Never heard bass like it...

[PJTX100]

...even the keys on the keyboard are shaking as I type this.

The album is Siren, by a band called Redshift. The thing producing the bass is a heavily sequenced moog modular. This thing goes lower than a low thing. For those of you with the really "big beast" subs this will probably cause foundation damage of some sort.

Whoever is doing the upcoming sub test should have this as a test disc. Not particularly easy to find, pm me if needed...PJ

 

[URL]

...had a quick look for it - where did you find it?

D

 

[Magnet & Steel]

ive found a pretty stunning sub bass track that sounds like it goes quite low and its from vinyl. ive recorded it as a wav and it does indeed work very well from my pc. ive tried to find out how low it goes, but for the life of me i cant get spectrum laboratory to work properly (hi nimby). anyway, its an old dance tune, Urban Shakedown featuring Mickey Finn - Some Justice.

i dont think we are allowed to swap tracks even for research purposes, so good luck with it

 

[PJTX100]

...had a quick look for it - where did you find it?

D

www.redshift.biz

 

[Crustyloafer]

What sort of music is it. Any chance you could e-maail me an mp3 of one of the track so I can get an idea if its my sort of thing?

 

[Nimby]

Well I don't know why you can't use Spectrum Lab.
No problem over here.

Isn't there any way a short snatch of sound file can be shared by everybody on a forum? Or would that be illegal file sharing? There's no sign of file "tasters" on the Red Shift link. They missed a chance to share their material there.

If anybody wants to send me the file I'll push it through SpectrumLab and report back. I promise not to listen to it.

I'm not sure I approve of this sudden interest in software. It's supposed to be a sign of satisfaction with your kit. And we can't have any of that! Or there wouldn't be anything to talk about of the forum!

Nimby

 

[PJTX100]

What sort of music is it. Any chance you could e-maail me an mp3 of one of the track so I can get an idea if its my sort of thing?

www.synthmusicdirect.com seem to have sound samples

click on the "sound" link on the left

samples are relatively lo-fi but they give you an idea of the style

anyone into Tangerine Dream's seminal 'Rubycon' or 'Ricochet' albums will go completely ape over Redshift - even if you don't like electronic music, the sonics are completely awesome

when it comes to synthesisers, there is nothing to match the sound of a moog modular - it blows away the modern software/PC based synthesisers

...PJ

 

[Nimby]

The downloaded files seem to be protected from being kept on my computer. They can only behave as temporary internet files. Perhaps I'm wrong.

It plays okay but when I tried to save it as a Real Player file, to do the analysis, my computer froze up solid. Woops.

I did a virus scan but found nothing.

As such I can't really see how I can run it through Spectrum Lab.

My guess from listening to the bass line only on the sub was that it reaches around 30Hz. But it's very difficult to be sure about these things. I had the room rattling on a fairly low sub gain setting so there may have been some inaudible tones hidden away under the surface.

It is certainly very crisp in the way the bass starts and stops.

Nimby

 

[Nimby]

Update: Sometimes the simple way is the easiest.

I just opened Spectrum Lab and played the Siren track and it showed up nicely. There is a lot happening at 40, 60, 80 and 120Hz. But nothing below that. So my estimate was competely wrong. It only sounds deep. Typical

Nimby

 

[eviljohn2]

What's this Spectrum Lab malarkey all about? I've never heard of it before.

And where's the sudden interest in software? Are there more toys that I should be downloading?

 

[Nimby]

We're not telling!

Nimby

 

[eviljohn2]

Awww... Go on.

I'll be good.

 

[Nimby]

Nope!

Oh alright then.

It's not rocket science. Just look for Spectrum Lab and download it.

It gives a running "waterfall" graph of audio files. Not as sophisticated as some which you have to pay for! Which have spikes in 3D to represent level. This has colours to show the true frequencies of audio signals.

Open SpectrumLab and just play a music file on your computer and it runs automatically. Brightness of colours shows level. Left to right shows frequency. (adjustable) North and south shows time or duration. You can even "capture" a screen shot with the button. It saves it to a file which you can look at later.

