Curently i have a fender blues deville 4x10 from 1994. I record using a sm57, into a firestudio project to my software. My amp sounds pretty good when i play with it live in overdive..but when i record it..it just sounds weak and fuzzy. I have about 1500 to spend, Would i be better off with a great preamp like a groove tubes SuPRe, or would i be better off getting a mesa boogie amp.
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What are you using to record now. You said SM57 and Firestudio
What are you using to record now. You said SM57 and Firestudio project, which are pretty good pieces of equipment. The pres on your Firestudio should be plenty good to give you the sound you are looking for. Is it possible to post a clip so me or one of the other board members can give you custom tailored advice? It would help to know how you positioned that SM57 and what sound you are going for.
Amps are funny. Your experience when you hear your amp being played is different than what is actually coming out of the amp. You have to realize that the sound bounces around the room and actually shakes the bones in your body and inner ears. This affects your perception of the sound. Your mic however, has a slightly different experience. The mic won't lie about your sound or introduce noise/tone that wasn't there to begin with.
What gets recorded is an accurate picture of what your amp speaker is throwing, given you have equipment that's above Radio Shack/Nady level. A new preamp will not change the inherent sound of your amp or hide the things you don't like about it.
You can always experiment with different miking positions and/or using different mics or blend more than one mic at a time. Tone blending is a good way to fool your ears into thinking that a tone is larger than it actually is.
Curently i have a fender blues deville 4x10 from 1994. I record
Curently i have a fender blues deville 4x10 from 1994. I record using a sm57, into a firestudio project to my software. My amp sounds pretty good when i play with it live in overdive..but when i record it..it just sounds weak and fuzzy. I have about 1500 to spend, Would i be better off with a great preamp like a groove tubes SuPRe, or would i be better off getting a mesa boogie amp.
That all depends on what you want to accomplish with your amp. Your amp is just great for anything from surf to rock. If you really want to do metal, then I would say change to a Mesa or something similar. I'm guessing you don't do metal, so in that case, I would recomment investing in other gear you would benefit more from. It also sounds like you might need to work on your recording techniques? Unless you are playing through a piece of junk guitar, I see no reason why you can't get good recorded guitar tracks.
k so here is a link to something i just recorded..i ended up mak
k so here is a link to something i just recorded..i ended up making a full song out of it real quick..just to show the different guitar sounds i use in a song.
Let me know if you still think the mesa would make a difference over getting a high end preamp.
The guitars sound just fine aside from what might be clipping?
The guitars sound just fine aside from what might be clipping? Not sure. Maybe overcompressed? Maybe it wasn't even the guitars that was making that odd sound early on. What guitar are you using? If you are using a cheap guitar then that is a big part of your problem. If not, then I'd say you need to work on your EQing and micing techniques. Of course, a good preamp will help, but is that addressing the real issue? How confident are you at mic placement and getting all the knobs set on your amp? If you already know how to work your amp and the mics properly for recording, then maybe you are just looking for a different tonal palette and new amp or guitar will give you a slightly different tone. But again, I think that if you don't have money to burn that you'll be better off learning to get the tones you want from your current amp and spending the money on something else. In fact, you may be less pleased with a Mesa Boogie, as Fenders do clean and pop a lot better than Mesa Boogie in my opinion.
nice song and style tight sound Nice sound for the band. I hear
nice song and style tight sound
Nice sound for the band. I hear some hi/mid definition problems, which could be your guitar, amp(eq), or the SM57 is not the perfect mic for this distortion. Although it sounds well played and still really good. I have that exact same amp too. It has 4 different speakers, so I use room mics and go light on reverb on mixing. I like the clean channel on that BLUES Deville 60 or 65 watts sounds like 100 watt amps and even louder. What I think you need is a tube screamer and some eq at amp/source. Use the clean channel and overdrive w/ tube screamer or something. Then use light EQ after the OVERDRIVE pedal and get that tightly controlled distortion. I never liked the dirty channel on most fender amps, but that's just cuz of my own style. People on this post say there is clipping, but I bet this guitarist recorded w/ headroom and it sounded good at the time. But BUTT lol The bad-clipping is coming from the amp's distortion channel. ANd to me (owns same amp) it's clipping the signal strangely and not like my Marshall JCM 2000 would. The fender blues Model dist. channel is not designed for perfect sounding dirty rhythm guitar. It's made to rip the leads even higher and feedback. I think you could try recording w/ a DI and some way to reamp the signal later. Also, the line out on that Fender amp sounds pretty decent when recording some parts and using A.S.S.(Amp Simulation Software). Go try an amp for a week and take the sucker back, unless u fall in love w/ it. In that case take the rig to Vegas and elope. Go get a fricking Bogner amp they are sweet.
