Like the sound from the PA but not in the box

LazerBeakShiek

Find Polaris..and Return
My equipment sounds good. I prefer how it sounds energized. Looking to find tips on getting a better amplified sound.
 
I'm not sure what you mean? Listening to a singer/player/band in a venue sounds good, but recordingt he desk output doesn't or do you mean the same band in the studios sounds worse?

Can you explain the circumstances?
 
Hello.

I use physical equipment. However..

The VG-99 goes direct USB with Rolands ASIO. That is in the box. No sound recorded from speakers. Reaper is the DAW . There is a 6i6 somewhere.

I am familiar with gates, compressors, filter banks, and all the gear. Not many VST's or plugins. Vst's for me would be in the box.

Need help making it all work. All I do is cuts with powerful EQ's. It needs to sound the same from music player to player.having trouble with that. Ill post a quick loop to show yall where I am recording my own music.

Is 9.7 ms of latency bad? in the corner of Reaper it says, 9.7/9.7 ms 96/24
 

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Wow - still a bit tricky to understand your issue. `your guitar processor connects to the computer, which I guess is 'the box' - not s term we use that much in the UK.

"Better amplified sound?" You mean you want it to sound like it's come out of a guitar cab? That I get. In all honesty, simulating the subtle effects of an actual loudspeaker cone in a box mean that the real solutions are probably mainly EQ based with perhaps a touch of compression, and maybe very subtle distortion. More than that is processing as an effect, and your VG has more adjustment of these than trying to do it in the computer. After all, all the work done by the processor to reproduce individual amps and guitars is more sophisticated that normal eq. I'm guessing but I suspect that to you, it just doesn't sound like it does used live? So it's your stage amp, or the DI'd sound getting to your ears with the room sound imprinted onto it. A bit of delay, a bit of reverb, a simulation of spill?

Can you give us a run down on what the problem is you want to solve - it's still not very clear. It sounds to my ears just a bit thin. Maybe your eq is just to savage for the clean sound, leaving it thin with no body. It's also very dry, so something to make it sound like it's in a space and not just a dead DI would help?

Latency of under 10mS is usually OK. Mines 8.9 and I can work happily with that and it doesn't bother me. It's the equivalent of having your amp 8 feet or so away from you.
 
It sounds like a very dry fizzy sound from the guitar. When you listen to a guitar played through an amp, you get a sound which is shaped by the characteristics of the cabinet, has travelled a couple of metres to get to you, and is coupled with a variety of reflections from the room in which you play. To get that from the VG -99 you have to add these back into the raw sound. I expect that the VG-99 has a variety of other effects that will allow you to do this, e.g. cabinet model, reverbs, and so on. You need to experiment with these.
 
Yes, easy. In the box no amp speakers. Energized is amplified through the speakers.

I play presets that should just rip. And yeah , they sound thin.

This is all in the box. No sound is recorded.

Here is another quick loopy jam. Trying for a sailing lead. GK Oct Sythn vg99 preset. These are just the presets. So I fill it with 4 layers of chords. Still thin. No power. Live from the stack it will cut you in half. I even threw in space sounds and white noise..talk about whats left the kitchen sink?

Both -12 db target on the meter . From these two examples what is one thing I should concentrate on?
 

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Yall know what a VP-9000 is? Makes perfect backing vocals.

Sm58 1/4 inched to the VP. Select robot voice, and chose the spots for the breaks. Keyboard tone is inserted for the voice. It should sound amazing. It does live off the PA.

Voice sampled and stretched to sound awesome. But still fails...thin. thin thin thin.
 

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Rob, I find that the digital recording path makes everything sound thin. Whether that the 6i6 , or a USB ASIO direct connection. Incredibly detailed but thin.

Looking for a suggestion for what it sounds like is missing. My conclusion is a tape head. I stay open for suggestions.

Cabinet sims are great in the VG-99. However it gets diminished in the DAW. I agree it sounds like there is no room.
 
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If you have a [Focusrite] 6i6, have you tried using any of the analog (vs. USB) outputs from the VG-99 into that to see if you get a better recording? E.g., 1) take the guitar output (1/4" unbalanced) into a 1/4" input and set it to INST. Or, 2) take the the MAIN (XLR balanced) outputs into inputs 3/4 on the back of the 6i6 (XLR to 1/4" TRS/balanced cable). Or, 2) use mic cables and go to the 1/2 XLR inputs on the front with the PAD switch on, INST off - according to F'rite manual, you have to use their MixControl software to enable the PAD on those inputs.

You would still need to add in an amp SIM or cab IR in your DAW, as suggested.

P.S. Maybe use that 6i6 and stick a mic in front of your amp and post a recording of the sound you are trying to achieve by going direct?
 
Thinking about this in a "backwards" mode, have you tried playing the recorded guitars through the PA system after recording? (VT99 -> Reaper -> PA) It might just be that the PA speakers are putting so much bass into the sound that you end up thinning out the guitar to make it sound unbalanced on other speakers. I don't know what you are monitoring the recording on in the first place. headphones? monitors? home stereo speakers? A PA speaker generally has different frequency balance compared to those other things unless you are using proper full range speakers.
 
On the amp sim, I assure you it is on. Live from a 1960A and B the volume makes it huge. The gain slider does not have the same effect on recovering the difference. Thinking of mic'ing from very far away. Perhaps loudness is necessary for the type of music I am recording.