I haven't looked into all its possiibilities. Though I often narrow the frequency screen width to the bass area only to analyse bass lines on CDs and DVDs.

The software is written by a clever radio ham who shares it freely.
It comes as two zipped parts which have to be opened into the same file and then the first part opened.

http://www.qsl.net/dl4yhf/spectra1.html

Nimby

 

[eviljohn2]

Thanks Nimby, I had a look at that when I was trying to find a decent free RTA program but didn't know it did exciting things like that too.

<---- Goes to investigate further.

 

[PJTX100]

There is a lot happening at 40, 60, 80 and 120Hz. But nothing below that. So my estimate was competely wrong. It only sounds deep. Typical

Nimby

Is this because it seems to be just a 56K MP3? The sound clips sound very weedy to the CD.

Anyway, I'm impressed!

Cheers...PJ

 

[eviljohn2]

Is this because it seems to be just a 56K MP3? The sound clips sound very weedy to the CD.

Anyway, I'm impressed!

Cheers...PJ

I'm not sure, MP3's may not be the highest fidelity format but most encoders tend to leave the bass fairly untouched due to the low frequencies involved.

 

[Nimby]

It was impressive even from a computer sound card on a downloaded file.

Does anyone actually know the lower frequency limit of MP3 files?

Surely they don't just die below 40Hz?

Isn't Snapbug using the same system for its test tones?

They go a long way down.

Nimby

 

[PJTX100]

I'm not sure, MP3's may not be the highest fidelity format but most encoders tend to leave the bass fairly untouched due to the low frequencies involved.

From what I know of mp3 (which may not be much! ) 96K is usually quoted as the minimum for decent sound quality, usually 128K is preferred. 56K is primarily used just to give you an idea of the style of music.

You may be right about low frequencies though...PJ

 

[benje]

Nimby,

i've tried that software that you referred to earlier but in all the waterfall charts when i'm playing music, i never get anything on the chart as louder than the dark blue (~ -90db?), initially i though the internal volume must be low or something but it is maxed out and obviously the external volume shouldn't affect this - i've looked through the options and the only thing i can see is to change the sensitivity from -120db -> 0db to -120db -> 30db or something which doesn't seem right at all. Any ideas?

wrt, your question about the cut off on LF in mp3s, i've encoded all my albums as vbr mp3 via lame and can't say i notice any difference in bass response... certainly it goes down to 20hz and with my DD15 mic, i have definitely seen activity on the graph down to 15hz (though as this is music it rarely ever gets that low!).

I have the snapbug tones and again definitely see response down to 15hz (as far down as the DD graph shows btw!) so there's certainly no absolute cut off but i suppose it could be rolled off? Some of the folks on hydrogen audio might know in a lot more detail!

 

[Nimby]

Dunno.

Are you playing your music on your computer CD/DVD drive?
Or on an external system and feeding your computer soundcard with that?

I use both methods mentioned above and it works fine.
Slow computer perhaps? Are you using Real PLayer or Media PLayer?
Try swapping over to the one your aren't using?

Is the Sp'Lab recognising the correct soundcard?
Go into Sp'Lab "audio files" (button on left) then "audio input" and check it's looking at the right soundcard. It may be reading your onboard card instead of your add-on card (if any).

Hope this helps
Nimby

 

[Magnet & Steel]

ok nimby, i cant get it to work for the life of me so ill do i high quality smallish chunk and email it to you

itll be 320k done with lame encoder.

damn i hope its low now after all this

 

[eviljohn2]

Just remember that a loud bass note that's been mixed "forward" in the recording can appear lower than a genuine low note.

 

[Magnet & Steel]

i agree, but like i said in my pm, i was just curious about this one as its quite powerful for one recorded from a vinyl

cheers mate

 

[Magnet & Steel]

oops, i didnt even pm you did i doh! sorry

and nimby, it sounds almost as low in the mp3 as it does in the raw wav, so should be a good isdh comparison

 

[eviljohn2]

You didn't PM me, but I'll happily have a listen if you want.