Tracy Chapman bass & low frequency response/sound

[Matt Werking]

Also thanks to all the rest who have posted, good stuff. Starting to make sense to me more.

 

[KEW]

...People, it appears, don't seek out to be bummed out...

Then explain the popularity of Country Music!

 

[Pogre]

Thanks Irvrobinson, thats helps alot, so would you say when you listened to fast car that the low bass notes blended in or stood out a bit or alot compared to the rest? just to clarify

The more you turn the bass up, the more it stands out? It's not strong bass or very deep, but it's there.

 

[Matt Werking]

Ok thanks, on my setup i have no gain controls of any kind. Other than volume. There are no EQ, no bass or treble settings. Thats why im making sure its correct as is and there isnt something else wrong somewhere as i expected deeper bass on this track just due to how it sounds in a car, on a normal radio or cd player or even pc, but those all have subs where my main system has only 2 tower speakers.

 

[Pogre]

Ok thanks, on my setup i have no gain controls of any kind. Other than volume. There are no EQ, no bass or treble settings. Thats why im making sure its correct as is and there isnt something else wrong somewhere as i expected deeper bass on this track just due to how it sounds in a car, on a normal radio or cd player or even pc, but those all have subs where my main system has only 2 tower speakers.

When I don't give it a bump or enable any eq, it's not very strong. Normally I have some eq going on, dynamic eq and a 6db boost on my subs. If your friend has a similar system with subwoofers it would definitely sound more bassy and maybe even feel a little deeper.

 

[Matt Werking]

Thanks Pogre!!

 

[highfigh]

Out of curiosity I took out my three favorite Tracy Chapman albums (her first three), including Fast Car, and sampled various songs I remembered have significant bass lines, and used my spectrum analyzer software with the mic at my listening seat.

All three albums have similar spectrum signatures. Most of the low bass energy is +/- 10Hz of 50Hz, with some occasional dips on all three albums into the high 30Hz range, and one or two little spikes at 28Hz (on the Mountains O' Things track). Nothing to use in a subwoofer survey.

This sort of spectrum does excite many peoples' room modes, and with speakers that may have been designed with a low bass hump, and a little bass level bump on an AVR that many people I know use, could easily result in a 15db+ response peak at about 50Hz. Strong 50Hz can sound impressive to the uninitiated, and some sounds that reach down to 40Hz can lead people to believe these albums have a lot of bass, but they don't.

Played back on a relatively accurate system, these albums do have a prominent bass line from electric basses and synthesizers, but it shouldn't sound loud or out of proportion. The occasional 40-45Hz notes will sound like real bass on a good system, but that's most of what there is to hear.

Did you connect it using the line in? I don't remember seeing many recordings that didn't peak close to flat when I would look at the Sony ES EQ/RTA when I was selling audio in a store. They can emphasize certain frequencies and process the sound to make it sound like it's warmer, brighter, more bass-heavy, but most peaked close to flat.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Are you sure you are not mistaking Fletcher-Munson for Robinson-Dadson? It's a common error.

How is the new standard worse for perception purposes? It's based on updated research. The Fletcher-Munson curves were established in 1933! Audiology techniques have hugely improved since then.

Well, now I don't know what I was looking at all these years. My bad.
You are correct, must have been the R-D curve.

then, there is not a lot of difference. Sorry about all that.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Thanks Irvrobinson, thats helps alot, so would you say when you listened to fast car that the low bass notes blended in or stood out a bit or alot compared to the rest? just to clarify

I'm not exactly sure how to interpret your question. I would say the bass line, such as it is at 40-50Hz, stood out on some tracks, but I'm not sure what "blended in" means. The bass lines are often obvious, as in unsubtle.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Did you connect it using the line in? I don't remember seeing many recordings that didn't peak close to flat when I would look at the Sony ES EQ/RTA when I was selling audio in a store. They can emphasize certain frequencies and process the sound to make it sound like it's warmer, brighter, more bass-heavy, but most peaked close to flat.

By "it" you mean the spectrum analyzer? It is part of the OmniMicII software I run on a laptop computer, and it uses a calibrated mic (which I stand-mount). I assume it's relatively close to accurate, because I once compared the measured results to my friend's XTZ set-up running concurrently in the same room, with the microphones next to one another, and the graphed results were within 2db of one another. That was closer than either one of us guessed they'd be. (Two completely independent devices from different sources are unlikely to be in error in similar ways.)

 

[highfigh]

By "it" you mean the spectrum analyzer? It is part of the OmniMicII software I run on a laptop computer, and it uses a calibrated mic (which I stand-mount). I assume it's relatively close to accurate, because I once compared the measured results to my friend's XTZ set-up running concurrently in the same room, with the microphones next to one another, and the graphed results were within 2db of one another. That was closer than either one of us guessed they'd be. (Two completely independent devices from different sources are unlikely to be in error in similar ways.)

Right, but that also takes the effects from the room and speakers into account, I was asking if you could go straight to the input from the CD/DVD/BD player, to get the response in the audio signal.

The response from different equalized systems in multiple rooms with decent acoustical properties is repeatable to a fairly high degree- the better live sound companies use equipment that constantly corrects for amplitude and phase automatically, so they don't need to do a sound check with an empty house and then scramble to make changes on the fly as the seats are filled or the weather changes when they're working in an outdoor venue. They set a preferred curve and the electronics do the rest. It's pretty interesting to watch this in action- TC Electronics has had this function for a long time.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Right, but that also takes the effects from the room and speakers into account, I was asking if you could go straight to the input from the CD/DVD/BD player, to get the response in the audio signal.

The response from different equalized systems in multiple rooms with decent acoustical properties is repeatable to a fairly high degree- the better live sound companies use equipment that constantly corrects for amplitude and phase automatically, so they don't need to do a sound check with an empty house and then scramble to make changes on the fly as the seats are filled or the weather changes when they're working in an outdoor venue. They set a preferred curve and the electronics do the rest. It's pretty interesting to watch this in action- TC Electronics has had this function for a long time.

My intent wasn't to do what ShadyJ does in his subwoofer candy thread. Running the digital stream through an analyzer (like WavePad) results in information that can be difficult for a novice to interpret. I was just trying to answer the question the OP had about the perceived bass in the Tracy Chapman album, and I thought the best way to do that was to run spectral analysis in-room. I agree that room effects affect the outcome, but absolute accuracy wasn't the objective in this case.