Still wrestling with guitar tone - SoloC + 8505 this time

[Erkan]

Yo guys!

I tried Erik's tips and got a lot of inspiration from his effect chain but as always... I just CAN'T get the tone I want However, the SoloC and 8505 combo did solve one problem for me which was fatness and fullness, I'm now instead left with some scoopage! Anyway, I will continue to fight this battle of the tones when I get home on Wednesday from a hopefully lovely little trip to Stockholm for a few days, I thought you guys could just listen and throw a few mean words meanwhile

First tone test: Pretty much the same settings as Erik sent me in a mail regarding his standard guitar chain, but I'm using freeware stuff instead of non-freeware which was present in his chain. I've tried to be as accurate as possible with the settings to get a similar result but... yeah, maybe too scooped.
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/585020/New Tone Test.mp3

Second tone test: Quite the opposite of the first one, and this is not SoloC+8505. It's WarpVST with Sickan's cab bypass impulse, so I could load up Ryan's s-preshigh impulse instead of the crappy stock impulses in WarpVST. It's very honky and... not as fat or full.
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/585020/New Tone Test Warp.mp3

So which tone is the better candidate for further tone development you think? I might be able to bring some mids in on the first clip, but I'm not sure I will be able to bring any fatness in on the second one... so I'm "kind of" leaning towards the first one. Keep in mind the music I have upcoming is sort of "melodic djent", so I'm kinda going for that djenty character but not as extreme as Meshuggah and stuff.

 

[Erkan]

Oooh crap, forgot to mention the fact that I'm doing this from home right now... and I've got like no comprehension of the high end on these desktop speakers haha. I seriously don't know what is going on... it could be harsh as a barbed police baton up one's rear or it could be... something else. Anyway..

 

[Metaltastic]

The second one is absurdly djenty IMO (and just to get this out of the way, djent is a musical style to me, with it's own specific type of guitar tone, so please, none of this "djent is just a type of palm muting" hootinanny ), so I suppose it fits, and honestly, with a bass might actually work pretty well. Not a big fan of the first one, just sounds kinda "nasty" in the high end; hard to describe, kinda sounds like what would come from the cheapest of single coils with tons of noise (but of course I doubt this is the case, that's just what it reminds me of). And tbh, I hear a bit of that in the second one too, but it's not nearly as bad IMO. I suck at tweaking ampsims though, so I can't really offer any suggestions to fix it unfortunately!

I must say though dude, these are some pretty sweet riffs! Oh, but while I know this isn't about the drums, that ring on the snare is killing me

 

[Erkan]

The second one is absurdly djenty IMO (and just to get this out of the way, djent is a musical style to me, with it's own specific type of guitar tone, so please, none of this "djent is just a type of palm muting" hootinanny ), so I suppose it fits, and honestly, with a bass might actually work pretty well. Not a big fan of the first one, just sounds kinda "nasty" in the high end; hard to describe, kinda sounds like what would come from the cheapest of single coils with tons of noise (but of course I doubt this is the case, that's just what it reminds me of). And tbh, I hear a bit of that in the second one too, but it's not nearly as bad IMO. I suck at tweaking ampsims though, so I can't really offer any suggestions to fix it unfortunately!

I must say though dude, these are some pretty sweet riffs! Oh, but while I know this isn't about the drums, that ring on the snare is killing me

Haha, awesome feedback Marcus

Hell, I can also imagine this becoming quite a thick tone once there is a bass guitar added so maybe the second chain could be useable after all. It's good to hear this from you since you are very very picky (of course, it's for the better) and it's nice to hear that you didn't dismiss tone #2. I will definately try to experiment more with that chain... perhaps borrow a few tricks from Erik's chain but still keeping WarpVST as the main source of distortion And to exchange KeFIR with LeCab ...we'll see.

Yeah, I always use AD for the drums when doing scratch tracks and I have gotten used to it's annoying ringings and rumblings I do agree with ya though!

 

[Erkan]

Shit... when A/B comparing the two tones, I like #2 better, especially on the last riff. A little more meat and a little less honk and it should be quite a sweet tone for an amp sim!

 

[Erik Monsonis]

I love the first tone, and I love the little djentiness in it (and I'm talking about the palm mute type :lol)
Maybe it could use some more mids, but it's awesome on it's own!

 

[exzem]

I think you should get a bass in the mix before focusing more on guitar tones. Bass tone can change the overall sound so much, I think it will be more rewarding if you tweek the guitar sound while listening to both guitars+bass+drums. I think tone nr 1 sounds better, nr 2 sounds like it's been EQ:ed a bit too much. But yeah there is something ringy in the high end, maybe try taping the high strings while recording or is it tremolo springs?

 

[Dexter_prog]

Would you mind posting the chain and settings? I liked both tones, but I think both need more bass in them

off-topic newbie question: what does people mean when they say "A/B"?

 

[reg3n]

I think the second one sounds great, really clean and yeah with some bass it could get a lot nicer... and btw....

