What went wrong? (quick micing Q)

[Tym_ex]

Hey, need your help on this.

I'll make this as short as possible: I've been recording a band's demo and last week it was time for the guitars. They had an Engl Fireball and Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier to work with. I chose do 4 layers of rhythm guitars, 2 mesa and 2 engl.

For simplicity sake I chose to work with only 1 SM-57 per cab. The Engl was connected to an Engl cab and the Mesa to a Marshall cab. We did the mic setup pretty fast and recorded all stuff. When I got home I transfered all stuff from my laptop to my DAW. Then I noticed something weird is going on with the Mesa recordings. Like an extreme tape saturation effect or something. I'm by no means an expert at micing amps so I thought maybe you guys know what went wrong here.

The mic was an inch or so away from the grille. The amp was pretty loud but not louder then the Engl which recorded just fine.

Here's a short mp3 from a mesa track
http://student-kmt.hku.nl/~tymon/mesa_weird.mp3

Thnx!

 

[MetalSound]

Just have my small pc speakers here to listen but it sounds to my ears like the amp could need some new tubes....
I had these problems too and after retubing the amp a new world of sound opened....

 

[Wolfeman]

Just sounds like bad mic placement/bad amp settings....

 

[metalkingdom]

Neck pickup instead of bridge.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

Nothing dramatic here...

 

[KeithRT99]

i like it

 

[billcraftmetal15]

Just sounds like your typical dual rec to me. Did you have a tubescreamer in the guitar chain? Would have made it a bit better.

 

[Matt Smith]

Also, don't forget that if those were standard 75-watt Celestions in the Marshall cab, it will sound a heck of a lot different than the (I assume) Vintage 30s in the Engl cab.

 

[Tachy]

Tym-ex: for me the best solution is to record the engl end the dual with the same cab, in this case the engl cab if it's loaded with V30.

 

[dontletmedrown]

Sounds like a Mesa to me. You can roll off some lows with a narrow Q and it should be useable. Difficult to judge out of context but you should be able to make it work.

:Smokin:

 

[Tym_ex]

Thnx for all the replies! I must say I'm quite surprised that people say this sounds like a normal mesa recording. Doesn't sound too good to me, but it was quite usable in the mix.

I'm not done yet but here's a small sample from a premix:http://student-kmt.hku.nl/~tymon/TND/TND%20- nr4 - premix - 22 jan 2007.mp3

 

[JimmyJ]

Thnx for all the replies! I must say I'm quite surprised that people say this sounds like a normal mesa recording. Doesn't sound too good to me, but it was quite usable in the mix.

I'm not done yet but here's a small sample from a premix:http://student-kmt.hku.nl/~tymon/TND/TND - nr4 - premix - 22 jan 2007.mp3

dude that sounds unreal!


the only thing id work on is that snare, the snare is only think that is telling me its not a pro recording.

 

[smy1]

I like the guitars and the overheads. Bring the guitars up and it's a shame that the band didnt play more extended chords because those sound awesome (when they happen).

I agree with jimmy on the snare, maybe replace it with something that has more attack. Same with the kick. It's a bit too low and indistinguishable ...

 

[Mood Bender]

that kicks ass...

don't care for the kit mix in general...

but, that kicks ass...

 

[Tym_ex]

Hey thnx guys! I agree on the snare, man I broke my head on that snare trying to make it CRACK. Anyways, I just got back from recording vox and solos so the serious mixing can begin now. I'll post some samples when I'm done And maybe ask for advice in the mean time