doubling/hard panning a mono ac. guitar

[circusfreak]

Hello all...

I have read numerous threads here about doubling a mono acoustic guitar track, then hard panning them. Then people have suggested shifting one track a few milliseconds, or compressing one really hard and leaving the other one alone... Or adding lots of reverb to one, etc...etc...etc...

Question -

I've got my doubled acoustic guitar tracks, and hard panned them. If I -

a) shift by milliseconds I get some pretty awful phasing. Is this correctable, or am I doing it incorrectly?

b) compress one hard and leave the other one alone it sounds really bad to me because my left ear sounds totally different than my right...

c) add tons of reverb to one - same problem as above.

I have read the acoustic guitar sticky many times over, and am just curious if anyone has anything to add to this discussion, or any tricks they generally go to when dealing with doubled tracks. Thanks so much for your insight and ideas.

PS - Double tracking the guitar is not really an option as I am a pretty aggressive, slappy guitar player and it NEVER comes out the same way twice so I just can't use that technique. I've tried....

peace-kev

 

[ido1957]

Stereo effects...

 

[Dogbreath]

Yeah, some stereo effects I guess.
Too bad about the double tracking tho cuz that's where I've got my best guitar. Ac or electric.

I guess just experiment. Try not hard panning and add some stereo effects. Or hard pan one, the other at say 2 o'clock and do effects on that one.

Dunno man. Maybe just go over the tune a couple hundred times til ya CAN do it twice the same way.

Luck....

 

[Steenamaroo]

are you just experimenting?

if not, what is it that you want to hear (examples of other artists)?



is recording in stereo an option?ie.two mics?


if you're stuck with a mono recording and you want a stereo sound,

i'd make two copies.....one panned centre, and dry,(barring eq/light compression)
and one with a stereo effect on it, like maybe chorus or reverb?

 

[miroslav]

Not sure how many milliseconds you are using...but yeah, if you use the wrong amount it could cause a bad phasing effect…or too much will make the tracks feel disjointed.

The way I like to do that is to compute my delay based on the BPM of the song...and I find that delays of 1/16, 1/32, or 1/64 work best...though sometimes I will split the difference of two and end up with something in-between...but that's a safe place to start from, and then listen for what works best within the context of the song.
There are many software BPM/delay calculators and delay charts available on the Internet.
Or just do the math.

I'll set up 2-3 different delayed/doubled tracks...and then just mute/un-mute and audition to find the one that works best.

 

[Greg_L]

PS - Double tracking the guitar is not really an option as I am a pretty aggressive, slappy guitar player and it NEVER comes out the same way twice so I just can't use that technique. I've tried....

peace-kev

Try it again. That's gonna be your best sounding option.

 

[mixsit]

...I've got my doubled acoustic guitar tracks, and hard panned them.

A copy' of the original is simplly another way to get there, same as making an aux send, or 'left dry, right wet' in a delay or verb plug for example. Either way gets you there.

...a) shift by milliseconds I get some pretty awful phasing. Is this correctable, or am I doing it incorrectly?

This is normal. In some cases, and with different amounts of delay it comes down to 'the sound with exceptable trade offs.

...b) compress one hard and leave the other one alone it sounds really bad to me because my left ear sounds totally different than my right...

Can't say I've tried this one. Seems like (hard panned) would have the image shifting as the gain on one side changed.

...c) add tons of reverb to one - same problem as above.

Don't use tons' or perhaps go with what it is, a mono guitar somewhere on the sound stage, with the space around it (or to the other side' of it. Maybe look at some very small (short) ambience patches to pan to the other side- This is along the lines of a still 'up front 'diffuse version, rather than a verb or room' sound.

...I have read the acoustic guitar sticky many times over, and am just curious if anyone has anything to add to this discussion, or any tricks they generally go to when dealing with doubled tracks. Thanks so much for your insight and ideas.

Why not skip the 'try to make it stereo.
Record it stereo, with two mono tracks,
You still have two' to play with in any number of ways, pan, 'effects, either of the two have different tone version as sources.. etc.

