Hot Rod Deluxe IV vs Peavey Rage158 home recording

Twinnie

New member
Hi everyone, I'm new here and the reason I'm opening this thread is because I'm getting desperate...I've been learning (reading articles,wathing YT lessons, discussing with other musicians here in my town,practising with my own recordings etc) about mixing and recording for 2 years now and I developed taste for what my guitar should sound like for my songs. It's pretty much that straight forward direct "in your face" sound with little dirt and crunch.

Now, the problem is I recorded the other day with my fresh new Fender Hot Rod Deluxe IV and I just can't get it. I recorded it in small room which is 4by4 meters and I have on 3 walls acoustic panels (not the whole walls covered) and in each corner i have bass traps. One wall has window so I just put a matress on it.
Next, I put SM57 right on the grill as close as I can, aimed at the center of the speaker.

My EQ setting are alway around something like this: Treble between 9 and 12 oclock, Bass same as Treble and Middle and Presence around 3oclock with no reverb at all of course. I also use clean channel with OCD for overdrive and I generally like the sound when I'm playing with my band or even on my own in a room but I really don't like it when I record it.

And now the funny thing... Yesterday I was frustrated and after recording with Hot Rod, I switched it and put little Peavey Rage 158 transtube (5or more years old) amp that survived a lot of shit) with 8" blue marvel speaker and the mic placement, room, and setting were all same and BOOM... I got that little dirty crunched "in your face" tone recording, little muddy but it was it.

So my question is what the hell haha. Have I really spent so much money on amp that can't get me that thing even though I heard a lot of musicians have it. It confuses me because I know that 12" speaker and quality amp with SM57 is kind of standard for recording and I still get better results with small old Peavey amp.

And the real question is what sould I do, what can I change? Is Hot Rod simply too powerfull for small room or is something with micing or anything else. Any suggestion is welcome and I'm very keen on getting good recordings with Hot Rod so really, any advice is welcome.
 
What [MENTION=39487]mjbphotos[/MENTION] said. When you are micing an amp, inches matter.

Now, I'm assuming you were hearing a tone from the HRD that you liked, and just disappointed that the recorded track didn't come close to that. That's a pretty loud amp, so in a smallish space, you'll have a hard time hitting its sweet spot at less than deafening levels (IMO/IME). Earplugs suggested...
 
Yeah...big wattage difference between the two amps...and I bet you had the HRD cranked a lot louder than the Peavey.
I'm just surprised you didn't try the Peavey before buying the HRD, I mean, if you were mainly buying it for recording.
That said...I'm confident you can get great, better tones from the HRD...you just have to find the sweet spots...and that small room may be working against you, or you just need to experiment.

Don't look at the HRD like a waste of money...it's a better amp than the Peavey, for sure.
I've got quite a lot invested in high-end amps, and any 1-2 of them could cover most of my needs...but that hasn't stopped me from buying more high-end amps.
:facepalm: :D
 
I have a Fender USA Blues DeVille that was hot rodded by the same guy that did SRV's and Eric Johnson's amps, and l have the same problem. I bought a stinking Behringer 15-watt practice amp with an 8" Bugera speaker for $20 at a pawn shop, and l got the best recorded tone l ever got in my life with that. Then Joe Walsh said the same at a LA Guitar Center clinic. The fastest easiest way to a great recorded tone is with a little SS Champ amp with an 8" speaker.
 
Then Joe Walsh said the same at a LA Guitar Center clinic. The fastest easiest way to a great recorded tone is with a little SS Champ amp with an 8" speaker.
Rocky Mountain Way was famously recorded with the Champ (though not SS but tubes). I still have mine for this very reason: I have a bedroom studio. One other little gem I keep around is my now discontinued Tech 21 Trademark 10 SS modeling amp for this same reason. They both sound great in small rooms.
 
Rocky Mountain Way was famously recorded with the Champ (though not SS but tubes). I still have mine for this very reason: I have a bedroom studio. One other little gem I keep around is my now discontinued Tech 21 Trademark 10 SS modeling amp for this same reason. They both sound great in small rooms.
Well these new little amps really aren't old solid state anymore. I think Joe was referring to speaker breakup, but for recording these new little amps with all the COSM and tube emulation circuitry and what not, really do sound better recorded into digital than their real tube cousins. If you can't get a fantastic guitar tone into a recorder these days, you are really doing something wrong. I bought a little Fender COSM amp and recorded it directly from the line out jack into a Roland VS880 and recorded a piece l called Texas Floody just to prove how easy it was to get that classic Fender tone. It's on my soundclick.
 
I bought a Fender Hot Rod Deville 212 IV 2x12" 60-watt Tube Combo Amp last March but it was with the express idea of having something a lot cleaner to record than the amps I already have. My personal preference is to record crunch type parts with small amps with 8-10 inch speakers. Even an inexpensive chinese fender frontman 25 can sound great with the right setup and speaker when we're talking about recording.

As for the HRD, while I do have a large enough recording room to handle the SPL ( I regularly record using a 4x12 in the same room without issues), with that particular amp I find that to get the best crunch or overdrive tones means getting just the right pedal and running the amp at lower volumes. I have been using the OCD with my small amps but for the HRD I found my favorites are SD-1, and the JHS Muffuletta and PackRat pedals. The JHS have multiple drive signatures which makes them great for dialing in the exact tone.
 
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