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I Need Some Help To Achieve This Tone


dat4009
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This video I believe is the best example I can provide of this tone I'm trying to match (or at least get one similar to it):

 

 

Quick run-down of my gear:

Gearbox software

Line 6 Guitarport

Jackson SLV soloist guitar

 

 

I even spent the $50 on the Metal Shop amp pack in an attempt to find the tone I'm looking for. Now, before anybody points this out to me, I am aware that the uploader of the YouTube video addressed in the comments section what settings he used to achieve this tone. I have tried these in Gearbox and had no luck.

 

 

Here is a screenshot of me trying to follow these settings in Gearbox: http://postimg.org/image/gy0l688ej/

Threshhold on Compressor is on 60, gain on 0. Threshhold on Noise gate is on -50dB, decay is 28%. I'm really not very good at this, so feel free to laugh at my ignorance here. But could anyone give me a hand? I just keep adjusting the settings and adjusting them over and over, but I'm not having any success and it's really beginning to frustrate me and make me feel stupid.

 

 

- David

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One other thing I feel I should mention is that I have also tried to download the manual (if there ever was one!) for the Metal Shop amp pack to get a better idea of how to use it, but went to the manuals section and there was nothing there for this product. Nothing.

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What is your recording setup?  Are you playing with a backing track?  Things will sound different raw, as opposed to recorded and processed.

 

All I use to record is the Line 6 Guitarport via USB and Audacity recording software. And I have tried layering two rhythm tracks together before and panning them too, but it still doesn't have the sound I'm looking for. I mean, it sounds good for whenever I want to play leads, but for rhythm sections it sounds very muddy and crappy.

 

 

Something I didn't think of before is the chord I'm using to connect from my guitar to the Guitarport. I'm really not sure if it would make a difference or not, but I will give it a try and see what happens.

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I don't think your guitar cable will make a significant difference here.  When I said "backing track"  I was suggesting perhaps drums, as with the YouTube video.  Guitar will sound very different when mixed with other instruments.

 

There may also be some post processing, like EQ, and compression at work here as well.  Recording through a sound card's analog inputs will also give a somewhat different result that recording via USB.

 

One more thing worth mentioning.  There are also mechanical factors involved.  Your pick, pick attack, fingering style, muting style, pickups, guitar output volume, tone settings, are all variables in the mix that can change the sound.

 

I wsh you luck, but there is a lot more involved in copying and recording a particular tone than just amp and effects settings.

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I don't think your guitar cable will make a significant difference here.  When I said "backing track"  I was suggesting perhaps drums, as with the YouTube video.  Guitar will sound very different when mixed with other instruments.

 

There may also be some post processing, like EQ, and compression at work here as well.  Recording through a sound card's analog inputs will also give a somewhat different result that recording via USB.

 

One more thing worth mentioning.  There are also mechanical factors involved.  Your pick, pick attack, fingering style, muting style, pickups, guitar output volume, tone settings, are all variables in the mix that can change the sound.

 

I wsh you luck, but there is a lot more involved in copying and recording a particular tone than just amp and effects settings.

 

I have only tried taking two rhythm tracks of the same guitar riff and putting them together. It didn't really sound much better, but I suppose I could try it with drums and bass and see what happens.

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How are you monitoring your sound? Meaing are you using a guitar amp, computer speakers, studio monitors, ect...

 

I usually plug headphones into the Guitarport to listen to what I am playing as I record and then play it back in Audacity through my computer speakers. Between the two, there really isn't much of a difference in the overall sound.

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Well, to give you guys something of an update, I was able to get a much closer tone to what you hear in that YouTube video by resetting the EQ and then adjusting the settings to what the uploader of the video said. And then I changed the cabinet I was using to "1987 Jazz Clean" (this is for the Metal Shop Diamond Plate amp).

 

 

I now have a much better distorted guitar sound. There's only one problem now: Whenever I record two rhythm tracks and layer one on top of the other, it still sounds a little dirty/grainy (and yes, I am panning 100% left and right, for all who would like to know). I've tried playing with the Compressor and Noise Gate to reduce this and I'm not sure how much of it is really being reduced. Any more tips that any of you could offer me?

