why did the 80s have no bass ?

[c s]

no joke, i really wonder why you can recognise 80s productions instantly by the lack of bass. pop, electronics, but also even hiphop from the 80s had no deep bass. but why ? as in the 90s it was the old analogue machines from the 70s/early 80s that provided the bass for techno, hiphop, dnb etc. of course, i know that these machines weren't used anymore in the 80s when fm came up. but fm is also capable of producing much deeper bass than in any 80s production i know. it's the same with bassdrums i think. any ideas ? the norm must have been different in producing, it just 'wasn't allowed' to go below a certain number of hertz ?

[Will O The Wisp]

in the 80s the main porpose was to "pack" as many minutes per side as you can, so there were records with 30, 40 minutes per side. The record companies had many different ways of doing it. One of the way was to cut low frequencies (they take up the most space on the record).

[Django]

what about depeche mode?
they made several things between 82 - 89 like "BLACK CELEBRATION", in which they mostly used an old technosaurus synth and dark station samples.
in my opinion very deep for this time..?

[c s]

technosaurus? dark station? is it a joke or do machines with names like that really exist? lol still not a vintage synth expert... but if they exist i want one of each for x-mas.

i remember some mixes from depeche mode from the black celebration period, especially a great b-side mix from fly on the windscreen. yes some bass sounds were comparably deep but still not half as deep as today, were they ?

album side length - could be a reason, but even on 12" and at the end of the 80s when cd was really taking over it was still the same. perhaps 70s tangerine dream records have more bass than those from the late 80s.

i still believe there must have been some secret agreement. ;)

[platinumray]

i blame the charlie.

[Loz]

Hip hop originally had no bass out of necessity. Hip hop originated from the streets and clubs where they didn't have any decent sound systems. So the music had to transfer over crappy PAs. Crappy PAs don't do bass very well, so they didn't use it.

True story.

[boffin]

I read that 90 percent of the Dx7's sent in for repair still had their presets intact. The DX7 was THE synth of the eighties. maybe thats why. You ever here those presets. not too bassy.

[Django]

Originally posted by c s - i like feis18 ;)
technosaurus? dark station? is it a joke or do machines with names like that really exist?

they do

some infos in german:

klick (http://www.synrise.de/docs/types/t/technosaurus.htm)

some bass sounds were comparably deep but still not half as deep as today, were they ?

modern technology?
i think sub bass ex 90-80hz isn´t heard in " more normal" music, isn´t it..?
Whether now or less in the past...

[c s]

Originally posted by Django
i like feis18 ;)

oh yes, good to hear that ! ;)


Originally posted by Django

some infos in german:

hmm but according to the info there all those machines are from the 90s ?!


Originally posted by Django

i think sub bass ex 90-80hz isn´t heard in " more normal" music, isn´t it..?
Whether now or less in the past...

if i find the time i'll look at frequency analysis and compare some cds from 80s (unremastered ones) and today. i wouldn't be surprised if normal 80s pop didn't go below 200hz or so.

[alex cortex]

i do think they go way below 200 hz, but soundpressure used to be created by a different combination of frequencies then nowadays. if you look at a frequenzy analyzer listening to some 80s pop or disco stuff, you can see that all the levels build one horizontal line, that was just the way it was mixed. today the highest level will be the 63hz and then going down in a slope. and regarding the thing with the early hiphop street PAs: i once met a guy who used to be the soundman for melle mel et al. he maintained, maybe even built (don´t remeber though) the PAs for those block-parties and said that the sound was astonishingly well balanced. anyway they used to play lots of 70s funk-records and they have a more "natural" feel than 80s stuff. even stuff done with synthesizers in the 70s used to be a lot warmer, so it has got to do with the mixing. i´m thinking of hancock´s "feets don´t fail me now (79)" or "secrets (76)" or marc moulin´s "placebo sessions (71-74)".

[c s]

Originally posted by alex cortex
today the highest level will be the 63hz and then going down in a slope.

aha, that could be it. still had no time but i could imagine that well.

Originally posted by alex cortex
anyway they used to play lots of 70s funk-records and they have a more "natural" feel than 80s stuff. even stuff done with synthesizers in the 70s used to be a lot warmer

well, i didn't want to start another one of those old 'warm/cold' discussions again lol but as i said, the only 70s records i own are by tangerine dream (and kraftwerk perhaps) and i also had the impression there's more pressure in them and i wondered why it had to decrease in the 80s. i don't think fm can provide no pressure/bass though.

apart from the 80s bass thing it seems 80s tracks were generally compressed very lightly compared to todays radio music that almost blasts the speakers. i wonder if you could play that back on your 70s hifi without distortion. ;)

i came to this when i wanted to try to mix mp3s of techno and ebm/new beat/pop - it seems difficult. as everybody knows i'm no dj anyway but soundwise i think many tracks would need to be mixed with another, a 'real' beat/bass all the time. playing them pure would sound really strange in a club i guess. except for some maybe. hmm perhaps traktor supports vst plugins so i could simply add a multiband compressor to 'the 80s deck'. :D

[alex cortex]

for further research on that topic (70s/80s sound and compression) i would recommend those three compilations, they give some interisting insight (and besides contain excellent music)

disco not disco vol.1 and vol.2 (strut)
in the beginning there was rhythm (soul jazz records)

added later:
to not make it such an advertisement, i´d like to explain why i consider them as being so good. all those tracks do not really match any cliché of anything. they are weird and different. i find them helpful cos those tracks show me that there was interest in not using machines in the "correct" studio-use manner even in dance music (for example compression or mixing) whereas for example mtume did really match into some "sound of the season". dub aswell had its dissenters, i think of all those really odd lee perry recordings.

[wheezer]

Originally posted by alex cortex
... cos those tracks show me that there was interest in not using machines in the "correct" studio-use manner even in dance music (for example compression or mixing) whereas for example mtume did really match into some "sound of the season". dub aswell had its dissenters, i think of all those really odd lee perry recordings. [/B]

... or were people just not technically able to use the machines properly...?

[alex cortex]

i don´t think so. if the 2-track master itself in the end sounds really good, it seems more that musicians were looking for different and maybe new sounds and grooves, whereas the recording itself was done properly. of course i don´t know that for sure but from my experience it sounds like that. to give you an example: cabaret voltaire - eight crepuscule tracks (1987). i´m quite sure they absolutely knew what they were doing.