Best compressor for bass

[Jon]

Can anyone suggest a high-quality compressor for use with bass (Jazz bass into EBS 650w head)? The head has built-in compressor but I was wondering if there's anything else out there? Pedals seem to add too much noise, so maybe a rack-unit with some gate of noise reduction/gate?

[Denyle_Guitars]

Try a DBX or Drawmer compressor (or most fet, vca types). Maybe a RNLA, but I'd avoid the RNC & ART VLA (and most optical types) units as they aren't aggressive enough.

[alanbass1]

I use a TL Audio Ivory 5021 valve compressor with my Eden WT800B and this sounds great. Very natural souding with great control and very little noise.

http://www.tlaudio.co.uk/tlaudio/docs/home/home_1.shtml

[serrit]

http://www.ev-b.com/compfaq.html

[Thor]

Very happy with my EBS dyna comp. Have not tried a lot of other units.

Cheers,

Edward

[fizzogy]

I use the BBE sonic stomp(box) $100. It's a soft knee compressor with an optional pad and it's pretty quite.

[Aaron Cheney]

Go here: http://www.ev-b.com/compressors.html


All of your wildest dreams will come true.

A

[James Hart]

I replaced my Ashly rack compressor with a Ross clone from Analogman. I was looking for a little more FX typed tone... harder squish if you will. I'm gonna swap it out with his B-CompROSSor since it's the Ross clone AND an Orange Squeezer in the same pedal. Tony Levin uses the Bi-CompROSSer in his pedal board.

[TedintheShed]

This really depends on what you are trying to accomplish with the compressor- speaker protection? Signal leveling? "Squish" effect? "Fatten" your tone?

Different compressors do different things well.

Can anyone suggest a high-quality compressor for use with bass (Jazz bass into EBS 650w head)? The head has built-in compressor but I was wondering if there's anything else out there? Pedals seem to add too much noise, so maybe a rack-unit with some gate of noise reduction/gate?

[Zim]

don't laugh, but check out Visual Sounds Rout 66, it is a OD and Comp in one pedal. I had a real old one that I just loved the Comp side for bass! The od....well it sounded good with guitar anyways.

[RocketMusic]

Check out T-Rex's new Squeezer pedal. It's a tube-based compressor pedal that they designed just for bass. The Squeezer has lots of control, so it can be as subtle or as obvious as you like.

http://www.t-rex-engineering.com/default.asp?show=page&id=2672

As with most T-Rex gear, it ain't cheap... but it's awesome!

[Podgorny]

If you're looking for a fairly idiot-proof, great-sounding compressor for your bass rig, it's hard to go wrong with a DBX 160. Any revision will work fine.