Yes, I am thinning it out. Not with EQ's that bump +12 -12db. Instead I use analog EQ's that cut to infinity. More power than a parametric. cutting the very lows and very highs allows it to sound similar from media player to player.
 
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You do realize that running through a Marshall 1960 stack you will have NOTHING much above about 7-8kHZ. Guitar speakers have a typical range of 75-5000Hz. A G12T-75 is down 10dB by 5K and down 20dB by 7K. Its down 20dB at 50Hz. Adding in the cabinet tends to add bottom end, so the top end suffers even more.

If you are doing an EQ curve, do a high pass at 75 and a low pass at 5K and see if it sounds more like your speaker. It probably won't have the peakiness and resonant boom of the real cabinet but it should be closer.
 
This is my first digital recording that sounds full. I need to figure out what was different about this time.

This is not thin thin thin. This could be useable. Scrambling to find out what is different.

Nope, I cannot figure out what was causing the low cut thin-ness. Stumped on this.

Is the Reaper DAW required to restart when a new USB device is plugged? Does it need to be restarted after the ASIO is changed due to instrument change? Does Windows10 need to be run in any compabilty mode or disable driver signing?

I didnt only record dry from the front of the 6i6 1/4", I used the VG-99 and keyboard USB and those were heavily low cut too. Then low cut the crap out of the drum software to even it out.

Looking at the 6i6nomute.mp3 under the O scope, it is much better movement.
 

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The Roland USB devices havent been the same since the update to Win10. On reinstallation the driver files would not work. So the Roland forum has instructions to change the string for Windows 10. Then the driver loads, but the sound might not be the same. Win10. This could be just excuses but seems to be I am encountering a fair share of digital obsticles.

Live, through amplifiers the equipment performs flawlessly. That is what I want to capture.

I am so confused. Those mixes had the bass guitar track slider all the way up. Ans it was barely over the mix. I had t cut with EQ everything cause the bass wass so quiet. Now I need the rethink everything.
 
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Last night I did one more before it got late.

Stratocaster w/ tone on 5, MP-1 preset 2 clean , EL-34 on 0.5 gain each side. Yes, out of 10..Then one SM58 in front of the 1960 A then one SM58 in front of the 1960 B. Say back about 6-12" from upper left speaker. The SM58s go into the front of the 6i6. Not in the 3 and 4 preamp cancelling rear inputs. I rather enter from the rear and take the 6i6 from behind but thats just me. In the front they go. The 6i6 vol is almost up all the way on 1 and 2 so they start flashing green. The USB takes it into reaper. I use the Scarlett 6i6 ASIO in devices. NOT ASIO 4All. In reaper no effects or VSTs anywhere except a HPF at 40 and then 8000LPF. Does this sound correct?

Does this MP3 Sound like the normal starting point one would come across, or is there something actually wrong?
 

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The guitar sounds ok to me.

As for going from the SM58 to the 6i6, you MUST to go through the front inputs. Those are the mic pres. (You are using XLR connectors on the mic, right?) The back inputs are line level inputs which are designed for higher level sources. Do you have the PAD activated in Focusrite Control? Do you have the proper level set? The SM58 doesn't put out an especially high level, but it should give you adequate signal level.
 
Great.

Yes they are XLR.
No the pad is not active
The levels are set highest peaks at -6. The earlier recordings were target 0 cause it was so thin.

Is there a microphone type you recommend for this application? Perhaps a LDC a bit further back, to blend with the SM58.
I have accumulated a small collection. Perhaps LDC's like the NT-1A and the AKG 414. I got the NT1 cause it was transformerless. I was on a transformerless kick for a while. I used Aphex pre's that specifically had no output transformer. I was going to build a seperate box and have 3-4 different transformers selectable. A sowter, cinemag, lundahl, Edcor etc..

I have a couple of SM58s and 2 cheap EV Cobalt mics that were left here by someone. 2 MXL 40 ribbns. 1 TC Helicon supercard from a VLrack. NT-1a, AKG414, RE20 EV, AT2020 cheapo that came with a podcasting kit.

LDC's, RE20 and AT2020 are my least favorite. The RE20 is for kick drums when I set that stuff up. The AT2020 is for talking, not very musical to me.
 
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OK, I listened to all your samples. The first one - yes horrible fizzy sound, what I would expect from a bad sim. 2nd one - lead guitar very thin, rhythm guitar track very muddy. 3rd & 4th (on this page) sound ok, but this is really not the type of playing that brings out the best of a Marshall stack. I hear some warmth but no crunch or drive.
 
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Any of those mics could easily make a good recording. Peak levels of -6 perfectly fine, especially if you are running 24 bit which gives as theoretical 144dB of dynamic range. Blending mics is common, usually to give a recording more ambient sound.

None of the above would cause your original complaint about sounding good through the PA but thin in the recording. However, if you really want to capture the sound as presented by the PA as opposed to the direct sound, then I would move straight to putting a mic in front of the speaker and record that. Better yet, record BOTH the speaker and the direct. Then you can blend as you like.

Attached is a sample of a solo jazz guitarist that I recorded a couple years back. Nothing fancy, an SM57 and a Studio Projects B3 condenser mic together gave it both body and top end. Mics about a foot from the speaker. The venue was particularly bad acoustically, but the close micing took care of that.
 

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