Tips on guitar cabinet micing

I've always thought that radial box looked cool. I've never used a royer, but have had good luck w a 57 close and 414 a few feet away for rock guitar.

 

I have a couple CabGrabbers, and haven't ever noticed any problems with vibrations, but a shockmount couldn't hurt.

 

If I had some budget I'd think about something like this :
https://dynamount.com/products/x1-r/

 

Nothing too special other than my personal preference of both cabs on the floor side by side instead of stacked. You feel the bass more and the speakers aren't at head level which is rough on the ears.

I think you may get a more raucous tone from a single cab/head but I've always liked the sound of two better for my own rigs. There's more dimension to the sound and if you use two different cab models you can really get deep. Coming from a rock and roll perspective.

 

I haven't use that particular model but I have used that type of mount a bunch of times live with no issues. I'm personally budgeting some cash for Atlas or K and M stands for all my new Mics.

Want one soooo bad. Two or four maybe lol.! Way too cool.

 

Chris ... s little while back, we talked about a particular phase alignment plug from Pyramix.
I know there are other alignment plugs as well, but IIRC, you had done some research on the Pyramix plug and you were impressed.
If you do a search of your posts with your name and "pyramix" I'm sure it would come up. I'd look for it myself and post a link but I'm on my iPhone and my charge level is really lo and is about ready to die. Lol

 

This is a good one :
https://www.soundradix.com/products/auto-align/

Thing is a lot of people make a big fuss about phase alignement but it is not always a problem. It could also be a EQ tool to achieve a desirable sound.
The most important thing is to be aware of it and make it your ally instead of your enemy.

 

I own both hardware and software versions of the Little Labs IBP. Can't be beat for the price and they aren't cheap. What they are is invaluable especially when you really need them.

I use the Royer R101 with antique SM57's. My favorites. I'm also prone to use the Sennheiser 906 and 609's.

Another old timey trick that works well as a multi-mic technique on guitar amps is a mid-side imaging. AND I usually put it in the BACK of an open backed combo amp. It's really cool for that clean picking and finger techniques. On this I use an old Studio Projects B3 in fig of 8 and a 57 or an Audix i5 for my mid mic. The Studio Projects is an original one and is actually a pretty good sounding mic. It's got a really tight null and works well in this situation. It really helps that I have a preamp that has M/S metering to get things just right. True Systems P2 Analog. Killer pre.BTW

 

Have you guys tried mic'ing more than one speaker instead of using two mics on just one speaker ?

For some reason I get a bigger sound that sounds more like the cab in the room than using two mics on just one speaker but I'm curious to read if anyone else likes to do this ...

 

Of course Mario, if you have the space and ressources, micking 2 cabs makes a larger sound.
Even more if you record a second part on the second cab.

Thing is using 2 mics on 1 cab is not always about producing a stereo signal.
Blending the 2 sounds in mono lets you change the texture of the sound, specially if the mics sound different. (ex : Ribon and dynamic)

I saw an engineer do a recording of 2, 3 and even 4 cabs in a room with only room mics.. this leads to unique sounds !

 

Where appropriate. If I'm micing a multi-speaker cabinet I might mic two different speakers. It's really cool if they are different types of speakers.

 

I've yet to try mic'ing more than one cab ! What I've done is mic both speakers on a 2x12 but on the same cabinet, tried two mics on just one speaker too but I liked the sound of two different speakers better, sounds more like the cab, but I don't always use both mics in the mix.

 

I don't either. Mostly it's one or the other in a multi-mic single speaker feed. But there are the moments when both the mics make a beautiful noise together. These times I buss them together and will usually commit to them by making a stereo track with both mic's mix as one. Sometimes I'll run them both out through hardware and then back into a mono or stereo track. Of course it's never "real stereo"...it's multi layered mono to a stereo fader.