Recording sounds like ****, even with killer tone

[Greg_L]

Well, I'm not trying to make "real" music at this point, I'm just trying to get started. Besides, I'm not trying to copy these bands. I know what you mean, but all bands aren't doing it like that.

Yes, I'm exporting drums from Guitar Pro 6 at the moment. No, I'm not trying to make (or expecting it to come out as) great music. All I'm trying to do it getting started in recording and writing my own songs.

I'm not knocking you dude. Do whatever you want. You gotta start somewhere.

I'm just talking about how I perceive that whole style of music. It's driven by the production just like rap, pop, EDM, or any other genre that relies on heavy editing, quantizing, and studio trickery. And no one cares. It's become widely accepted. That has become the norm through indifference from the masses and the artists themselves.

 

[Steenamaroo]

I actually was a guest on a podcast today, and I made a joke about how lots of people in metal do those MIDI drums now, and I was proud of a particular band for coming in and actually recording live drums for once.

Shame what technology has done now. I actually know a guy, calls himself a recording engineer, but does MIDI drums, MIDI bass guitar, DI electric guitar, and then calls himself a "recording engineer."

What do you record exactly? xD

At least try to be subtle. I am here, you know!

 

[sturegren]

I'm not knocking you dude. Do whatever you want. You gotta start somewhere.

I'm just talking about how I perceive that whole style of music. It's driven by the production just like rap, pop, EDM, or any other genre that relies on heavy editing, quantizing, and studio trickery. And no one cares. It's become widely accepted. That has become the norm through indifference from the masses and the artists themselves.

Aye, I know what you're talking about. Technology allows us to edit music way too much, and I "kind of" agree with you, at some point it just gets ridiculous.
But of course, if I want to "go all the way" and record a "real album", I wouldn't be sitting at home with my POD and Midi drums.^

But I've gotta start somewhere, right?

 

[Greg_L]

Aye, I know what you're talking about. Technology allows us to edit music way too much, and I "kind of" agree with you, at some point it just gets ridiculous.
But of course, if I want to "go all the way" and record a "real album", I wouldn't be sitting at home with my POD and Midi drums.^

But I've gotta start somewhere, right?

But you could record a real album with pods and midi drums, tons of bands do it, like that sample vid you posted earlier, and that's my point. It's ridiculous, but it's been accepted. Some even think it's awesome. Trash can cymbals, typewriter drums, and fizzy overcooked guitar tracks, no problem!

 

[CoolCat]

anything goes. great tips greg, i never thought of the mono as being so different than a couple stereo takes.
you always have great guitar tracks, drums tight too... ive read articles of SLash or someone doing 12 or 20 guitar tracks to be huge, and the Nevermind ME saying how he mixed like a bunch of totally different tones of guitar track sounds, to get a big sound, clean, dirty, fuzz all piled in.

whats the minimum you do for a guitar tracking section, say rhythm??

 

[Greg_L]

Me? I pretty much always do two mono rhythm tracks. Pan each one wide. One lead somewhere near the middle. That's it. Occasionally I'll use like an accent track mixed in for some licks or something. But 99% of the time it's just two mono rhythm tracks and a lead. No muss no fuss works great for me.

 

[CoolCat]

Hello!

So, first of all, I'm using a Line6 POD HD500x to simulate amplifiers, and I use Ableton Live Lite 7 (Line6 version that was included when I bought a Line6 UX2 interface).

So, what is my problem? My recordings sounds horrible. Unusual? No, not really. But the odd thing is that when I'm jamming through the HD500x with the same preset, it sounds awesome. The tone is just sick, it's EXACTLY what I want. BUT, when recording, it just sounds HORRIBLE.
Maybe I should add that what I'm trying to record is metalcore.

Any ideas what the problem might be? Thanks.

are you using the monitors for setting up your tones, or headphones, or hd500 into an amp/mic?

going direct you should be able to get the tone through the monitors, then at mix stage it shouldnt need much tweaking...

with that said I was never able to get good metal-ish tones with my line6 stuff, some seem able to, but it dont come easy..imo.

