Need help with guitar recording sound please.

[Roy]

Hi Everybody

I record in my home studio which means I can't mike up an amp & get a great guitar sound without upsetting the neighbours. I have to use the method of plugging my guitar into a zoom pedal & then plugging that into my Yamaha MD8 recorder. This method gives a really weak sound.

Can anyone come up with advice on how to improve my guitar sound, for instance I've heard of pre-amps but I don't really know what they do?

Any help you could give would be really appreciated.

Thanks

Roy

 

[Indiooo]

The preamps are modelling amps, meaning that they emulate the sounds of notorious amps and cabinets. Line 6 PODs, Behringer V-Amps, Vox Valvetronix, Yamaha DG Stomp, etc.

If you have a tube amp you could get an attenuator and a speaker sim and be done with it. You won't have so many sounds, but you would arguably have a more natural tone, and certaily closer to the tone you get playing through your amp.

 

[Nefarious_]

Most heads have a Direct Output socket nowadays anyway don't they?

I've recorded with zoom pedals before and they've always given me a pretty brutal blackmetal sound, I don't mean to sound like a patronising asshole, but have you tried turning the level up on the pedal? I've always found them to be loud and full sounding, but if yours sounds weak, couldn't you just tweak the sound with an equaliser or something?

 

[the alumnus]

my advise? buy a line6 pod.

 

[Roy]

I've played around with the zoom pedal for ages now but it never gives the full sound that you get on professional albums. I'll have to try layering the guitar by recording the same bit on 4 different tracks.

 

[kosh]

If you use a VST based sequencer, maybe try out the direct solution:
You can get very cool guitar VSTIs at SimulAnalog for free. Their JCM 900 model sounds quite good I think, and you just have to put your guitar directly into your soundcard and can change the sounds even after the actual recording process.

Here are two short tracks, I recorded using these VSTIs (Guitar--->Line In--->TubeScreamer VSTI--->JCM 900 VSTI--->Logic):

Track #1 (1,2 MB/ right-click, "save as")
Track #2 (2MB)