The New Tone Thread
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minerman
Tonetard
Nice Greg, to me, that tone has the right amount of high end/"bite" that would cut through a mix effortlessly...I hear just a little fizz, but, all this time fucking with ampsims, trying to cut it out completely, I've finally realized that real amps have it too, it's just not as prominent, & doesn't stick out as much with a real amp...The drums/cymbals will hide some of that shit too, but it did take me forever to realize that's part of how a real amp sounds....
Cool man, how I'd love to be able to use your amps for a couple weeks...
Still doing the drum programming, & I haven't even fired up either of my amps in days now, but I'm making progress...Might even start on some guitars for the songs I have finished, drum programming-wise, dunno....In a way, it's making me pull my hair out, but, in a way, it's kind of rewarding knowing that I'm actually learning something that's gonna help me later on....To be honest, I'm pretty proud of the progress I've made in the last couple months with those motherfuckers, & it's getting easier/faster for me to do, now that I'm finally getting my head around 'em...
No word yet on any diagrams for the DSL-1 mods, but he did say it was gonna be this coming weekend, I'm pretty stoked about that honestly...Should sound like a totally different amp when I get done....Hopefully, it'll be for the better...LOL....While it ain't bad stock, I think these simple little tweaks are gonna make my 'lil DSL into a really versatile recording amp...
Cool tones there Gerg...Time for a shower, something to eat, & probably some sleep...It's been fuckin' snowing here today, I couldn't believe it...Couple days ago, I had the fucking A/C on, now, it's fuckin' snowing....LOL....
Cool man, how I'd love to be able to use your amps for a couple weeks...
Still doing the drum programming, & I haven't even fired up either of my amps in days now, but I'm making progress...Might even start on some guitars for the songs I have finished, drum programming-wise, dunno....In a way, it's making me pull my hair out, but, in a way, it's kind of rewarding knowing that I'm actually learning something that's gonna help me later on....To be honest, I'm pretty proud of the progress I've made in the last couple months with those motherfuckers, & it's getting easier/faster for me to do, now that I'm finally getting my head around 'em...
No word yet on any diagrams for the DSL-1 mods, but he did say it was gonna be this coming weekend, I'm pretty stoked about that honestly...Should sound like a totally different amp when I get done....Hopefully, it'll be for the better...LOL....While it ain't bad stock, I think these simple little tweaks are gonna make my 'lil DSL into a really versatile recording amp...
Cool tones there Gerg...Time for a shower, something to eat, & probably some sleep...It's been fuckin' snowing here today, I couldn't believe it...Couple days ago, I had the fucking A/C on, now, it's fuckin' snowing....LOL....
jonny deep
Disappointing Member
You guys are so paranoid, lol! I sell and give stuff away on the internet all the time, people come to my house to look at and pick stuff up. Is there really that much more of a danger in the US?
Thanks man.dude!
That sounds awesome ...... I want that sound right there ..... serious as can be ..... and nice rendition of the Sabre Dance too .....
Thanks dude. Real amps can get fizzy as all hell. Sometimes it's in the character of the amp. Many Orange amps are fizzy no matter what. Sometimes it's too much gain with a too bright mic placement. The difference, to my ears, between a sim's fizz and a real amp's fizz is the sim fizz kind of sits on top of the sound, an amp's fizz is kind of layered into the sound.Nice Greg, to me, that tone has the right amount of high end/"bite" that would cut through a mix effortlessly...I hear just a little fizz, but, all this time fucking with ampsims, trying to cut it out completely, I've finally realized that real amps have it too, it's just not as prominent, & doesn't stick out as much with a real amp...The drums/cymbals will hide some of that shit too, but it did take me forever to realize that's part of how a real amp sounds....
I really like the way the EQ controls interact with the gain stage on this Plexi. My very limited and rudimentary understanding of it is that Super Leads are a tone-then-gain kind of circuit, where most amps are gain-then-tone, or something like that. The tone pots on all amps only remove frequencies, but cranking the tone controls on the SLP sends all of the signal to the tubes to get mashed up instead of filtering out certain frequencies before amplifying it. Whereas the more common setup is to have the signal ramped up by the gain stage, then it hits the tone stack to be filtered by the tone controls. With the SLP, rolling down the bass knob doesn't really take the lows away, it just keeps them from getting overdriven. It's like everything is always there, you just fine tune how much of which frequencies get slammed by the tubes. My 2204 or JMP don't act that way at all. It might just all be in my mind because that's how I think it works, but it sure does seem to work that way. I can't get away with diming the tone controls on the 2204 or JVM.