Look up Josh Kennedy (guitarist currently in Violet Wild) He's really good plays out of a Deville style amp w/ mods. He uses the clean channel only. He uses some EQ but very lil. He mostly was playing a cheaper guitar(Fender rip off of Les Pauls w/ chambers)... Great sounding inexpensive lil stage Gem. Anyway he only used one Tube Screamer(customized mod) and when he went to leads he would kick in a CLEAN boost(before the screamer). Sounds as smooth as ICE! It's cuz those Fender amps have so much Headroom or something. But when they clip too much(dirty channel), they need EQ Pedals/etc. to tame the channels natural sound. And I aint the greatest player... so it starts there on any amp or guitar.
Currently I think the sound is pretty good here. I think you need other mics to try and experiment w/ different sounds of room mics. I tried the I5 on the Fender blues deville and compared w/ the 57 it was a little bit more tame. I also got decent results w/ the AT3035, that I use, as a room mic. Plus what mic position are you using on the 4 speakers? Did you try each speaker? Turn it down a bit even and don't fully clip as much. ACDC got it's rock sound w/ a rather clean tone distortion.
I dont think theres anything wrong with the guitar sound other t
I dont think theres anything wrong with the guitar sound other than mic selection and placement. This sound you're working is one that would be enhanced by another mic as well as your SM57. So two mics on the setup will be a better overall pallette to work from.
The Heil mics would help you here. PR40 especially. It has the clarity and top-end of a lot of conensers but the meat and girth of the great dynamic that it is. Kinda like an SM7 with big balls.
Look at your placement. The edge of the speaker gives you a different sound than the center. Angling the mic so it is still @ 90degrees to the cone will also help with the clarity.
A condenser out in the room at least a couple of feet from the amp will give you some more depth. This wont work in a poor sounding room.
Are you using baffles or gobos to isolate the amp at all? Sometimes this will give you a better low-end response and clear up any anomolies that are happening in the room.
One thing I noticed, the tone you are getting is in a good spot for a mix. It does compete with the drums or the bass. This is a good thing so changing this will have some effect on other stuff in the songs.
I also agree with DrGonz about the the distortion side of the Fender amps. Especially for recording. They're pretty good for lead work and a little too ratty for chimes and rhythm passages. There are mods for this and they do make a big difference.
And I also agree that if you're set on trying other amps you're gonna have to try out a Bogner.
Try another mic first. At the price of the Groove Tubes pre you can do a lot more things to improve the sound that the pre might or might not give you.
Maybe he was baffle(d) about anomalies that are most likely happ
Maybe he was baffle(d) about anomalies that are most likely happening in a concrete room, or maybe he just gobo'd right over that part of your answer.
Gobo (definition) "2 : a device to shield a microphone from sound." Merriam Webster
"Gobo
Short for "Go-Between." A gobo basically forms a type of barrier: sometimes this can be between a light source and an area to be lighted where you want to keep the light off of part of it, or it can be to form a barrier for sound such that a particular sound source is shielded from a microphone during recording. Gobos are often used in recording studios for just this purpose. Say you have an acoustic guitar and a drum set in the same room. In order to help reduce the amount of drums bleeding into the acoustic guitar mic sound, absorbent panels, or gobos, are place between the drums and the guitar mic." Sweetwater.com
or maybe he did not understand the term anomaly.
thanks for all the replies..and Davedog, yes i did read it..A bo
thanks for all the replies..and Davedog, yes i did read it..A bogner is my dream amp, but im pretty sure its out of my price range, i have about 1500, which is why ive been looking at the mesa's
I also didnt mention that i own an AKG perception 220, so i could use that with the sm57 in the future.
So after playing around with mic placements, do you think the isolation box wold be a waste of time?
The Bogner is simply a suggestion. My point was all about your m
The Bogner is simply a suggestion. My point was all about your mic placement, sound control of the area and the use of a second mic to hopefully give you more clarity and size to the sound of the guitar.
It was NOT about buying something expensive to improve a sound that only needs a bit of work.
Controlling the sound in your main recording area will always buy you ten times the amount of quality as a preamp or new mic or new amp can possibly do.
Reread my post and try and get around any of the gear related suggestions other than using your second mic as a room mic.
Go down to your local used office furniture outlet and buy several office partitions. Check them to see if they absorb sound or reflect it. Yes, they all have a sones rating. If you dont know what this is then use google. You check them by simply sticking your head down in the middle of the panel and yelling or singing for a moment. It will all too obvious what the panel will do.
