Looking for advice (on guitar tracking/layering)

[jherman]

here's my dilemma: I'm tracking a "southern hard rock/metal band" and they're going for an Orange sound etc, got that covered. The problem lies in the players. One is "semi" tight and the other is no where near it. We are having the "chorus" issue when the tighter guitarist tries to double his tracks. We've tried him to the click itself, to the drums, to the drums and click, to the drums and his first track, you name it, we've tried it.

Currently we have a left and right (hard panned) rhythm tracks and the panning masks the unwated "chorus" effect. I've heard about people copying and moving "good takes" minuscule amounts to fatten up the sound but I've never personally tried it.

Honestly I've never encountered this problem before (which is fortunate i've gotten to work with good players) as I usually *at least* quad track all rhythm guitars. Other than learning and re-tracking their entire record after their "studio time" is up, what can I do?


-J

 

[RedDog]

Tell them to practice. And practice hard. To a metronome.

I have a MIDI based metronome that can be popped up on a desktop if you want it.

Or you can pull the switcheroo on them.

 

[jherman]

That's the bitch about it, the drummer tracked to a click and his biggest "time slip" was 1/32nd off of it. You can tell these dudes are used to playing "loose" but, can't have that in the studio without tracking live... *sigh* Also, I told them tonight (the guitarists) that they NEED to practice to a metronome.

-j

 

[Sacha]

Get the semi tight guy to double all the rhythms, punch in smaller sections.

 

[Jormyn]

Record DI, punch in as needed, slip-edit the living fuck out of it, reamp.

 

[jherman]

took 11 hours today to get 7 songs doing it piece by piece but it sounds LIGHT years better. thanks all