Lol. Yes, your drum programming has gotten much better from what I've heard. What a nightmare it must be to mess with that shit.
I think so, definitely. Those middle gain ranges in the DSL are where the best tones live IMO. They left that range out of the DSL-1. The big 2-channel JVMs are kind of like that. They left out the best parts of the 4-channel JVM.
It got pretty cold down here too. Not even close to snow cold, but cold for April. This has gotta be our last blast though. We always get one last cold snap in April, then the relentless unforgiving heat shows up. I say bring it. Fuck winter.
The US can be a very ugly place. We probably have more crime in one hour than the UK has in a decade.
jonny deep
Disappointing Member
We have a higher rate of violent crime according to some sources (although definitions of violent crime vary; the US has higher homicide rates, largely as violent crime with guns is a lot more effective), e.g. England has worse crime rate than the US, says Civitas study - Telegraph.
What you do have in the US is a more sensationalist media (if that were possible!), and I wonder just how realistic your fears are.
Sorry, I know this isn't about tone, I'm just surprised at how scared of each other you are. People here are unrealistically afraid of paedophiles - there's not any greater danger nowadays, but the media whip it up out of all proportions and people get scared and so you hardly get children playing out in the streets any more, despite the fact that most related offences are perpetrated by friends and family.
Wow, that's surprising. I figured we damn near led the western civilized world in violent crime.
Our fears might very well be unrealistic. I know in my 40 years I've never had a gun shoved in my face and I've been in some pretty sketchy situations. I have been burglarized. I don't really consider burglary a violent crime, though it might legally be considered a violent crime. I don't know. I did feel violated, but I was never in any actual danger as I wasn't even home when it happened.
Anyway, in my mind, it's the very real threat of guns that makes me sketchy about meeting strangers to exchange property and money. The US has a serious gun problem IMO, and it's very easy to get one and hide one in your pocket. I'm not a gun guy. It's not that I oppose guns or people's freedom to have guns for home protection or hunting, I just don't like the idea that I have to be locked-and-loaded just to perform a very minor business transaction. A gun makes a questionable character braver than he really is. I hate that. I hate the we've right-to-bear-armed ourselves into a society of gun toting idiots.
Our fears might very well be unrealistic. I know in my 40 years I've never had a gun shoved in my face and I've been in some pretty sketchy situations. I have been burglarized. I don't really consider burglary a violent crime, though it might legally be considered a violent crime. I don't know. I did feel violated, but I was never in any actual danger as I wasn't even home when it happened.
Anyway, in my mind, it's the very real threat of guns that makes me sketchy about meeting strangers to exchange property and money. The US has a serious gun problem IMO, and it's very easy to get one and hide one in your pocket. I'm not a gun guy. It's not that I oppose guns or people's freedom to have guns for home protection or hunting, I just don't like the idea that I have to be locked-and-loaded just to perform a very minor business transaction. A gun makes a questionable character braver than he really is. I hate that. I hate the we've right-to-bear-armed ourselves into a society of gun toting idiots.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
think of it this way:
Tone controls are really just volume controls except they only control the volume of a particular range of frequencies.
So if the tone controls come before the volume (gain) stages then turning up a tone knob will do the same thing as turning up the gain knob .... it'll drive the input harder leading to distortion and compression .... except that it will do those things in a frequency range defined by which tone knob it is. If the tone circuits come after the volume knobs then it won't have that effect on the pre-amp and will only affect the power amp so you won't get the compression/distortion until the power amp gets driven hard.
So the two placements of tone controls will have very different results as far as compression and distortion so they can sound very different.
Yes! That's it. That's how I understand it to be. You said it better than I did.
The tone-then-gain style with the Super Lead seems to have less overall effect than the gain-then-tone style of my other two amps, but the Super Lead's way is more ear pleasing to me.
Mick Doobie
Resist We Much
Greg said:Lol. Yes, your drum programming has gotten much better from what I've heard. What a nightmare it must be to mess with that shit.