 

[sturegren]

are you using the monitors for setting up your tones, or headphones, or hd500 into an amp/mic?

going direct you should be able to get the tone through the monitors, then at mix stage it shouldnt need much tweaking...

with that said I was never able to get good metal-ish tones with my line6 stuff, some seem able to, but it dont come easy..imo.

I've plugged in my computer speakers to the Headphones jack on the POD, and what comes out sounds great, but what the DAW captures sounds like crap.

 

[CoolCat]

i'm wondering ....

if youre using gearbox/podfarm you have to select 11/12 or something to get the FX sounds and if youre going to track 1 in1 you get the dry version to your track (so that owuld sound totally different than the processed sound).

i know my ux2, and ux8 does that.....i have to tell reaper to bring the sound from 11/12 to get the fx version of the gerbox on channel 1 & 2, and i get the dry tone on in 1. something like that...so when you select an input go through the entire list until you get the "fx/processed" input.

and my headphone jack is always getting the processed sound, which sounds like your issue. maybe not your problem but it sounds possible.

 

[MrWrenchey]

Well, I'm not trying to make "real" music at this point, I'm just trying to get started. Besides, I'm not trying to copy these bands. I know what you mean, but all bands aren't doing it like that.

Yes, I'm exporting drums from Guitar Pro 6 at the moment. No, I'm not trying to make (or expecting it to come out as) great music. All I'm trying to do it getting started in recording and writing my own songs.

Whoops, I wasn't trying to take a knock at you either, mate! I started in the same place before I could afford all the microphones and stuff I have because I had no option to do anything else.

I'm just being a bitter old goat about audio. And to think I'm only 21...

 

[sturegren]

i'm wondering ....

if youre using gearbox/podfarm you have to select 11/12 or something to get the FX sounds and if youre going to track 1 in1 you get the dry version to your track (so that owuld sound totally different than the processed sound).

i know my ux2, and ux8 does that.....i have to tell reaper to bring the sound from 11/12 to get the fx version of the gerbox on channel 1 & 2, and i get the dry tone on in 1. something like that...so when you select an input go through the entire list until you get the "fx/processed" input.

and my headphone jack is always getting the processed sound, which sounds like your issue. maybe not your problem but it sounds possible.

Okay I'm not really sure what you mean right now, but I am using the POD HD500x Edit software.
So the preset that I'm using has two different amplifiers panned left/right. So what I did is that I center panned both amps, then I put them both on channel 1 and switched to Mono recording like Greg_L told me to. And yeah, it does sounds quite a lot better now.

 

[CoolCat]

nevermind, I thought you were using the ux2 with it.

Im not familiar with the L6 Edit software...although it might be similar.

what I was referring to is if you select a track in your DAW, there is a drop down list to select which source you want.

on the L6 devices I have there are 1 through 12 to choose from.
if I plug into the Guitar input.....
DAW selection is:
1 is a dry guitar, for example.
2.3.4.5.6.
etc....
11 & 12 are stereo guitar with FX.
11 is a mono fx version of 1
12 is a mono fx version of 1

if I setup the L6 for distortion and reverbs and stereo delays, I need to select input sources "stereo 11&12" to record the FX version, if I choose 1 , I get a dry version/no fx.

heres a pic example of input source selection-

 

[sturegren]

nevermind, I thought you were using the ux2 with it.

Im not familiar with the L6 Edit software...although it might be similar.

what I was referring to is if you select a track in your DAW, there is a drop down list to select which source you want.

on the L6 devices I have there are 1 through 12 to choose from.
if I plug into the Guitar input.....
DAW selection is:
1 is a dry guitar, for example.
2.3.4.5.6.
etc....
11 & 12 are stereo guitar with FX.
11 is a mono fx version of 1
12 is a mono fx version of 1

if I setup the L6 for distortion and reverbs and stereo delays, I need to select input sources "stereo 11&12" to record the FX version, if I choose 1 , I get a dry version/no fx.

heres a pic example of input source selection-

Alright here's how it looks like for me in my DAW.