Futurology production and mixing question

[darkanddivine]

Originally Posted by Marat Sar

What's the instrument? Is it bass? Because it doesn't sound like bass guitar to me, much colder and sharper, although I can hear the picking of the strings.

Almost certain it's a bass.

Generally 2 signals are recorded to make most bass sounds on a recording. One is the direct signal (which is often mostly the middle frequencies.) This combined with an amp mic achieves the fatness of the bass and the natural sounds of string plucks etc. To get a full bass sound, this channel usually dominates, and the direct signal is subtly blended in. In the case of this song, I think it might be the opposite.

If MSP took the direct signal from the bass, made that the loudest of the 2 channels and then really tightly mixed it with the amp mic with all the bass rolled off and some fast reverb, a sound like this would be possible.

Obviously this could be wrong, but to me that is what it sounds like.