It is. I know I get accused of not recording, and/or not posting any tunes. In part it's true, I hate and never desired to be a drum machine programmer. And, when I'm done, it sounds like cheesy canned drums. And at times I've had to change what I want to do to what I can do on the drum machine, in order for shit to line up properly. Then after I've gone through all of that, I find I want to re-arrange something, or add parts, back to the drawing board....pita. I was never really that much into writing my own shit until I started coming here and listening in the clinic. Now I have shit bouncing around in my head all the time, many songs that have yet to be recorded.... but I have to program drums first.
I've considered recording on my stand-alone with a click or with basic drum patterns from my machine, then transferring to the computer(reaper maybe) and using one of the drum vst programs, or whatever they're called. For someone who hasn't/doesn't have any more ambition than to just record some tunes for shits n giggles, that's a lot of damn work. Maybe I'm just lazy.
It's not that I'm paranoid of danger. I just can't figure out what the purpose is of people who respond online to ads or an inquiry about an ad with cryptic weirdness and/or no follow through. It's a pisser, and I'm not sure I want to know the purpose.
Mick Doobie
Resist We Much
^^to add...
Not to mention the level of some of the stuff some of you guys are posting. The bar is set pretty damn high. It's both inspirational and discouraging all at the same time.
anyway, sorry to muck up the tone thread.
Not to mention the level of some of the stuff some of you guys are posting. The bar is set pretty damn high. It's both inspirational and discouraging all at the same time.
anyway, sorry to muck up the tone thread.
jonny deep
Disappointing Member
I wasn't aiming that comment at you particularly. I'm not suggesting you start trying to meet all the morons and weirdos who respond unintelligibly. I'm commenting on the cautiousness displayed when actually meeting (i.e. meeting in car parks, no-one can come to the house, go with a friend, etc.).
I sold a bed online once and this girl came round to look at it. She came in my house and up to the spare bedroom having only just met me. I'm sure she told someone where she was going, but neither of us thought anything of it.
There's just a bunch of weird motherfuckers out there. Here's a real true story for ya, happened pretty recently....long but yall might find it kind of weird or funny
I sold one of my kids violin through Craigslist. This lady responded right away to my ad and didn't even try to haggle the price. So I went to her house which was like 5 minutes away. I get there, nice house, and and asian lady answers the door and invites me in. The house is very very cold, very dark, and virtually empty. So I'm ready to slit her throat like right away. This had the immediate look of an organ harvesting setup. I really did not wanna go in there so I just stood at the door looking like WTF is going here. The asian lady walks into the living room and waves me in. One of my hands is holding the violin case and the other hand is in my pocket on my fine italian switchblade and this zipperhead bitch is about to get ripped open. So I'm slowly walking to the living room, in this cold ass dark empty mysterious house, looking around, taking in my surroundings. It's dead silent. Not a TV or radio on anywhere. Doorway over there, stairs to my right, kitchen to the left, stab this chin-ho and run. So I get to the living room and there's another asian lady in there, sitting in the dark, and she's about 2500 years old. This was like genghis khan's wife or something. Neither of them says a word. The house smells like cooked roadkill. So the first lady motions me to sit on the couch, which is pretty much the only thing in the room, while she sits in a small chair next to the couch. So I sit on the couch, next to the ancient relic chinese lady, thinking any second now I'm killing both of these fucking whores and I'm gonna burn this fucking house down. Seriously, neither of them has said anything yet, several minutes have gone by, and I say something dumb like "which of you is Ann?" No answer, they just kind of stare at me and smile and I'm not kidding when I tell yall I'm literally pulling my knife out of my pocket to perforate these ladies when this creepy as fuck little asian girl comes down the stairs. Now I'm really losing my mind. This is like that movie the grudge or something. The little kid walks up to me, hands me a wad of cash, and it's not all there. I tell her, "you're 20 bucks short". She looks at the first asian lady, the one that answered the door, and says some ping-yong-doon-gow shit to the lady. The lady gets up, picks up the phone, dials a number, and is like screaming some ching-chong shit at whoever is on the other end. At this point I'm like, I don't even give a