Direct Guitar Recording

  • Thread starter Thread starter tonyA
  • Start date Start date

DO YOU RECORD DIRECT?

  • Never, that is lame. I mic everything - vocals, guitars, keyboard, drums

    Votes: 63 14.8%

  • Need to mic Drums, Vocals and Lead Guitar

    Votes: 81 19.0%

  • Except Vocals and Lead Guitar, I could plug everything direct

    Votes: 29 6.8%

  • Yes, with a little work I could get a good sound from it

    Votes: 254 59.5%
  • Total voters
    427
Direct recordingf / Plugins

What I have found over my years of recording is ...direct recording and miked recording are two different worlds..anothers words..they don't mix....i still am searching for some sort of direct box that will BLEND them both......anymore ideas out there????How about plugins????? Anyone use them?????? VST / AU
 
sharic4 said:
What I have found over my years of recording is ...direct recording and miked recording are two different worlds..anothers words..they don't mix....i still am searching for some sort of direct box that will BLEND them both......anymore ideas out there????How about plugins????? Anyone use them?????? VST / AU
Click to expand...

How about recording them to seperate tracks? If you check out the the Tech21 website they have examples of guitars recorded simultaneously with the Sansamp DI and a 57 on the cab, the individual tracke being panned in oppostion. I've also recorded basses using both. Sometimes you have to flip the phase of one of the signals depending on how close the mic is.
 
I swear by DI

I absolutely swear by DI. I seriously think that as long as you have a decent DI processor/amp simulator (POD 2.0 in my case :oP) and a good recording brain that you can get something down that sounds just as good if not better than a mic'd amp. Think about it, number 1, when you mic an amp, theres more links in the chain to think about. One dodgy link (crap cables/mics/sockets/amps even) and your overall tone suffers. Number 2, the main reason for the DI vs MIC debate is that people dont differentiate between tones that will sound good through headphone, sound good live through an amp mixed in with a band and that will sound good on a recorded mix. I see them as three totally different things and I'd never consider using any of the tones from my live rig (Marshall MG100DFX/JCM cab) in the studio miced up or not. Too many people are still making the mistake of picking tones that sound massive through their stereo when theyre just jamming to record with. Tones like this always turn to mud in the mix and most of the bands that use massive, abrasive scooped tones live use actually low gain, mid heavy sounds in the studio. Its not just about getting a great tone ya know. Its about getting one that sounds great when you chuck a drumkit, bass guitar, 2nd guitar, vocals and even keyboards on top of it.
 
DI 0wns

I record everything (guitar/bass wise :P) DI. I use a pod 2.0 and I really dont get why people are still clinging to mics. Sure, it dont sound like that Mesa Boogie Twin Rectifier in your front room but, reality check, ITS NOT MEANT TO! Its meant to provide a great tone that will sit well in a mix. Not to vibrate walls into dust. Theres a great difference between a tone that sounds massive live and one that sounds massive on record. I never use high gain sounds when I record. Even for my death metal band and my power metal band. Generally I use a marshall patch on half gain. Also, most people when theyre jamming/playing live will cut mids. Reality check, THAT TONE WILL MOST LIKELY SUCK on your record. In a mix you need all the mids you can get because this is the only part of the spectrum that isnt being cluttered up with bass/kick drum low end and vocals/cymbals high end. Recording great guitar is down to realizing that you cant just crank up the lows and highs to get a massive tone with lots of definition. Takes a bit more thought than that!
 
I just got this Laney yesterday and got a noise complaint within 15 minutes of turning it on. It's amazingly loud, so to try it out, I just used some speaker impulses.

Here's a full mix clip:

Epiphone GOTH SG > Laney GH100TI > FX SEND > Speaker Emulation
Amp settings: All tone controls at 5 (12:00) / Gain on 6 (1:00) / Switches off / Master 0

Three separate takes pan Left, Right, and Center
100hz high pass is only EQ change

I played bass through the amp too with gain on 2 to clean it up a bit, but still have some crunchy, not very noticable in the mix.
 
Sloan said:
I just got this Laney yesterday and got a noise complaint within 15 minutes of turning it on. It's amazingly loud, so to try it out, I just used some speaker impulses.

Here's a full mix clip:

Epiphone GOTH SG > Laney GH100TI > FX SEND > Speaker Emulation
Amp settings: All tone controls at 5 (12:00) / Gain on 6 (1:00) / Switches off / Master 0

Three separate takes pan Left, Right, and Center
100hz high pass is only EQ change

I played bass through the amp too with gain on 2 to clean it up a bit, but still have some crunchy, not very noticable in the mix.
Click to expand...