 

[Illogical_Mind]

what about formant shifts. I'm taking this from a vocal trick I just read about but:

Take the better mono track and copy it to another track.

Pan one hard left and one hard right

Shift the left up like 12 cents and shift the other down -12 cents.

delay the right side 25ms.

Gave a cool effect to vocals, might work with guitar?

 

[miroslav]

Try it again. That's gonna be your best sounding option.

I agree that playing it twice can be a more "natural" way to go...but it may not always be the "best" sounding option for the mix...IMO.

Sometimes having two copy/double tracks that are perfectly timed/delayed for every note/beat...imparts a different sonic quality that may fit the song better...
...than having the "almost the same" quality of two individually tracked passes.

There are times when I will double track an instrument or vocal...but then sometimes I prefer the copy/double approach more as I want the delay "pulse" to be identical for every note/beat, which accentuates the delay aspect rather than the multi-instrument aspect of tracking 2-3 passes individually.

 

[miroslav]

what about formant shifts. I'm taking this from a vocal trick I just read about but:

Take the better mono track and copy it to another track.

Pan one hard left and one hard right

Shift the left up like 12 cents and shift the other down -12 cents.

delay the right side 25ms.

Gave a cool effect to vocals, might work with guitar?

Yeah...using the slight pitch shift give you more of a Chorus effect rather than straight delay/doubling.

Again...it's whatever the song wants...any of these approaches can be valid for a given production.

 

[Greg_L]

I agree that playing it twice can be a more "natural" way to go...but it may not always be the "best" sounding option for the mix...IMO.

Sometimes having two copy/double tracks that are perfectly timed/delayed for every note/beat...imparts a different sonic quality that may fit the song better...
...than having the "almost the same" quality of two individually tracked passes.

There are times when I will double track an instrument or vocal...but then sometimes I prefer the copy/double approach more as I want the delay "pulse" to be identical for every note/beat, which accentuates the delay aspect rather than the multi-instrument aspect of tracking 2-3 passes individually.

I've never heard a doubled mono track with trickery sound better than just 2 well played individual takes. That's just me.

 

[circusfreak]

I've never heard a doubled mono track with trickery sound better than just 2 well played individual takes. That's just me.

while that may be the case, in my situation - it's just not an option. have you ever heard john butler or old ani difranco? they are really beating the crap out of their guitars and it's a very aggressive approach to the instrument. my songs just don't incorporate G C D played with a soft strum, which is where the 2 individual takes would really shine. believe me - in the recording process i wish they did!

that said, i think i've got something workable going on, at least for now. thanks for all your input. it's a wonderful thing to have so many people to bounce ideas off of. peace-kev

 

[Greg_L]

while that may be the case, in my situation - it's just not an option. have you ever heard john butler or old ani difranco? they are really beating the crap out of their guitars and it's a very aggressive approach to the instrument.

That may be true, but I still think that if you're a competent guitar beater you'd be able to pull off two similar takes.

 

[noisewreck]

while that may be the case, in my situation - it's just not an option. have you ever heard john butler or old ani difranco? they are really beating the crap out of their guitars and it's a very aggressive approach to the instrument. my songs just don't incorporate G C D played with a soft strum, which is where the 2 individual takes would really shine. believe me - in the recording process i wish they did!

that said, i think i've got something workable going on, at least for now. thanks for all your input. it's a wonderful thing to have so many people to bounce ideas off of. peace-kev

Greg is right. Aggressive playing/sloppyness is just an excuse. If you're sloppy, then practice more. Then listen to anything by Slayer and some of Metallica's stuff (Ride the Lightening comes to mind). Then practice some more.

Hard panning a mono source, delaying one a bit, and all other kinds of trickery is really the lazy way to do it and the results are gonna come out sounding just like that... i.e. you were being lazy.

 

[miroslav]

I've never heard a doubled mono track with trickery sound better than just 2 well played individual takes. That's just me.

Well...it's not so much about "trickery".