fuck if they kill me because I have to see where this goes. This lady is screaming on the phone in some asian language, and the little girl is standing right in front of me, way too close, just standing there. The ancient lady hasn't budged or made a peep. She might have been dead already. She's asian and it was dark in there so I couldn't tell if her eyes were open or whatever. So anyway, the first lady hangs up the phone, kind of smiles at me, and holds up a finger as if to say "one moment" or whatever. Okay so I'll wait. It's only 20 bucks, but this was just too interesting now. So I wait and wait and wait for about 20-30 minutes, sitting there in the dark in this cold ass creepshow of a house with these generations of mysterious asian females all around me. Still no one has said a word besides me telling the kid she was 20 bucks short. Then out of nowhere the first lady jumps up and runs to the door. She opens it and another asian lady walks in. I didn't hear a knock or a car pull up. It was silent. Windows were closed. There was no way to see or know this lady was at the door. But this lady must have dog hearing or something. So this new lady walks in, middle aged semi-attractive asian lady, and I'm thinking "all right, four dead asian females, how am I gonna explain this?" My mindset now was I'm walking out with cash in hand or blood on my hands. So this new lady walks up to me, points at the cash in my hand, and holds out her hand for me to give it back to her. I do, and she hands me a check for the full amount. I point back at the cash in her hand, and give her back the check to say "I want the cash lady". So she digs through her purse, pulls out a 20, and gives me back all of the cash. Cool. I hand the violin case to the lady, she hands it to the kid, the kid pulls it out, and just starts ripping violin music on this thing. This kid is some virtuoso protege or something. I had no idea this cheapo violin could be played like that. Then I thought, "okay, this is some kind of signal and ninjas are about to come storming down the stairs right now". So I get up to leave, and the 2500 year old asian lady turns, looks at me, and motions at me to sit and listen. No chance, I hold up my hands, shake my head to say "no fucking way", and I'm out the door and on my way home. That was the creepiest, strangest craigslist experience I've ever had.
Lt. Bob
Spread the Daf!
not to worry .... the tone thread meanders a fair amount .... it's kind of a board all to itself.
rayc
retroreprobate
Hello Folks,
No Freak Show story or box cutter balladry I'm afraid. This is a song Terry & I wrote in the mid 80's. We've been struggling to do it justice in terms of recording. Interestingly it's been covered by two different artists downunder!
I'm interested in the guitar tone. Not the solo but the rhythm guitars particularly in the verses as I've thrown a couple of highlight bits on the choruses & the change.
The main guitar tone is from a Guyatone Mosrite copy into a Kustom 5watt tube amp. Different pick up selection for each take. The song is all open chords (Em G Am C for the verse and Em F for the chorus).
Terry feels he's singing of tune in this one but hasn't rerecorded the vox since the mid 90's. The drums are a stereo track by Rami. The guita solo, (which may need to be slid about a bit to fit perfectly) is by Ido1957. the sax is by Terry.
While I'm at it - the bass - I decided to do the relentless 80's chug. Does that work or should it be looser?
Thanks in anticipation...
No Freak Show story or box cutter balladry I'm afraid. This is a song Terry & I wrote in the mid 80's. We've been struggling to do it justice in terms of recording. Interestingly it's been covered by two different artists downunder!
I'm interested in the guitar tone. Not the solo but the rhythm guitars particularly in the verses as I've thrown a couple of highlight bits on the choruses & the change.
The main guitar tone is from a Guyatone Mosrite copy into a Kustom 5watt tube amp. Different pick up selection for each take. The song is all open chords (Em G Am C for the verse and Em F for the chorus).
Terry feels he's singing of tune in this one but hasn't rerecorded the vox since the mid 90's. The drums are a stereo track by Rami. The guita solo, (which may need to be slid about a bit to fit perfectly) is by Ido1957. the sax is by Terry.
While I'm at it - the bass - I decided to do the relentless 80's chug. Does that work or should it be looser?
Thanks in anticipation...
minerman
Tonetard
Mick: Yeah man, it is a lot of fucking work, just to put together a song or two, just for kicks...Fuck man, I'm doing an album all by myself, Greg's helping me by giving me some pointers & suggestions on the drum programming, but the rest is all on me...But, I will say that this recording shit keeps me sane, sure at times I'd like to pull my hair out & scream, but 99% of the time, it's all I've got, & is what keeps me going....
