Best method of achieving Mesa Dual Rec 3CH metal tone.

[GreyWolf]

I'm new to the forums, but I've read quite a bit of the threads posted,.. and I've been trying to gather a bit of information.

The jist of my question is that I have a Mesa Dual Rectifier.. The 3 channel style with just regular 6L6GC Mesa tubes and the 5 12AXL PreAmps in it..

My buddy and I just ran the head through an attenuator, and let the load of the head go into a JCM 800 Cab.

The head's slave output is going into a STUDIO PROJECTS VTB-1 Preamp, and thus into reaper.

I've heard some pretty killer tones on here that people have been messing around with, and I've heard a lot of rattle about impulses and proper tone modifications.

My question to you all is..

1. What is the best impulse method to use for a pretty solid metal tone. If something along the lines of KeFir do you have an opinion on which impulse works best? (i.e. Between the Buried and Me)

2. Would it be better to actually mic the cabinet I have with an SM57 and draw the gain out with an overdrive in front of the amp like a Maxon 808?

2.A. (Mesa Dual Rec Users) What settings have you found to be very good tones for in studio and mix rather well? Any tubes you recognize as a better choice for a really crushing metal tone? JJ Power Tubes or anything? or certain Preamp tubes?

3. Finally, would the best tone come from a cranked output? Almost near wide open or 3 oclock or so?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Dylan S]

I don't have much experience with my Dual Recto yet compared to a lot of guys here, but I'll answer your questions as best I can.

For Impulses, I use Voxengo Boogex, and Recabinet - impulses which are available for purchase at www.recabi.net. I also use plenty made by people on here like Metaltastic, Guitarhack, Goddamn guitar and Catharsisstudios.

Micing an amp will sound better almost all the time IF you are good at it. I find I am not that great or experienced with micing amps right now, so I get better results with impulses. A lot of the guys here who have made impulses are incredible at micing amps and dialing in awesome tones, and there are plenty who are experienced with Dual Rectos also - more so the 2 channel ones.

Using an overdrive with a Dual Recto is an industry standard basically. A lot of people use Maxon OD808's or Ibanez tubescreamers, and I personally use a ZW-44.

I'm not sure about the cranked output. I haven't experimented with that on my amp too much, but I usually have it cranked or around 3 o'clock, and then have the master on the channel at around 9:00 or 10:00. A common setting on the back of the amp is to have it set to 'diode' mode instead of vacuum tubes, and also set to 'bold' instead of 'spongey'.

If you want to hear a 3 channel Dual Recto with recabinet impulses, check out my thread in the 'rate my tone/mix' section. I'll be updating it with a better mix and better impulses as soon as I have more mix suggestions from people. I've only got 1 comment so far.

 

[lolzgreg]

Guitar-> Any good od pedal with a high-pass and slight mid boost- OD (keep the level at unity gain, tone around noon and gain almost off (if it has those controls))-> Mesa orange channel modern->gain at 2:00, bass at 10:30, mid at 7:00, treble at 11:00, Presence at 1:30.

Sm57 up to the cab (find the best sounding speaker) put it around an inch away from the grille cloth and inbetween the crease of the dustcap and the cone.

No attenuator, you don't want power tube distortion with a recto- sounds muddy.

Mic it up and roar!

 

[Dylan S]

Nice advice man, but do you not feel like you need more mids with them at 7:00?

 

[Metaltastic]

Yup, definitely mic up a cab, and while the JCM cab is good, for modern metal nothing beats a Mesa Rectifier Oversized cab IMO! (and I just got mine used for $480, there are cheap ones EVERYWHERE, check craigslist). Setting-wise, on my 2-channel Dual Rec, I run Bass 10:30, Mid 9:30, Treble 11:30, and Presence 12:30, so I would think applying those to the Orange channel in modern mode on your amp would be about the same! (and if you were to try it on the red channel, I would keep the same but drop the presence to like 9:00, since the orange and red channels on the 3 ch. Rectos are identical except for the presence knob)

As for volume, I've gotten tones I'm more than happy with (e.g. this ) recording at "just above the pain threshold when standing in front of the cab" volumes; you really don't need to get much louder IMO! (and if you go too loud the speakers can fart out unpleasantly). And 1 SM57 can always do the trick! (and better to keep it simple to start)

And stick with the stock tubes, Mesa tubes are good enough that the differences going to any other types will be little to none. Good to get a second quad of 6L6's for backup though, so you might as well get Winged C's (the best IMO) both as a backup and to try comparing with your stock Mesa tubes.

