What are some good ways to sneak a guitar track into a live mix?

[McLowery]

My band's last gig was recorded and pretty much everything came out well in the mix except the guitar is just too low to make it useable. (Just the heavy rythym parts, the leads and cleans came out nice.) I was wondering if there are any transparent ways to get an underlying guitar track into the mix, to beef what's already there up to come out in the mix.

 

[006]

Just record them and keep them low...start bringing the volume up until it sounds loud enough but not too much or to where you can tell it's done after-the-fact. Seems pretty easy to me...

For live shows that I have recorded I always just take a DI of the guitars and bass and reamp the guitars later and blend those in.

~006

 

[McLowery]

I just did some test runs in Cubase and I think it will work just fine. I was afraid of the guitar tones being way too different to mesh but a little EQ and the correct IR cabinet and BAM, spot on match! I matched the live mix's natural club reverb as close too.. Thanks a lot. Next gig I am going to DI the bass and axe, didn't even think about it the last time... I'm still pretty green in the tracking department.. LOL Great advice man, thanks.

 

[006]

No problem man, we all start off somewhere. Don't be afraid of the noobness, asking questions is the best way to learn. I wish I was lucky enough to have found a place like this when I first started.

~006

 

[Zack Uidl]

I was going to recommend the same thing. Since live recordings tend to have more room noise you would just need to make sure that the levels of the new guitars don't get too loud.

 

[hoehlentroll]

the problem I would see is to get the exact timing afterwards. This is of cause no issue if the drummer/all played live to click track.

 

[McLowery]

the problem I would see is to get the exact timing afterwards. This is of cause no issue if the drummer/all played live to click track.

Well the only guitars that needed anything was the rythym parts so I didn't have to double any solos. It wasn't too difficult to track after sitting and tweaking the mix for the added guitar with the original mixdown. We are going balls out fast though, and I hate that part of playing live when the songs just come out flying! I posted a rough take comparison to the original I had to work with in this section of the forum for critiquing.