I started the fake drum journey about 5 years ago, on a Zoom HD8, & to me, those were just totally useless...Sure, some people could program 'em to sound ok, you could even export the midi & use other samples, but I just could'nt get those fuckers to do anything close to what I wanted...So, then, I switch to the pc (Cubase LE4), & Beatcraft, which is kinda like Ez Drummer, just not as advanced, & IIRC, it used the "one shot" sample thing....You could load your own samples/sounds, but there were no velocity layers...Moved on to EZ Drummer & the piano roll thing, which to be honest, I spent a lot of time with, & thought I was pretty decent at programming 'em like that (up until just a couple months ago)....Wrong....LOL...Started using Jamstix 3 a year or two ago, but I use it for the midi out, to trigger my other vsti's....It's a really deep & complicated program, & would take years to master, if that's even possible...There are so many knobs/buttons/parameters to tweak, it's unreal...You can load different drummers (I just bought the Metal Pak, which has Neil Peart & Mike Portnoy plus a few more), that are modeled after their playing style/tendencies...You can tweak their limb speed, which determines how fast they can hit another drum/cymbal after hitting an initial one, all kinds of shit, & the results can be quite good, but again, it's a lot of fuckin' work to make it sound anywhere near realistic...
I've told the Gerg all the drum samples I have, here's the "jist" of 'em:
Superior Drummer (with 4-5 expansion packs)
Steven Slate Drums Platinum 3.5
Abbey Road 60's, 70's, 80's & Modern Drums
NI Studio Drummer
EZ Drummer (with 4-5 expansion packs, if not more)
Jamstix 3 (with the "XL" pak, & "Metal" pak, I don't use these sounds, just the "drummers" & AI (artificial intelligence/"brain"))...
So, I've spent enough on these drum vsti's to buy a nice, full kit, plus mics for all of it, a couple nice tube amps, another cab or two, & then some...But, I don't have the ability to use real drums (noise), so, this is the route I have to take....
Greg has been nice enough to listen to a bunch of my shitty songs I'm working on, & help me out by pointing out things that make 'em obvious programmed drums...I'm learning, but it does take a lot of time & work just to do one song...I've got about 10 songs in various stages of being "finished", about half of those are pretty much ready for guitar/bass/vocals...LOL...
Greg: Cool story man, & yes, there are a lot of fuckin' weirdos out there...It used to be away from here (where I live), but now, those fuckers are around...I see 'em everyday, & while I try to be a nice & good guy all the time, I wouldn't hesitate for one second to shoot one of those fuckers I'm talking about, if it came down to it...Again, I try to be a nice & good person, but some of the shit I've saw in the past few years around here, I wouldn't think twice about it if I thought they were going to try something on my family or me...
Rayc: Well, the song isn't terrible man, but IMHO, needs some attention in the mix....If you're wanting just the guitar tone opinion, myself, I'd try to change the sounds up a little, maybe use a different mic or speaker on 'em to make 'em each kinda unique...And, in the mix, the guitar in the right side/speaker needs a little less 'verb and/or maybe some high end eq, to give it a little sparkle/jangle type thing....On the overall mix, IMHO, the drums need just a little more vol overall along with the bass...Just my opinion, & trying to be honest & helpful, so please don't get all bent out of shape on me man...I don't hear the vocals being out of tune, but IMHO, they need to be re-tracked with some more emotion/feeling....I know how hard this is to do too man, so again, don't think I'm pickin' on ya or anything, just trying to be honest...
I started the fake drum journey about 5 years ago, on a Zoom HD8, & to me, those were just totally useless...Sure, some people could program 'em to sound ok, you could even export the midi & use other samples, but I just could'nt get those fuckers to do anything close to what I wanted...So, then, I switch to the pc (Cubase LE4), & Beatcraft, which is kinda like Ez Drummer, just not as advanced, & IIRC, it used the "one shot" sample thing....You could load your own samples/sounds, but there were no velocity layers...Moved on to EZ Drummer & the piano roll thing, which to be honest, I spent a lot of time with, & thought I was pretty decent at programming 'em like that (up until just a couple months ago)....Wrong....LOL...Started using Jamstix 3 a year or two ago, but I use it for the midi out, to trigger my other vsti's....It's a really deep & complicated program, & would take years to master, if that's even possible...There are so many knobs/buttons/parameters to tweak, it's unreal...You can load different drummers (I just bought the Metal Pak, which has Neil Peart & Mike Portnoy plus a few more), that are modeled after their playing style/tendencies...You can tweak their limb speed, which determines how fast they can hit another drum/cymbal after hitting an initial one, all kinds of shit, & the results can be quite good, but again, it's a lot of fuckin' work to make it sound anywhere near realistic...
