IR question: How much is too much?

[Gar23]

Hey everyone. Lately i'm thinking that I have been killing my guitar tone from using too many impulses at one time.

To give you an example. I am currently working on a mix where I wanted quad tracked guitars. I figured the way to do this and maintain a balanced tone on both sides was by splitting two guitar parts with the artificial double tracking plugin (ADT) and panning one 70/70 and the other 100/100. Each guitar had three impulses loaded so by the time the guitars were set 6 IR's had been doubled to 12 total between the two guitars.

Right now it sounds like this http://soundcloud.com/garpocalypse/supremacy-cosmic-cataclysm-1

I've got a few people telling me to back off on the way i'm doing the guitars but when I thin them out they don't sound nearly as thick as I want. My main issue right now is I'm not sure if i'm just a small tweak away from getting something I want or if I am completely overkilling my guitar processing.

Bash away!

 

[Red Phoenix]

I always see IRs as an EQ and layering them till it sounds good. Sometimes i have 8 IRs on one track. But keep in mind to have them in parallel.

 

[reg3n]

You should be able to get a great tone with just one impulse, and prolly no EQ or just a classic LP/HP and nothing else, most people are not aware of the phase problems their plugins cause, but in the case you don't know about that matter, minimize the risk just using ONE you like, then if you want to add something (I repeat, ADD something) then you can play with impulses and EQ, they're basicallly the same thing so, I'd just go Pedals > Amp > IR ; if things don't sound good you might have a bad recording/playing/guitar/pickups/cables/etc. I guess my point is, you can REALLY get good tone from source, and if you're doing the right thing, EQ feels like "taking away" stuff, not "adding" which is not possible. Try substractive EQ after your IR if you need EQ, but just stick to substractive, and see what happens. Oh and "artificial doublers"... just DON'T.

Hope that helps.

 

[Gar23]

. Oh and "artificial doublers"... just DON'T.

Hope that helps.

Thanks for the comments! right now I switched from Le Cab loaded with three impulses to Boogex which has only one. It's different but I think it's going to work better. Of course i'll probably wake up tommarow listen to it and decide that sucks too.

..and i'm giving up on ADT btw.

reg3n i love your forum pic.

 

[Flow Of Time]

My personal maximum is 2 IRs. I always try to keep it realistic, I guess with a tube amp, you wouldn't mic 6 cabinets either..
If you're looking for an awesome cabsim, take a shot at Recabinet!
http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/backline/794690-recabinet-3-1-1-now-speaker-dynamics.html

 

[Bay Studio]

My personal maximum is 2 IRs. I always try to keep it realistic, I guess with a tube amp, you wouldn't mic 6 cabinets either..

I know, it´s not important, but i recall AILD using 5 or 6 cabs in the studio on their latest record. Pretty crazy actually haha..

 

[Sethis]

Layering many impulses on a single guitar track isn't gonna make it sounder fatter. Just different. At least not in the same way as if you would use multiple mics on a cab. If they don't sound thick enough it is probably an EQ issue, too low gain or a mix of those.

 

[Gar23]

During my very limited time here these forums have been freaking awesome. The open guitar tone I was looking for was being trashed by the artificial double tracking I was trying. Now that that's out i feel like getting what I want is possible again.

I also looked into the tone cloning post and thought it was pretty awesome how a near perfect guitar tone was obtained through only two mics. So i'm cutting back on alot of stuff and so far it seems to be improving. I'm also not resetting and retooling the ampsims every time I open the project so that's a huge plus.

Next up, getting leads that don't suck.