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Getting A Good Sound For Distortion


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Hi!

 

All new to this recording thing, so I would just like to ask some questions.

 

The song I would like to record, is Tidal Tantrum by Dark Tranquillity. It's mostly the rythm part starting around 0:42 min into the song.

I've tried lining up a noise gate with the Lunatic amp, but when I record it doesn't sound clean with the distortion. (I'm using Reaper for recording).

 

I suspect this isn't the hardware or the softwares mistake, but rather me not knowing what to do probably. So if anyone has a good idea about a setup in podfarm, I would be glad to be enlightened :)

 

Regards,

 

Joshua R. Thomsen

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When recording electric guitar with distortion, 'less is more' - in other words, turn the gain/fuzz down.  You say 'it doesn't sound clean with the distortion' - I hope not!   I assume you mean it doesn't sound how you want it.   You will need to experiment with the gain and distortion settings to find exactly what you want.

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Hi,

 

    There are a few things you might wish to try:

 

Like Mike said, lowering the gain/drive can help clear up the sound and give a more pleasant tone.

You could try a few things to beef up the sound:

 

-Try (you might have tried it already) having two amps (with or without effects) playing at once in Pod Farm by clicking on 'Dual' and adding another version of the same setup (copy current tone), or create a new one (create empty tone) and then add the amp etc. you would like. With this you can set them up with different distortion pedals/settings or whatever.

 

-Try recording a number of tracks at the same time or simply record one track and then copy the result and paste it into another track and so on.

 

With this method you can apply the pod farm plugin to each track and have each one set with a different amp or setting. You can also have stereo versions and mono versions. I used to record 'dry' (bare un-effected) and then add the Pod Farm plugin later and choose the sound I wanted. Now I record dry and 'wet' (the effected sound I hear from Pod Farm standalone while playing) versions. This allows you to quickly hear the original effected sound when playing it back but also change to another sound when using the dry track with the plugin added.

 

I usually record at least two rhythm guitars (depending on styles) and have one coming from the far left through the speakers and the other from the far right. This is good for filling the sound and also allowing other instruments and vocals to be around the centre. This can make it sound bigger too. If you use the exact same recording -one left, one right (or possibly more) its maybe best to delay the sound of the additional versions. If you listen to the recording with one version left and one right (with no delay added), it will sound pretty much just like having the one version playing right in the middle. If you delay the additional versions however, you suddenly have a 'big' sound. You can get free or purchasable delay plugins to do this. Just add it to the tracks you want and set the time delay to taste. You can record the part a second time however and have one left, one right etc. and not need the delay, as the natural difference of the recordings adds to the sound itself. Sometimes you might wish to record the two tracks with different settings on amps or the guitar, so that they have less chance of interfering with each other. That's not necessary though.

 

-I find that for some pedals/amp setups in pod farm, I prefer to have the gain setting up higher than the drive setting on the pedal. I think this is probably more for lower distortion but maybe worth looking at. I tried it just a while ago with the killer pedal and insane amp and it didn't seem to change it much though. I usually use the screamer pedal and have the drive of the amp down a bit, but thats when using a lighter distortion than what you are probably wanting. Its been a while since I spent some time playing with high gain.

 

 

One thing which is useful is the 4 band eq in pod farm. I have it at the end of the chain on all of my saved guitar tones. I originally found it hard to get a good distorted / overdriven sound in Pod Farm and I messed about with the 4 band eq and then applied the same setting to all tones. Since then I have adjusted my listening setup so I might need to change that, but while I'm recording, I'll keep it. I'll change it when I get down to mixing and need to get the right tone.

 

I think you have platinum? I see that it has more high gain amps etc. I haven't heard what they all sound like.

 

God Bless,

David

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