YESSS the GH100TI. I've been waiting awhile to hear some decent recordings using that head. i was considering getting that one myself but was turned away from the distortion only settings ( at least i think that's why)

by the way: thanks for using LANEY!! it seems to be a rare thing to see one around these days but i swear by em
 
Sonixx said:
:cool: shred101... got any tones to post?
Click to expand...
Toneedit is a right arse on my computer as (you probably might guess) im a hardware head and dont have a decent comp :oP. Generally for recording I use treadplate/modern hi gain/brit hi gain patches through VOXAC15/AC30 (yes really!) cab simulators. Most of the ones I use are just modified versions of whats on LINE6.com or POD2.0 to begin with. Plus I use a netcafe so posting is difficult :oP. The main ones Ive modified to suit me (turn gain down, boost mids, cut low, change cab to voxac15/ac30, etc) are searchable under:
Dimmu Borgir (yes really lol)
Line 6 Insane
JMP-1
Soldano X88R
Modern Hi Gain
Brit High Gain
Treadplate 1
Treadplate 2

dont know what it is about the Vox Cab simulator. Bit of a weird choice for metal I know but all my best stuff has used those cab simulators. when I get round to actually sorting out my myspace n website ill probably post some downloads of recordings and POD tone files n stuff.
 
Dont get the reamping thing...

Ill be honest, never tried reamping but surely if you record something you're tracking some natural background noise into your desk along with the music itself. Then when you run it back out to an amp you amplify the noise and then amplify it and track more noise when you run it back into the desk? Make sense?
 
UnityRecordings said:
YESSS the GH100TI. I've been waiting awhile to hear some decent recordings using that head. i was considering getting that one myself but was turned away from the distortion only settings ( at least i think that's why)

by the way: thanks for using LANEY!! it seems to be a rare thing to see one around these days but i swear by em
Click to expand...

It's pretty cool, but definitely kind of a one trick pony. You can plug in the low input for a -20Db cut and get into more rock ac/dc ish territory. That's about it!

I could have bought a 5150/jsx/rectifier or whatever, but decided to try something different and I really like the different voicing it has.
 
As a poor college student, DI recording is by far the better option than mic'ing amps. Instead of the money i would have to spend on a decent mic, preamp, compressor, etc, I paid 80 bucks for a used POD 2.0 off ebay and got a more than satisfactory sound. Plus, living in an apartment, its really the only feasible option.
 
I'll give you some links to some of the results... I think all of you will be pretty surprised. Its amazing what you can do with a boss BRshitstudio, a tascam portustudio, and a POD when you have decent knowledge about musicianship and recording. Sorry I have to break these posts up, but I'm a new member and it wont let me post links until i'm up to 5 posts. My apologies.
 
All these were done with a cheap Taylor acoustic, an American Telecaster, a POD 2.0, a Beta58 mic, a boss BR856, and a Tascam Portastudio DP02. All DI. Pretty amazing results for a very, very modest setup. No mic Preamp.

www.myspace.com/flatleyscrutch

here are some quicker demos I put together in under an hour each:
www.myspace.com/thelately

all drums are done using Acoustica Beatcraft... a $40 program.
 
Yammie072 said:
All these were done with a cheap Taylor acoustic, an American Telecaster, a POD 2.0, a Beta58 mic, a boss BR856, and a Tascam Portastudio DP02. All DI. Pretty amazing results for a very, very modest setup. No mic Preamp.

www.myspace.com/flatleyscrutch


all drums are done using Acoustica Beatcraft... a $40 program.
Click to expand...

dude, i gotta hand it to you--the results really belie the methods. i direct record all my guitars, but your sound is pretty head and shoulders above what i'm doing, and i'm not completely horrible at this. nice job!
 
Yammie, I liked GET OUT, really well done.. All DI and POD 2.0 huh?

Did sound prettydamn good. I still think many mention an amps easier to get a great tone from, but I don't know?
once a person finds the sound they like, "tweaked in" on a POD (and if you took notes) it wouldn't be any harder to call up the same tone on a POD as an amp.

thanks for sharing.

the ol' tech rabbit has come a long way in tones and ability to simulate the amps and rooms.
 
Thanks guys. A lot of it is really just trusting your ears and knowing what you want. If you're using DI stuff, you're guitars just simply aren't going to sound as full as using an amp - the tone will never be as good (maybe i shouldn't say never). So work KNOWING that. double guitar parts that accent different areas of the mids. for most of that stuff i was using a Tweed, a Matchless, and an AC-30 model (the Small Tweed, Modern Class A, and Brit Class A models). The most important thing is to keep the drive/gain down low. On my POD, the drive never goes above 2 (!!! I know!). This is made up for in compression, which i keep at around 3 or 4 (on the POD again, where you dont have all the attack and release options). Compression really rounds out the tone and stabilizes gain structure - I firmly believe midrange, compression, and low drive are the key to getting good results out of modest DI recording.

Bass and drums have a lot to do with it too. I would by no means to would have gotten anyhwere near those recordings with real drums, and this not to say i don't know drummers that could blow those tracks to pieces. Drums are the most important aspect of any recording, and they have to sound professional for the recording to even come close, which is why i chose to use the fake drums.
 
DI + ampsims = kick ass

unless you have a (great sounding) room of awesome amps, mics, and stomp boxes, and ability to use them combined --

you cannot beat it.
 
I didn't read through all the posts on every page so I'm sorry if this is a repost. But, if you like D.I. recording then you should check out using Impulses. There is some really good info on using them at http://www.guitarampmodeling.com
 
This is a really old post, but still.

DI is hard for me to manage, but I do DI for guitar and bass to save my mics to use for the drums. Necessity, but I also get 0 bleed on drum track.
 
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