It's WarpVST with Sickan's cab bypass impulse, so I could load up Ryan's s-preshigh impulse instead of the crappy stock impulses in WarpVST...

never heard of that, any reference?
go for the second one!

 

[-Loco-]

I think the second one sounds fuller. Is there any bass in that? I can hardly tell although it's probably because of my laptop speakers. First tone sounds really thin IMO. Cool riff!

 

[reg3n]

what about the "Sickan's cab bypass impulse"... been checkin' the thread all day long

 

[reg3n]

anyone know about this thing? i'm sorry but... i'm very intrigued ;_;

 

[Erkan]

Sorry, I was away for a few days but I'm back now.

Thanks for your comments, and I think I will focus on working on tone #2 more, even though I find Erik's chain (which #1 is "based" on) amazing in its simplicity, I think #2 will probably fit my upcoming music better.

I think you should get a bass in the mix before focusing more on guitar tones. Bass tone can change the overall sound so much, I think it will be more rewarding if you tweek the guitar sound while listening to both guitars+bass+drums. I think tone nr 1 sounds better, nr 2 sounds like it's been EQ:ed a bit too much. But yeah there is something ringy in the high end, maybe try taping the high strings while recording or is it tremolo springs?

Yeah you are absolutely right about the bass but I don't own a bass myself (well, I do have one lying around here but it's a really cheap Hohner bass with a tiny body, probably sounds like shit) so I don't have a way of trying it with a bass guitar until I borrow a bass for the recording, which is in the future yet. If someone would provide me with a bass track to any or all of those riffs *hint hint* it would probably help me a lot with tone tweaking!

Yes you are right Exzem, it is ringy and it is indeed because of the lighter strings resonating while I'm playing. I usually mute them with something when I record "for real" but I didn't bother for this clip.

 

[Erkan]

anyone know about this thing? i'm sorry but... i'm very intrigued ;_;

Sickan has given me permission to share this with you guys so here it is:

http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/585020/Sickans Warp Bypass.rar

The "WarpCabBypass.wav" is the original one which "detaches" the original cab (The British Cab, won't work on any other and it doesn't need to either) in WarpVST and lets you use your own impulse after WarpVST with LeCab or KeFIR or whatever you use. All other impulses in that rar file are for overriding WarpVST's settings, so if you slap on the "10Mid.wav" after WarpVST, you will get the sound of a WarpVST which has the mid control on 10, while it's actually on 5 on your WarpVST... sounds hard to explain but basically, it's just a mid emphasis, so it will give you more mids than WarpVST usually would. I asked Sickan to make those in order to control the mids a bit more in WarpVST because it usually sounds very scooped.

For the clip I posted, I'm running the standard impulse "WarpCabBypass.wav" with WarpVST's mid control on almost full... 9.5 or so to be exact. After that, I run Ryan's s-preshigh in LeCab.

WarpVST has some cool high end and some nice flubby bass which I happen to like The mids and the beef in the low-mids need work and I HATE that you can't disable the cab in WarpVST... I haven't bought WarpVST yet but I will if I keep it through the entire project. It's just 50$ anyway, even though it sucks to pay for only the "half" program or so to speak but hey, if I use it, I buy it.

 

[reg3n]

thanks a lot man! kool info, i had no idea there was such a thing, so thank you and mr Sickan =) and yeah, i'd totally go for the second one man, just heard that again and i think the kick does a lot for the tone, so i'd keep that too i think...

 

[Erkan]

thanks a lot man! kool info, i had no idea there was such a thing, so thank you and mr Sickan =) and yeah, i'd totally go for the second one man, just heard that again and i think the kick does a lot for the tone, so i'd keep that too i think...

No problem, thank Sickan

Hmm well, the drums are Addictive Drums which I really don't think is a good choise for this music style but you are right about the kick contributing to the guitar tone! It's all about the grand mix in the end after all, so everything does affect everything... but I think I can still hunt for a good guitar tone "base", and then tweak from there in the mix.

Edit: Oh and of course, I only use AD for scratch track purposes... I'm going to be recording the drums myself and causing myself multiple head aches later on

 

[reg3n]

haha kool man, at least for me when going for that kind'a... kick-mixed-with-guitar tone kind'a thing i prefer the kind'a kick u use here, even if it's a scratch, i don't like the super clicky stuff for these tones though i ONLY use clicky shit always

 

[feles]

Hey man!

I was bored, and i practiced bass, so i made a DI track for you)

http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/151663/mp3/ERKAN-bass.rar

I'm not sure in the first riff 'couse i only got a 4 string bass, so i could't play so low(A#),and i'm deaf haha
It's a bit sloopy and maybe shit but i tried it

And i like the Warp VST better, the 8505-SoloC has a harsh high-end

I'm waiting for your new mix

feles

 

[Erkan]

Hey Feles! Thank you so much for the bass track, I'll give it a try and see how the guitars and bass play with each other Kinda busy atm but I'll definately give it a try later and post something back... and at the same time, I can let you guys hear the new and hopefully slightly improved WarpVST chain