pumpkinesque wall o guitars

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WEBCYAN

WEBCYAN

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How is it done? And I know about hard panning two channels, but other than that..?

Like on Cherub Rock...how is that sound acheived.. I want it. :)
 
There are various different methods of getting 'huge' guitar sounds.

Try recording multiple takes of guitar, varying each take by changing chord progression or shapes (i.e have no guitar playing exactly the same) and also changing the sound of each take either by using different guitars, different pickups or different amps.

This is where guitar modellers like the POD come into their own I think but a lot of people don't agree (they usually have access to 3 different cabs, amps and a VOXAC30 they keep in their bathroom)

Also, different amounts of distortion can also make a difference. Don't think that maximum gain will get you maximum power.

Another trick is to put an Acoustic guitar in the background somewhere to sweeten up the guitars. Make sure it's not too full bodied, all you're looking for is the definition of the notes.

At mixing, some compression with a fast attack and slow release gives power to electric guitars.

I never try to go too mad with guitars as too many can eat up so much of the limited EQ space you have anyway.

Hope this helps a little.
 
Don't forget to pan all those guitars out slightly differently as well. That's how you literally get that "Wall" of sound. EQ is fun on tracks like that, though...

The masters of squeezing too many guitars together in a mix (or at least a good band to learn from)? Led Zepplin. In some cases you can clearly hear what Jimmy did to the poor guitars to get them all to fit together. Over all it sounds great. If you listen to just the guitars you'll wonder if he was playing the thing through a boombox.

Chris
 
The pumpkins Siamese Dream sound is pretty easy to attain. Here are the ingredients:

various Strats and Les Pauls
Big Muff
Marshall JCM800 amp
4x12 cabinet
between 16 and 130 guitar tracks
Butch Vig's ears and hands
Billy Corgan's mind and hands
a multi-million dollar studio

As you can see, it seems a fairly simple thing to do, and yet no one's really equalled it. I can't figure out why...
 
I listened to the guitar sound on "Millencollie..." album and tried to achieve it on a Roland GP-100, used distorsion (not overdrive) and Mesa Boogie stack. It's recorded straight into the computer.

But, I agree with "charger", putting a mic on the right gear is far better. A Marshall JCM800 amp and a 4x12 cabinet together with a Les Paul, a Strat and some boxes is outstanding.

Have a listen in good sound quality to the GP-100 sound at:
www.hig.se/~hrn
->samples
-->music
--->Hagen
---->Mother Nature

The bass is also recorded through the GP-100, Marshall emulation there, one 4x12 cabinet and an overdrive.

Hans,
www.hagen.nu
 
One way to fatten up a guitar sound and make it sound larger than life is to record one guitar track and pan it hard right or left. Then, if possible duplicate the track and pan it hard left. Here's the trick: the two guitars won't sound special like this, to make the listener percieve more sound coming from the speakers you have to differentiate the two guitars:
1. Delay one guitar by about 20ms. The key is to only let the delayed sound through, just the same track but 20 or so ms behind.
2. Use different eq, sparce effects on one/both of the tracks.

A lot of times people will double track guitars by recording the same part twice, but persoanlly I don't like doing that if there is only one guiatr player in a band, it sounds to busy or fake. The above delay method still sounds like one guiatr player, just with a big sound.

Experimentation is the key...

Ian
 
Hi Ian,

I tried that delayed track thing and found that it sounded a bit funky when the tune was played in mono. The sound of the guitar changed. Probably not a big deal, really. It just makes me nervous knowing that there is a variable like that in the mix.

I haven't figured out a way around that, yet. If I didn't double check my mixes in mono I might never notice, but...

Take care,
Chris
 
Yeah, you will definately get sme wierd stuff in mono. I don't really worry about the mono personally, cause I'm mostly doing punk stuff, not gonna get played on an elevator for sure... If the delay isn't what you are going for, the I think the next best thing is to physically couble track the guitars and pan em hard L and R. You probably won't have that "short delay sound".

Try it and let us know what works. You are using a killer sound in the first place right??

Ian
 
You might want to consider tuning your guitars down to C. I think that this is quite important, if you really want to get that depth (frequency-wise).

David.
 
No, the pumpkins only did that on Machina. And I don't think that that album is on the list of top quitar sound. Siamese Dream is for me though. And for that you need some really damn loud stacks...
 
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