Oh, and when mic'ing a cab, be ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN to high-pass at ~80 Hz (to remove annoying rumble) and especially low-pass at around 11k (gets rid of so much annoying high-end static-y sound), and for impulses, I think Voxengo Boogex sounds better than KeFIR; just make sure to turn all four "Amplifier" knobs down to zero and increase the low-pass filter to around 7.72k for a little more bite (it defaults at like 7k). And as for impulses, I think the best out there are mine and CatharsisStudios'!

Oh yeah, and attenuators are pretty much useless with a modern high-gain amp, since all the distortion comes from the preamp! Yes, working the power section A BIT fills things out nicely, but I feel like you get enough of that recording at the aforementioned "just above the pain threshold" levels

 

[Metaltastic]

Oh yeah, and definitely Diodes/Bold - and here's a link to my impulses! And I truly can't even stand to play it without my Tube Screamer (Drive 8:30, Tone 11:00, Level 12:00)

 

[Lasse Lammert]

definitely mic the cab!
Impulses are for gays and people that can't mic cabs (either because they have neighbors who are complaining or because they're just not capable of doing it ).
with the 3ch I'd recommend using the 2nd/orange channel....less fizzy and more organic sounding...closer to the red on the 2ch

 

[Dylan S]

definitely mic the cab!
Impulses are for gays and people that can't mic cabs (either because they have neighbors who are complaining or because they're just not capable of doing it ).

I live in a university house with 5 other people, and have many MANY neighbours. If I could be loud all the time, I'd be micing all the time.

Impulses are still good fun though.

 

[GreyWolf]

Oh yeah, and definitely Diodes/Bold - and here's a link to my impulses! And I truly can't even stand to play it without my Tube Screamer (Drive 8:30, Tone 11:00, Level 12:00)

You sir are a saint.. I'm going to try this stuff out!!

I don't have the money just quite yet for a Mesa Cab.. but I'll look into it!

I was thinking about pumping up my S prestige with some blackouts to help push the sound without the routing.. and possibly like you mentioned a new cab.

May even try a Vader to be honest.

Not once have I ever tried using an OD to boost my tone with an amp.. never really knew how to.. I guess I'll figure that out somehow with the term Unity Gain.. Kind of confusing..

 

[Dylan S]

Dual Rectifiers respond really well to having an overdrive pedal push their sound a little. A lot of people I talk to say things like "you have a Dual Recto and it still doesn't have enough gain so you use an overdrive pedal too?!?!?!" and they couldn't be more wrong. It's not like you use one to give more gain...it just boosts/compresses in a nice way. It's not as simple as just taking the pedal out of the loop and turning the gain up a little on the amp to achieve the same effect...

 

[Metaltastic]

You sir are a saint.. I'm going to try this stuff out!!

I don't have the money just quite yet for a Mesa Cab.. but I'll look into it!

I was thinking about pumping up my S prestige with some blackouts to help push the sound without the routing.. and possibly like you mentioned a new cab.

May even try a Vader to be honest.

Not once have I ever tried using an OD to boost my tone with an amp.. never really knew how to.. I guess I'll figure that out somehow with the term Unity Gain.. Kind of confusing..

My pleasure dude! Honestly though, I would recommend an EMG81 or even 85 in the bridge over the Blackouts; granted, I only tried the Blackout bridge, but I was not impressed, check out the comparison thread here - basically to me the Blackout was muddy, flubby, and generally not to my liking. As to the differences between the 81 and 85, I find the 85 to be in between the Blackout and 81; not nearly as muddy/flubby as the Blackout, a bit chunkier than the 81, but less clear in the highs, which is what makes the 81 the winner for me, especially at 18 volts (85 vs. 81 in this thread - what can I say, I like doing shootouts to know for sure )

As for Vaders, I've heard lots of praise for them, but never once a single recorded clip, and spec-wise they don't seem to have the odds of getting a good recorded tone in their favor; honestly, damn near every awesome recorded metal tone was done with a Mesa Rectifier Standard (Oversize) 4x12, don't mess with success! (I tried to by getting the smaller Mesa Traditional, but I learned ) And as for the TS, just use the settings I mentioned above and re-tweak the gain accordingly (though you shouldn't have to mess with it much), then try taking off the TS, and tell me you could ever play like that again! Although for the record, really the main reason they're so desirable is because they have a way of filtering out some of the excess lows, rather than any sort of noticeable compression or anything (check out the TS FAQ for a lowdown, just make sure you're comfy! )

 

[GreyWolf]