I've told the Gerg all the drum samples I have, here's the "jist" of 'em:
Superior Drummer (with 4-5 expansion packs)
Steven Slate Drums Platinum 3.5
Abbey Road 60's, 70's, 80's & Modern Drums
NI Studio Drummer
EZ Drummer (with 4-5 expansion packs, if not more)
Jamstix 3 (with the "XL" pak, & "Metal" pak, I don't use these sounds, just the "drummers" & AI (artificial intelligence/"brain"))...
So, I've spent enough on these drum vsti's to buy a nice, full kit, plus mics for all of it, a couple nice tube amps, another cab or two, & then some...But, I don't have the ability to use real drums (noise), so, this is the route I have to take....
Greg has been nice enough to listen to a bunch of my shitty songs I'm working on, & help me out by pointing out things that make 'em obvious programmed drums...I'm learning, but it does take a lot of time & work just to do one song...I've got about 10 songs in various stages of being "finished", about half of those are pretty much ready for guitar/bass/vocals...LOL...
Greg: Cool story man, & yes, there are a lot of fuckin' weirdos out there...It used to be away from here (where I live), but now, those fuckers are around...I see 'em everyday, & while I try to be a nice & good guy all the time, I wouldn't hesitate for one second to shoot one of those fuckers I'm talking about, if it came down to it...Again, I try to be a nice & good person, but some of the shit I've saw in the past few years around here, I wouldn't think twice about it if I thought they were going to try something on my family or me...
Rayc: Well, the song isn't terrible man, but IMHO, needs some attention in the mix....If you're wanting just the guitar tone opinion, myself, I'd try to change the sounds up a little, maybe use a different mic or speaker on 'em to make 'em each kinda unique...And, in the mix, the guitar in the right side/speaker needs a little less 'verb and/or maybe some high end eq, to give it a little sparkle/jangle type thing....On the overall mix, IMHO, the drums need just a little more vol overall along with the bass...Just my opinion, & trying to be honest & helpful, so please don't get all bent out of shape on me man...I don't hear the vocals being out of tune, but IMHO, they need to be re-tracked with some more emotion/feeling....I know how hard this is to do too man, so again, don't think I'm pickin' on ya or anything, just trying to be honest...
rayc
retroreprobate
Minerman,
Thanks for the detail.
The Guitar tracks are done with diff mics in different configurations/orientations but on the same marshall cab. There's no reverb on the guitars individually or bussed. I think I'll repost the clip with all guitars but the latest removed.
yeah, I know the mix needs work - I figured a good mix will start with the right guitar sound.
The retracking of vox - I've been chasing that for about 5 years. Terry doesn't emote when he sings. It's that way with all our tracks.
I'll get back to you shortly with an adjusted sample.
Thanks for the detail.
The Guitar tracks are done with diff mics in different configurations/orientations but on the same marshall cab. There's no reverb on the guitars individually or bussed. I think I'll repost the clip with all guitars but the latest removed.
yeah, I know the mix needs work - I figured a good mix will start with the right guitar sound.
The retracking of vox - I've been chasing that for about 5 years. Terry doesn't emote when he sings. It's that way with all our tracks.
I'll get back to you shortly with an adjusted sample.
rayc
retroreprobate
OK, I'm back.
This mix has three guitar tracks L C & R GTR is as describes above.
Each a separate take.
The augmentation at the Chorus & bridge/change have been muted.
C is the gtr with both pickups in play & using a Shure 57 off axis (side on) at the right edge of the speaker.
R is the guitar with bridge PU L'Grange Dynamic right up against the L edge of the speaker
L is with neck PU Sennheiser dynamic facing the bottom edge of the speaker.
No reverb on guitars as mentioned.
Light compression on the gtr buss and a narrow little scoop at 3Khz to allow the bass definition some space.
Thanks in anticipation again.