(upbeat bass music)
- Hey everyone, this is Jamahl Smith,
and today we're gonna talk about
how to make your bass guitar sound like a synth bass.
But before we hop into it,
here's a bit about myself,
I'm a bassist and also a synth bass player
whose worked with the likes of
Ella Mai, Teddy Riley, Khalid,
and many other prominent recording artists
from across the globe.
On a lot of the gigs that I've done,
and still currently doing,
bass guitar only makes up
about half of my player responsibility.
The other half is made up within playing synth bass.
For those who have no idea what synth bass is,
allow me to briefly explain.
Synth bass often referred to as key bass,
are basslines played on the keyboard through synthesis.
You can come up
with many different tones and characteristics,
that can make a song feel new age and completely different,
than playing along the standard bass guitar.
Some classic songs that include key bass
instead of bass guitar,
would be stuff like,
"Drop the Bomb" by The Gap Band,
"Flashlight" by Parliament-Funkadelic,
and "Thriller" by Michael Jackson.
In today's lesson, I will be playing
my red Fender Jaguar Bass with PJ pickups,
and I will be giving you not just one,
but two ways to modify your bass sound
to sound like a synth bass,
just in case you get to the gig
and you don't have one in your arsenal.
Let's talk about the two different techniques
we'll be approaching today.
In synthesis, you have sound waves,
which are also known as oscillators.
In many bass sounds,
you shake the oscillators
to model which tone you're going after.
Today, we'll be talking about the sine wave tone,
(bass buzzing)
and we'll be talking about the saw wave tone.
(bass buzzing)
All right, before we begin,
let's hear that saw wave tone one more time.
(bass buzzing)
Right off the bat,
I can hear the hard edge quality of the tone
versus the sine wave,
which is more round and smooth.
To achieve the saw wave tone,
we're only gonna need one tool.
Some of you might have guessed what it is,
but for those who didn't
we're gonna be using the infamous octave pedal.
The octave pedal I'm using today
only has three knobs to it.
The first, is the dry volume knob.
What we're gonna do with this knob
is match it to the volume of our bass,
so that way when we activate or bypass the pedal,
we don't have any spikes or drops in volume.
The goal for this knob
is to have one consistent volume in bass,
whether the pedal is on or off.
The next knob is the one octave down knob,
this knob gives you 12 semitones
below whatever pitch that you play.
What we're gonna do is blend it
until you find a tone that you like.
It should sound something like this.
(upbeat bass music)
The last knob we'll be talking about on this pedal,
is the two octave down knob.
This knob gives you 24 semitones
below pitch of whatever you play.
Typically, I don't use this knob in my playing
because since I'm already playing bass,
two octaves below gives me a lot of muddiness
and undistinct sound that I can't really use
on the day to day gig.
The key with this technique
is not to try to replicate
what I'm doing verbatim with each knob,
but to create a tone that works for you
and suit you best on any gig that you're doing.
Let's talk about the sine wave approach.
As I mentioned before,
the sine wave is a much more round smooth tone
versus the saw wave.
To achieve this, we won't be using any pedals,
but we will be taking a look
at our fingering hand position.
As bass players, we normally play a lot of the lines
on our back pickup,
or here on our front pickup.
But today, the technique I'm gonna be talking about
is actually playing the bass higher on the neck,
to sound something like this.
(smooth bass music)
Another other tip I will offer with this tone,
is to cut some of the highs from your bass
and maybe boost some low end with EQ.
You can add a chorus pedal,
octave pedal, distortion,
really anything you like that inspires you.
But the whole general key to this technique,
is to play the bass high up on the neck
versus back on the pickups,
so that way you get a much more smooth transient
versus a punchy sound.
Thanks for checking out this "Technique of the Week".
I hope you learn something new and useful.
If you're stuck, drop your question in the comments,
and if you're looking for more tutorials,
check us out on Fender Play, peace.