Anyone using the Helix with a double bass?

[ricksteruk]

I play double bass on quite a lot of my regular folk gigs (when travel allows.. it's bass guitar or ukelele bass in a squeeze!)

 

I have two pickups on my DB, one magnetic and a piezo that I mix and eq in my Euphonic Audio Doubler amp.  It works great, but sometimes I wish I had a compressor or a bit more comprehensive EQ.  Also if I want to swap to Electric bass for a tune I need to unplug from the amp and fiddle the with amp EQ and level.

 

The Helix could be a very handy tool for this scenario.  Anyone tried it with a double bass?

 

I also play a bit of mandolin and occasionally acoustic guitar in this band.. I bet the Helix will be awesome for this.. I can use an XLR to send these to the PA and the jack to go to my bass amp as a monitor.. nice.

 

EDIT: By the way the main reason I've got the Helix is to use with my guitar rig of course :)

[roscoe5]

Dude, Helix on Double Bass is a great idea! I have a double bass gig tomorrow.  I may give it a go if I can get a preset setup.

 

I have a Schaller magnetic pickup, K&K Bass Max, Barcus Berry 1360B bass transducer bridge, and a K&K PRO ST Preamp,  I run only 1 of the two piezos depending on the gig type.  I had been running that into a Markbass Compressore and Markbass Super Booster pedal for VLE & VLF filter (like a super easy EQ), boost, and DI out.

 

With Helix multi-in, I shoould be able to run a stereo cable from the stereo jack snapped between strings below the bridge to the Helix and a Y cable to split it between say guitar in and aux in or something.  The Aux in may be stereo, but I'll have to test it as I need to control each input separately. 

 

I too bought Helix for guitar, but found it great for electric bass at home or on a gig.  Cant believe I haven't tried it on Double Bass.

[ricksteruk]

Looks like the aux in is mono from the manual. :(

 

The Returns are selectable to instrument level.. I wonder if a magnetic pickup would work well enough directly into those?

 

Another option for the using the Helix with DB would be to use a mic into the XLR input which could be routed to the FOH via the XLRs mixed in with the pickups, and then the stage amp could just have the pick ups to avoid mic feedback.

[roscoe5]

That's a good idea too.  I forgot I had a K&K golden bullet mic that came with the K&K piezo and preamp set.  NEVER had good luck with that not feeding back on stage, so threw it in the box of misfit toys and forgot about it.  The 3M dual lock is still inside my F hole...no jokes ;)

 

So theoretically I could connect 4 signals to Helix

• Schaller magnetic (punchy)
• K&K Bass Max piezo (thumpy boomy)
• BB transducer bridge (singing and snappy)
• K&K mic (sweet and airy)

Have to run a snake to my DB ;)  JK, I could do it with two stereo cables.

 

But man, if feedback started on stage I would be scrambling.  I would probably set up a block that I could use as a kill switch on each piezo and mic signal path, like a volume all the way down, until I was comfortable with the mix live.  No issue with the magnetic, it's always my safety net.

 

Foot edit mode would be our friend for levels and eq on each path.  Will have to take care assigning levels and probably EQ to the footswitches so that they are accessible in foot edit mode.

[ricksteruk]

Yeah the kill switch idea for the piezo and mics would be a good failsafe mechanism.

 

I don't think I'd put any mic signal through the stage amp - I've tried that before too and it just feeds back far too easily - I'd only send the mic into the FOH mix with a blend of piezo and magnetic.  

 

At the moment with my EA amp I find I get a well controlled low end from my magnetic pickup, and I use my piezo for capturing more of the woody midrange character.  The Helix would give me a lot more control over the EQ of each signal... And I might even try using a Crossover Split block so I could compress the low end and the mid/high separately.

[roscoe5]

Yeah, agreed.  No mic to stage.  I use my mag & piezo in the same manner.