Markbass TA 503 - Manual (Page 7)

07
eQuAlIZAtIon
Markbass amps are designed to faithfully reproduce the natural sound of your bass. If you have a good instrument, very little equalization (EQ)—if any—should be required. Bass guitars produce a surprisingly wide
range of frequencies—from extremely low frequencies that are more felt than heard, to extremely high frequencies that pass through your cabinet’s tweeter and are barely audible to the human ear.
As you experiment with your EQ settings, you will notice that all the different frequency ranges play essential roles in making up your bass tone:
LOW frequencies constitute music’s sonic foundation—they give power to your sound, physically resonating your listeners’ bodies (and yours!), sometimes even causing people to move and dance!
LOW MIDs (“MF LOW” or Mid Frequency Low) make your bass sound loud, projecting the sound over long distances, “filling the room.”
HIGH MIDs (“MF HIGH” or Mid Frequency High) convey the pitch of the notes that you play. Clarity of this range ensures that the melodies in your bass lines are heard. If detail is missing in this range, your melodic
contribution to the music will suffer.
HIGH frequencies carry the percussive content of your playing—the attack of your notes, the sound of your finger or pick passing over the string, fret noise, and in the case of slap bass, the “tick” noise produced when
the strings bounce off the frets.
If any one of these frequency ranges is neglected or poorly represented by your amp, you are not hearing an accurate representation of the sound that your bass is generating. Since the TA501 has been designed to
give you clear, detailed and musical sound at all frequencies, when the amp is set “flat”—with all EQ knobs at 12 o’clock—you should hear a very true mirror of the sound of your bass.
However, the following circumstances will require you to use equalization:
1.
The signal from your bass is lacking output level in one of the frequency ranges described above.
2. The room or venue you’re playing in has poor acoustics and excites a certain frequency. For example, if you’re playing on a hollow stage, certain low frequencies may sound disproportionately
loud or out of control, and you may notice that every time you play a certain note, it sounds much louder than all the others. In these cases the offending frequency needs to be identified and reduced.
3. You’re seeking to alter the basic sound of your instrument in order to achieve a particular musical effect.
Equalization should be treated as fine-tuning. Spend some time listening to your bass through the amp with all the EQ controls in the neutral (12 o’clock) position before you start changing the settings. You’re likely
to need little or no equalization!
However, if and when equalization is required, you will find this amp’s EQ to be powerful and impressively detailed.
The LOW EQ (7) control on the TA501 is set to a center frequency of 40 Hz. This means that it either boosts or cuts the volume of the frequencies around 40 Hz, to a maximum of 16 decibels.
The LOW-MID (MF LOW) (8) and HIGH-MID (MF HIGH) (10) controls are semi-parametric EQs. This means you have more specific control over what frequency you boost or cut. The knobs on the bottom row, MF LOW
(8) and MF HIGH (10), determine the center frequency of the range to be controlled. The knobs above, MF LOW LEVEL (9) and MF HIGH LEVEL (11), determine how much the frequency area selected will be turned
up or down, again to a maximum of 16 decibels. The HIGH EQ (12) control boosts or cuts the frequencies around 4.5 kHz, by as much as 16 decibels. The Q on this EQ (the range of frequency controlled) is quite wide,
spanning from about 2 kHz to about 30 kHz. If you need to reduce an offensive frequency using the semi-parametric EQ controls, start by turning the EQ’s LEVEL knob counter-clockwise (usually this will be in the
low-mids)—try around the 9 or 10 o’clock position. Play the note on your bass that sounds out of control. Then gradually turn the MF LOW (8) knob or MF HIGH (10) knob if the frequency is higher until you notice the
annoying sound go away. Unfortunately bad room acoustics can be very hard to compensate for... but you’ll find that the EQ on this amplifier is detailed and powerful enough that you should be able to fine tune
your amp to sound great anywhere!
Vle and VPf fIlters
The TA501 amplifier features two magic knobs that alter the equalization of your bass signal with specially formulated musical results. Most players use these controls more than the EQ since they were designed
specifically to meet the practical needs of bassists.
The VLE (14) (Vintage Loudspeaker Emulator) filters out high frequencies to give you a mellower, less modern sound. As you turn the knob clockwise, you will find that a wider and wider range of high frequencies
gets cut (see page 11 for a graph of this filter’s function). This EQ effect is especially useful for acoustic and older styles of music.
The VPF (15) (Variable Pre-shape Filter) boosts lows (around 35 Hz) and highs (around 10 kHz), and cuts mids at 380 Hz. This filter has very powerful uses for rock music and is also a favorite of many slap bass players
(see page 11 for a graph of this filter’s function).
Again, we recommend you start off with these filters in the off position, and dial them in gradually to discover what effect they have. Explore them separately first—but you may find that using both in combination
can lead to some very appealing and musical results!