Recording guitar with MR8

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cellardweller

cellardweller

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Could someone give me some guidelines for recording heavily distorted guitars with the MR-8?

Straight in to A/guitar (seems unlikely)?

Mic into MR-8, and if so what kind of mic?

Mixer into MR-8, running guitar effects straight into mixer (mackie)?

Mic guitar cab into the mixer, into MR-8? (once again, what kind of mic, I am gonna buy a better one soon!)

Also, could anyone tell me the best all around VST-plug in compressor?
Are there any that are for specific instruments? Vocals? Types of vocals?

Any additional pointers/info appreciated!

If only I'd started all this 15 years ago, when I had time to experiment...
 
I use a POD.

You can also check out a Johnson J-station. I hear that they are cool and more affordable than the POD.

If you must mike an amp, try using a shure SM 57 aimed at an angle to the speaker.


clif
 
Please elaborate...

What is a "POD", besides a christian rock/rap band?
 
I presume you have tried plugging straight in and using the MR8's own distortion.
 
I tried it briefly, but think I may have been recording too close to clipping range or something.

Is this a tried and true method for you?
 
Re: Please elaborate...

cellardweller said:
What is a "POD", besides a christian rock/rap band?
Click to expand...

The POD is a direct recording cabinet emulator capable of getting you any tone from Beatles to Metallica.
It is made by Line 6 specificaly for recording direct.


clif
 
Is this preferable to miking an actual cabinet because it is more reliable/reproducable? Is it just more practical on this level to convert guitar to digital using this as opposed to mic?
 
all my guitars are recorded from a mic to the cabinet.

i use a vox ac30. and akg d3800/d660 mic(s).


its not heavy guitar though. we do have some harder rock but not posted yet....for now, you can hear the results on

www.nowhereradio.com/randomthought/singles/


I like mics on the amps to get that nice feedback or that warm sound. i dont have the experience with direct for that stuff.


every studio we've gone into prefers mics on the amps.......
 
Cellard, the Pod is a very useful tool.
If you have the money I highly recommend you buy one, or some other amp modeler. The J station mentioned below is another modeler that many people recommend and of course Behringer has their version. You essentially have a choice of what kind of amp you want to sound like such as mesa boogie, marshall, vox, fender etc. All these units have their strengths and weaknesses, but if you tweak them enough you can pretty much get what you want from them without the hassle of micing an amp and then upsetting the neighbors with the noise. Many people feel that the pod is about 80% accurate on many of the models it it trying to imitate. I would dispute that myself, but it tends to sound good enough for home recording. You really need to get to a music store and try these units out. The Behringer V amp has a lot of fans on this forum and is very cheap, as is the J station. The pod is almost twice as much as these two.
Forget using the distortion on the MR8, it is really awful and will drive you crazy, it's that bad.
 
Got to add another plug for the POD. Look around and you'll see an awful lot of "real" bands using Line 6 gear.

What's really cool about their stuff is that is brings out the sound of each guitar. My Digitech and Korg effects have the astounding ability to make my Les Paul sound exactly like my Tele...

(And the guitar 'effects' on the MR-8 make all of them all sound like a 39 dollar guitar from Sears...)
 
Originally posted by MRX
Got to add another plug for the POD. Look around and you'll see an awful lot of "real" bands using Line 6 gear.

What's really cool about their stuff is that is brings out the sound of each guitar. My Digitech and Korg effects have the astounding ability to make my Les Paul sound exactly like my Tele...

(And the guitar 'effects' on the MR-8 make all of them all sound like a 39 dollar guitar from Sears...)
Click to expand...

Ain't that the truth.
 
I have a Behringer V-Amp 2 which is similar to the aforementioned POD. I played both and they both sounded great, but the V-Amp 2 was $100 cheaper. The POD probably did sound a tad better, but I'm on a budget and really CAN'T complain about the V-Amp 2.

Here's a link to a song I recorded with the MR-8 and the V-Amp 2 plugged directly into it. It's got some good tone but I could have dialed up the distortion etc if the song had called for it.

http://www.nowhereradio.com/artists/album.php?aid=3128&alid=-1

Hope this helps!

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Actually I got a sound I quite liked from the MR8's own distortion, a bit like a swarm of angry bees wielding toy buzz-saws. It suited my purposes anyway.
 
The POD is, imnsfho, very overrated. Especially for distorted guitar sounds. Everything sounds terrible on the gainy sounds. There're 1 or 2 ok cleanish settings - and the rotary effect is quite good too. Personally I would mic a combo or cab, with a dynamic - probably. And then use either the amp's own gain or else something like an Ibanez Tube Screamer - preferably the TS9 or TS10.

Although you didn't ask about bass guitar, it's probably worth mentioning that the POD is potentially extremely useful for bass. And yes - I mean the guitar POD (I or II), not the bass POD. Try the Tweed Blues setting with the compression effect (set on 9 or 10) with virtually any kind of Prec copy. Play the parts softly - very softly if using a plectrum. The sound you get will be extremely aggressive and very full. Consequently you may not need very much of it in the final mix. But, if the part is well-nailed, it will pump and power other parts of the beat along.
 

Although you didn't ask about bass guitar, it's probably worth mentioning that the POD is potentially extremely useful for bass. And yes - I mean the guitar POD (I or II), not the bass POD. Try the Tweed Blues setting with the compression effect (set on 9 or 10) with virtually any kind of Prec copy. Play the parts softly - very softly if using a plectrum. The sound you get will be extremely aggressive and very full. Consequently you may not need very much of it in the final mix. But, if the part is well-nailed, it will pump and power other parts of the beat along. [/B]
Click to expand...



Hmmm. I will have to try that.



clif
 
Experiment with drive levels. Sometimes a tiny hint of fuzz works excellently. I dunno, a YMMV caveat is probably in order here - but seriously, PODI or II for bass every time for me. That compression circuit must be 1 or 2 dollars worth when broken down over the cost of the whole thing, but I can honestly say I've recorded some great bass tones with it. Yes, it errs towards the trad, 'felt not heard' end but you can also get the 'heard' aspect right there too if you fiddle with the PODs tones knobs. Cool.
 
The quickest way tp recording a good guitar tone is as follows:

- a good guitar, properly set-up and intonated (obvious, you say? - you'd be surprised how many players don't think it's important necessary)

- a good player

- a good-sounding amp

- put the amp in a good-sounding room, and have the player adjust the levels to a comfortable point at which the amp is also producing the desired tone.

- get the guitarist to play while you get down on your hands and knees near the amp and listen for the best-sounding spot

- throw an SM57 right at that spot.

- connect the SM57 to a decent mic pre (or the on-board pres if you have no other choice - but you should consider gettign at least 1 external pre - porta-studio on-board pres are notoriusly hideous)

- listen back in the control room and you should be hearing something very close to what you heard with your ear to the amp.

This method will ALWAYS sound far better than a POD, provided you got the first few steps in down (good guita/player/amp/room!)
 
Cellard, I think the bottom line here is if you don't have to worry about keeping the noise level down, then mic the amp. If you don't want to upset your neighbors the direct imput is the most practical, although not the best sound wise.
 
what about recording the guitar clean, then dumping the wav to computer and effecting there? Then you just export back to the mr8.

Any one do this now? What sw/plug ins?
 
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