For guitar, an absorptive unit will yield better results. Get several. Then go to a moving place and buy several packing blankets. The large heavy ones....drape these over the partitions and you will control the sound in your concrete room to a point that spending 1500 on a solution for your problem will become a thing of the past. This will all cost you less than $300 and probably less than $200. Duct-tape the corners together for rigidity and dont make 90degree corners. Experiment with the sound and the arrangement of the barriers.
Got an open basement ceiling? Floor joists showing and no insulation? Cedar roofing shakes. Cut to fit and build a box pattern over an area where you sing or the drums are sitting. Space the cedar at 4 to 6 inch intervals down each run of floor joists. Dont make them all the same interval for a bit more control. If you're handy with a chop saw, you can do this in a few hours and spend a hundred bucks. Form fit all the cedar shakes. No need for nails if you're accurate or you can use carpenters glue on the edges when you slide the shakes in place.
Look. Its really easy, due to the large amount of traffic about this stuff on the net, to think its all about the gear. Gear helps if its good gear and you know what it does and how to implement it into your recordings. But sound control, even the most basic as I have described to you here, is the MOST important element of getting pro sound out of ANY type of gear.
Give me a Mackie board, 12 SM57's and some talent to record and a great room and we could make a great sounding record.
Its all relative to the talent in the first place anyway.
My opinion after hearing that track is you need to control your recording sound in a better way. You need to improve your placement skills and you need to know more about the recording process and your sound will flourish. When you get to a point after you have learned these things, is when spending big bucks on a small piece of gear will even be noticable.
I just thought I'd say, on the topic of mic position. One posit
I just thought I'd say, on the topic of mic position. One position that I've tried with my SM57 and had very good results with is this one...
Place tip of mic at the very right edge of speaker but point the mic towards the center of the cone. The best part of this position is that you can experiment with different angles. The depth of the angle greatly affects the overall tonality. For instance, angle of zero (mic aimed dead on straight at the edge of the speaker will have dulled highs and 'scooped' mids sound. See first example below.
Mic pointed at the center will have the lows of the edge position but the HF definition of the center of the cone. See example two below.
And any angle in between results with a tone obviously somewhere in between. Definitely a versatile and sweet sounding tool.
Such as...
...not everyone has maps?
rockstardave wrote: try getting a MD421 and using it in conjunct
rockstardave wrote: try getting a MD421 and using it in conjunction with the sm57. 421 gets great detail, 57 gets body.
While I don't agree completely agree w/ the tone descriptions, I do feel that the 421 provides a lot of what a 57 does not, and vice versa. I regularly use this combination. Sometimes also w/ a ribbon mic (I know Dave and I love the Fathead for this), or a combination of the ribbon and one of the dynamics. Depends on what sounds best for the guitarist/guitar/amp.
There are a lot of variables in recording guitar, which can make it tricky. Think of the signal chain: guitar>cable>amp>mic>cable>preamp/interface.
Chances are you're not going to change the beginning or end of that chain, but things like amp settings, mic choice, mic placement, and room can drastically affect the final signal being recorded.
Play around w/ these FIRST, and then maybe think about another mic, preamp, guitar, or amp (in that order).
Or better yet, do some of the sound treatments Dave has suggested. I've got the privelege of recording in a large church sanctuary, and I still use self-made gobos in every session. Plus lots of other treatment in the live room and my mixing room.
(I record in a church NOT designed as a studio, and things are a lot better for the treatments. Not where I want them yet, but a much better situation than I started with - thanks RO!)
Hey guys, i used alot of advice and recorded this song...I think
Hey guys, i used alot of advice and recorded this song...I think its a major improvement...Check it out
It does sound a lot better; the guitars are really fitting the m
It does sound a lot better; the guitars are really fitting the music now. However, you are clipping once the drums come in, especially on the down beats. That is not very pleasant to listen to. And now all you're missing is the vox -- I'll go out on a limb and say that instrumental pop isn't going to take off anytime soon. 8) But yes, work on those tones, micing, and getting a more isolated signal (as can be heard in this latest song) and you might decide your current amp is more than adequate. Good luck.
untitled******** and i used your technique..I put an sm 57 righ
untitled********
and i used your technique..I put an sm 57 right at the edge of the speaker (Your first picture). And also used my akg perception 220 condenser about a foot away. Then i had a big sofa cushion behind the condenser..( it was the only thing i could find that could be useful)
Whatever you did to record this write it down. I listened to it
Whatever you did to record this write it down. I listened to it probably 5 times so far lol. And while it's not really my style of music, I can't help but appreciate the quality of the sound you were able to achieve.
See? And you were ready to lay down $1500 on a preamp! And all you really needed to do was move your mic and dust off an old friend :D
Definitely the new amp. Without question. If you can get the s
Definitely the new amp. Without question. If you can get the source right from the start it will save you thousands of dollars and countless hours of time down the road.