he wanted just high end at the mixing board. He wanted bass to sound like a guitar. It’s because his high frequency hearing was lost.

It’s important to watch this.


Another approach is to use a 12 string bass like Cheap Trick does. Again they use a guitar amp and a bass amp. This is a pretty radical and expensive approach through. It can be EQ’ed for more high end.

 

[el murdoque]

I'd start experimenting with a HPF and some sort of EQ.
Since you're bi-amping you can easily cut some content, because the bass amp will provide the lows.

 

[gg69]

Neat ideas. I remember seeing a video on YouTube by some guy doing exactly what you said, but on a guitar: 2 instrument outputs, bridge pickup to guitar amp, neck pickup to bass amp.

An approach is to use a stereo bass such as a ric, neck pickup goes to the bass amp, the bridge one goes to the guitar amp. A treble booster on the guitar channel will boost the high end coupled with EQ on the amp. HPF is part of the answer as well but not the same as a treble booster.

When Lemmy recorded he wanted just high end at the mixing board. He wanted bass to sound like a guitar. It’s because his high frequency hearing was lost.

It’s important to watch this.


Another approach is to use a 12 string bass like Cheap Trick does. Again they use a guitar amp and a bass amp. This is a pretty radical and expensive approach through. It can be EQ’ed for more high end.