My pleasure dude! Honestly though, I would recommend an EMG81 or even 85 in the bridge over the Blackouts; granted, I only tried the Blackout bridge, but I was not impressed, check out the comparison thread here - basically to me the Blackout was muddy, flubby, and generally not to my liking. As to the differences between the 81 and 85, I find the 85 to be in between the Blackout and 81; not nearly as muddy/flubby as the Blackout, a bit chunkier than the 81, but less clear in the highs, which is what makes the 81 the winner for me, especially at 18 volts (85 vs. 81 in this thread - what can I say, I like doing shootouts to know for sure )

As for Vaders, I've heard lots of praise for them, but never once a single recorded clip, and spec-wise they don't seem to have the odds of getting a good recorded tone in their favor; honestly, damn near every awesome recorded metal tone was done with a Mesa Rectifier Standard (Oversize) 4x12, don't mess with success! (I tried to by getting the smaller Mesa Traditional, but I learned ) And as for the TS, just use the settings I mentioned above and re-tweak the gain accordingly (though you shouldn't have to mess with it much), then try taking off the TS, and tell me you could ever play like that again! Although for the record, really the main reason they're so desirable is because they have a way of filtering out some of the excess lows, rather than any sort of noticeable compression or anything (check out the TS FAQ for a lowdown, just make sure you're comfy! )

Haha fair enough!

I'll try to make due with the G-12T75 JCM800 cab at the moment until I can afford something like a mesa cab.

The only reason I considered a blackout is due to the routing problem I've been told about.. and it would be going into my Ibanez S5470.
I actually read your thread about the comparison.. it helped a good bit!

I'll also consider the OD thing.
From what I'm seeing a TS7 would be a better choice over a maxon 808?

Considerably, you mentioned impulses as well.

Are you suggesting micing the cab while recording.. and just for shiggles.. trying some impulses from direct in?

Or is there some crazy mixture of the two I'm not aware of.

Thanks again mate.

 

[Metaltastic]

Yup, I love my TS7, and you can't beat it for $40! (and it's identical electrically to the TS9 and probably OD808, though I'm not certain - either way, they're gonna be SO similar it will hardly matter). And I guess you could try mixing the preamp signal with impulses applied with a mic'ed signal, but I was more thinking one or the other (impulses in case you're having a tough time mic'ing the cab cuz of volume issues or just still working on your mic placement skillz).

 

[Lasse Lammert]

yep, I've got the ts7 and the ts9, noth modded to 808 specs.

they both use exactly the same circuit but not the same components (same values but not same types/brands).
they sound VERY similar, the ts9 is a bit more open and airy while the ts7 has like a high-shelf attenuating the very high freqs a bit.

both sound great, I prefer the ts9, but it's not worth 4times the price of the ts7

I'll perhaps post a comparison in the next days

 

[Metaltastic]

Cool Lasse, that'd rule! Though Jeff would insist that the differences are just because of poor standards of the electronic components, and you could be just as likely to get a TS7 that sounds better than your TS9 if you tried enough of 'em

 

[Lasse Lammert]

Cool Lasse, that'd rule! Though Jeff would insist that the differences are just because of poor standards of the electronic components, and you could be just as likely to get a TS7 that sounds better than your TS9 if you tried enough of 'em

well, I know that he insists. but I've said it before, in this case he's just wrong

you just have to open them up and take a look, every component in the ts9 is twice as big and the spaces between all the conductors are bigger (that's probably the more likely reason than the actual components).

just compare the vert input 2203 to the horizontal one...very same circuit design and even with the exact same components they still sound different due to PCB design and the conductor-spacing.
I'm very sure if JBroll opens the units he'll agree, cause as a physics student he'll know about how two conductors influence each other..especially in the high freqs

 

[Metaltastic]

Hmm, intriguing - might have to pick up a TS9 and compare, simply because I'm a neurotic, but I still wanna emphasize that I've been totally happy with my TS7 so far! (and any tone problems I've had I've been able to fix with changing amp settings and/or mic position) Anyway, looking forward to that comparison!

 

[Djabthrash]

Impulses are for gays and people that can't mic cabs (either because they have neighbors who are complaining or because they're just not capable of doing it ).

haha

 

[GreyWolf]

By the way metaltastic.. what are you gain settings?

Same gain level as on your ts7?

Trying to figure out something pretty good for my stock hotgrinder pups.

 

[Metaltastic]

Well I keep the TS7 settings pretty constant with what I have above (occasionally I'll boost the level for a bit more gain when re-amping, but not by much), and as for the amp, I set the gain by palm muting the open low-string (in my case C) and turning the knob up until I get a nice saturated fizz on it; on my 2-channel that's around 3 o'clock or so!