I mean...if you want the two tracks to sound like two individually played parts, then yes, I agree…play/record them that way!

I'm saying that sometimes the goal isn't about "faking" the sound of two individually played parts...but rather it IS about taking a single part that is then copied/doubled/delayed so that you get that rhythmic "pulse" from the delay between the two, and it pumps perfectly, on time, for every note/beat.

It's a per-song thing.

I've mentioned in another thread about doubled tracks awhile back how I use the copy/double/delay approach for organ tracks, rather than playing them twice.
I set the delay so that the vibratos of the two tracks fall “in-between each other” *exactly* (like combining the teeth of two combs)...whereas if you played/recorded them as two individual passes, the vibrato timing would be random throughout...and there’s nothing wrong with that....but you don't get that steady rhythmic "pulse" going L <---> R.
Same thing goes for any other instrument or vocal.
Sometimes the natural "drift" between two individually recorded tracks sounds the best...sometimes that perfect rhythmic "pulse" adds a better/different quality to the mix…IMO.

Often I'll use both methods in a given mix...one on some tracks and the other on different tracks.
It's just another "color" on the palette...rather than about thinking which sounds more "real"...AFA it being two tracks of the same instrument/vocal.

 

[gcapel]

It's a per-song thing.
QUOTE]

No doubt. But I have rarely copy and pasted the same guitar track unless it were a lead guitar part. For me tipically the copy paste trick is mostly used for creating an effect on the vocals. On the acoustic I generally record a single rythem track. The under laying problem maybe that the raw initial recorded guitar track is not up to par.

 

[grimtraveller]

while that may be the case, in my situation - it's just not an option. have you ever heard john butler or old ani difranco? they are really beating the crap out of their guitars and it's a very aggressive approach to the instrument. my songs just don't incorporate G C D played with a soft strum, which is where the 2 individual takes would really shine. believe me - in the recording process i wish they did!

That may be true, but I still think that if you're a competent guitar beater you'd be able to pull off two similar takes.

You never really specify what you're looking for when you say 'doubled'. Do you mean identical performances from both guitars {the kind you say you can't do if you were to double track} or do you mean two guitar performances ?
Anyway, one thing I've been trying recently (I seem to do different things each time) is to record the electro-acoustic with a mic while simultaneously DI-ing, either through it's own input (which, on it's own I don't really like the sound of) or using this el cheapo bottle top contact mic. The very difference of the DI'd sounds from the 'smoother' (or at least as close to smooth as my rough style gets) condenser makes it sound like two performances.
That also said, I like doing two performances, one with the condenser on a 12 string, the other with my son's cheap beginner's nylon 6 string, again with the bottle top mic. I'll varispeed down or up (if I can play fast enough) sometimes one tone or three semitones and play in a different key, sometimes capo'd with as different inversions as I can manage without fainting in coils. While individually each sound may not be glorious, together they're often bang on, with great and noticeable contrast. I think you should look at beating the bloms out of your guitar twice for a track. Not everytime or for every one. Make the extra effort, just once, one gargantuan, herculean, concentrated effort. You could even do the double track in sections then just crunch them together. You'll sound like a genius and your secret will be safe with us.....































for a negotiable fee......

 

[grimtraveller]

It's a per-song thing.
QUOTE]

On the acoustic I generally record a single rhythm track. The under laying problem maybe that the raw initial recorded guitar track is not up to par.

I was going to suggest just sticking with a single guitar track. But you want more than that, right ? I think you can do it, hard style or not ( for some of those songs that require 'doubling').

 

[Yonce N Mild]

Why not use 2 mics?

 

[miroslav]

It's a per-song thing.

No doubt. But I have rarely copy and pasted the same guitar track unless it were a lead guitar part.

Try it....focus on the "rhythmic pulse" of the delay between the two identical tracks (which should also be in sync with the BPM)...
...rather than approaching it as a "fake" second guitar track (or any instrument vocals for that matter).

The one thing I hardly ever double is the lead guitar part!