 

 

I really appreciate all the tips you all gave me before and thanks so much.

 

 

- David

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Try panning a little less than 100% LR.

 

Are you capturing wet and dry simultaneously?

If so, try blending in a tad of the clean guitar.

 

 

Forgive my ignorance please, but could you explain to me what "wet and dry recording" is? I Googled this question to see if I could find an answer and that didn't really help me.

 

 

Thanks for the tip on panning less than 100%, I will definitely give that a try.

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+1 to Zap.

 

In Pod Farm you can assign what is being sent to your DAW.

 

If you have the POD Farm plug-in a typical workflow is to capture the wet and dry simultaneously and then add the plug-in the the dry track post processing.

 

Another technique is to double track (or more) your guitar and have variations of each track regarding amps, amp settings, ect...

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+1 to Zap.

 

In Pod Farm you can assign what is being sent to your DAW.

 

If you have the POD Farm plug-in a typical workflow is to capture the wet and dry simultaneously and then add the plug-in the the dry track post processing.

 

Another technique is to double track (or more) your guitar and have variations of each track regarding amps, amp settings, ect...

 

I don't have POD farm, but I'll download it and see if it helps with my recording. Thanks.

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If you have an old red guitar port, you likely do not have a plug-in license unless you purchased the license separately or purchased a Gearbox plug-in license in the past.

The free demo version of POD Farm 2 has limited selection of amps/effects. But you can upgrade from Gearbox to POD Farm 1.12 for free, but it will not include the plug-in (unless you already had the Gearbox plug-in).

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If you have an old red guitar port, you likely do not have a plug-in license unless you purchased the license separately or purchased a Gearbox plug-in license in the past.

The free demo version of POD Farm 2 has limited selection of amps/effects. But you can upgrade from Gearbox to POD Farm 1.12 for free, but it will not include the plug-in (unless you already had the Gearbox plug-in).

 

 

No plugin on the demo version...in that case, I will try panning less than 100% and keep trying to minimize the distortion by adding some clean guitar.

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UPDATE:

I feel like I'm getting closer to the tone I want the more I work at it, but still not there yet. Recently, I learned that one of the more major things that was ruining my tone was something I myself was doing subconsciously. When I would go to use the "Amplify" function in Audacity, I would have the "Allow Clipping" box checked. When I unchecked it, it sounded much, much better.

 

 

What I've realized is that the tone I'm looking for for my recordings is something of a cross between this punky one:

 

...and this metal one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSX86zPnUkY

 

 

I've done some research and found out that both guitarists (Eric Melvin and John Petrucci use Mesa Boogie amps). The Cali Diamond Plate amp in the Metal Shop pack I have for the Guitarport is based on Mesa Boogie amps, so I'm trying to work with that. Any more tips you guys could give me in regards to the EQ level, effects or anything like that? Remember that I am using Gearbox here and do not have POD farm or RiffWorks. Thanks.

 

- David

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FWIW, you can upgrade to POD Farm 1.12 for free (not POD Farm 2.5, that is a paid upgrade). It will not change your tone, but technically it replaces Gearbox for the Toneports.

 

Not sure how far along Audacity has come since I used it years ago, but IMHO I would look into a different DAW. Audacity still does not support ASIO (for licensing reasons), which is really what you should be using, unless you jump through hoop to compile it during your install. The info should be on their site. 

 

Reaper is a popular choice, it is free to try, and at ~$60 it offers a lot of bang for your buck. IMHO it is pretty powerful for that price, of course you may introduce a bit of a learning curve. 

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  • 3 months later...

Another DAW to try is Mixcraft 6 - also free to try, cheap to buy.

 

MUCH easier to set up and use than REAPER (which I also use BTW). The interface is very user friendly. Long term REAPER is more powerful but for simplicity Mixcraft is (IMHO) very good. It will allow you to use the Line 6 ASIO drivers.

 

http://www.acoustica.com/

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