mixes lack power . . . waves plugs the answer?

meadows.83

Member
Jan 20, 2007
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Westerville, OH
i've decided through much trial and error and reading everything that i can get my hands on that i don't really have a problem getting decent guitar "tones." by "tones" i mean what the recorded sound of the amp sounds like regardless of the size of the sound. what mine are lacking is size, depth, power. could waves plug-ins be the answer? i've got pretty nice gear for a home musician otherwise: great river me-1nv, sm57, r-121, etc.
 
just waves plugs in general? they have a lot of useful stuff, i assume you mean one of the bundles? EQ, compression, reverb, etc are definitely essential mix tools, and if you arent using them now i suggest you learn about all of them and how to use them
 
how is the RNP compared to the Great River? I've been thinking of picking one up as I can't afford a lot of stuff in the thousand dollar range like the GR
 
waves makes some great plug-ins, but just having them isn't going to make your mixes sound any better unless you understand the basics of any eq, compressor, verb, etc. But if you are asking if eventually waves plugs will make a difference, I say yes, they make some really great, and high quality plug-ins that work really well. I would get the RenComp and EQ to try out and then see what you think.

Jordan
 
waves makes some great plug-ins, but just having them isn't going to make your mixes sound any better unless you understand the basics of any eq, compressor, verb, etc. But if you are asking if eventually waves plugs will make a difference, I say yes, they make some really great, and high quality plug-ins that work really well. I would get the RenComp and EQ to try out and then see what you think.

Jordan

Amen to that...

Waves is cool, but they will not improve your sound as much as you might think they would. The most important thing is the input! if your recordings sound good/decent when you have no plugins on them, you are on the right way.
If they sound meh, then don't rely too much on any kind of plugin to improve that, sure mastering can help, so can compression and EQ, but the most important thing to do is to get the input right before you add plugins or mix anything, only then can you really get it right...
 
If the amp sounds good and the recording doesn't then move the mic.
All of your gear is great. Throw a 57 on the speaker and move it until it sounds good. It should sound good before you even touch an EQ.
Spending a couple grand on waves really isn't going to solve a fundamental lack of "size, depth, power."
A lot of the size and depth comes from quad tracking.....
 
thanks for the replies guys. yes i'm considering the gold bundle. i've heard really good things about the L1 Ultramaximizer, the C4, and i heard a really cool sample from an online review of someone using maxxbass on a bass line that to me was quite impressive. i understand that the tools alone don't make the mix. i'm reading everything i can get my hands on trying to get my engineering chops together. i've been doing that for a couple years now, actually. for some reason, something is always missing in my mixes. it is always that "in your face" and powerfull sound where the music flies out of the speakers and punches you in the chest. i'm really trying to read as much as i can about how to use eq, comps, and limiting properly. i'm hoping one day it will all just click. to the guy asking about the RNP, it is a very nice unit and being stereo it is most likely unmatched in terms of "bang-for-buck." also, Black Neon Bob i am very impressed with your mixes that you have done especially since you are using a POD. i noticed that you use some of the plug-ins above that i mentioned. anyway, i'll post a clip maybe tomorrow or the next day. i need to add some bass to it. thanks again for the input.
 
two more things:
1. could my lack of power in my guitars be from recording at low volumes, which is what i'm pretty much limited to since i'm in an apartment?
2. i realize that my current mix won't have the sound i want without bass in it. my later mixes had bass and still had the same problem and i just haven't gotten around to putting the bass in this one yet. thanks.
 
yes i would say recording at low volumes would cause a loss of "power"

i mean every Cd that you listen to were the guitar is kicking .....There most likely using a tube amp and its being blasted ......You want to hear the speakers move
 
not to piss on your porridge, but i think that there are better plug ins out there for the money than the waves bundles. although i love the waves ssl stuff
look into ssl's duende, uad 1's, tc powercores and focusrite liquid mixes as well as the sony oxford stuff. id take any of those over anything waves makes any day.

oh and all of the above bar the sony stuff is running on its own dsp as well
 
two more things:
1. could my lack of power in my guitars be from recording at low volumes, which is what i'm pretty much limited to since i'm in an apartment?
2. i realize that my current mix won't have the sound i want without bass in it. my later mixes had bass and still had the same problem and i just haven't gotten around to putting the bass in this one yet. thanks.

Just gotta get it out there, are you at least double tracking your guitars and panning them?
 
Triple mic is just not going to be easy, dual mic takes a lot of work, my best recommendation would be to stick to finding the parts where one sounds good and fix other things in the chain.

Volume and size have been discussed before, so I won't go into too much detail, but to summarize the 'loudness' of the amp will be how you control three things. First is the amp's power section coloration - some amps don't color much at high loads (my impression is that Rectos and a few others are designed to not need excessive volume to add 'chunk'), others color a lot (EVH's early tone came from cranking the fuck out of a poor, abused Marshall that just needed a hug), and you need to figure out what yours does at different volumes. Apartments are bad for this, but you can always find a new one... unless you're in NYC, in which case your volume isn't as big of an issue anyway compared with the average New Yorker's conversation. Second is the speaker's excursion - the fucker wiggles more at higher volumes, and pushing the speakers harder gives more speaker coloration, which is why we have debates about V30s or G12T75s or Greenbacks or refrigerator magnets and duct tape or what-have-you; this will change the 'size' content often and reduce the 'fizz' apparent, so play with that. Third, occasionally, is the cabinet's movement - there's a reason why we make cabs out of specific woods and not the bones of the fallen or sheetrock or marble; strange as it may seem, getting the cab moving can have a good bit of input on the sound - not always the case, but useful to play with if you need it.

We could go for pages on pages about mic placement, and knob twiddling, and gain structuring, but we already have elsewhere so I will assume for now that you've read bits on proper techniques in those; if you don't have that, you'll need to get placement and tweaking under control before thinking about Waves, and if you do have that but you're still lacking 'size' we should try other things before you go off and spend money on Waves stuff - it's tasty and fun, but it's not magic in a box and it won't solve your problems completely.

Embarrassing as it may be, and vulnerable as it may make you, posting clips would help a LOT. We can pull together some links on threads that discussed power and loudness and suchlike, if you just can't find them, but sample clips would help determine what you're talking about much better than 'it's little' or 'it's soft' or whatever, so if you can do that we'll get much better help for you.

Jeff
 
To answer the original question; the waves plugs are not the answer.

You're mentioning L1 & C4 above.

Here's a Waves L1 clone with identical output: http://www.yohng.com/w1limit.html
If you look around, there's a GUI version somewhere too.

Here's a free multiband compressor that you could use instead of the C4: http://www.gvst.co.uk/gmulti.htm
I've used it on guitars and bass, and it's in no way worse than the C4, besides being 3 bands instead of 4. If it's Andy's C4 preset you think you need, you can easily dial in the same thing on this plug.

I don't know of any free sub bass plugin unfortunately.
 
Here's a Waves L1 clone with identical output: http://www.yohng.com/w1limit.html
If you look around, there's a GUI version somewhere too.

http://www.betabugsaudio.com/plugs.php :)

That said, I didn't like it too much. And I have heard many bad things about the L1 around here. With free stuff, I usually end up using the Kjaerhus one!

I agree with the general theme here... if you have a fundamental flaw in your mixes, then changing to a different set of plugins won't fix it. But when you've figured out what you're doing wrong (personally I think it's mainly the low volume thing) they might make a more subtle improvement. Going from good mixes to awesome mixes.