Depends on what you mean by “pristine.” Most folks use that word to mean a total lack of distortion. The only way to do that is to lower the gain until the distortion goes away.For making clean tones even MORE pristine, what do you tend to do with eq? Do you use any in front of the amp as well?
Thanks!
If “pristine” means something else to you, you’ll have to let us know what that is.
I'm still not quite sure what you mean. "Clarity" as in brighter, "clarity" as in rounder, or as in more-forward-in-the-mix, or...? Truth is, a very slightly distorted tone will sound more clear in the mix than a pristine clean tone. So if I can't be sure of what you mean, I'll stick to generalities.I just meant pre-eq or post-eq to make a clean tone with much more clarity. With an already clean amp tone. Especially when using humbuckers.
I'm still not quite sure what you mean.
if you want to kill muddiness, cut lows. If you try to drown the mud with more highs, the mud will still be there.
Adding 10db of high end to something peaking at -2db is a recipe for clipped transients.
I think the reason is because adding anything increases noise...In recording, there is a huge school of subtractive (cut) only EQ. My best guess is that they do it to avoid the potential of clipping sources.
This seems logical, though in practice it's not necessarily the case. For example, adding 10dB of boost at 5KHz to a clean sample peaking at -2dB won't necessarily result in clipping.
It will if there is energy there, it won't if there's not. Adding 10db of boost at 5khz won't do much of anything to a guitar that doesn't have any real response there (like a dark humbucker).
I never mentioned 5khz. Just high end;
I think the reason is because adding anything increases noise...
The issue with the first clip is lack of high end, not muddiness. That’s why the fix for mud didn’t work, but boosting the highs did work (it preserved the low mids, which were fine to begin with). In fact, a mild, low-Q boost centered around 2 KHz might work even betterA lot of people seem to believe this, however in practice, that doesn't appear to be the case. Here's an example:
Original Sample:
Low Cut Exclusively:
High Boost Exclusively:
Sometimes a combination (high boost / low cut) works well. There are no hard and fast rules. However, in order to get even partially close to the clarity of the top end in sample 3 by cutting the lows in the original sample, you'd have to cut them so much that the bottom end would ultimately sound fairly thin, and even then, because you're only cutting the low end, the high end still won't match the clarity of the top end in sample 3.
The issue with the first clip is lack of high end, not muddiness. That’s why the fix for mud didn’t work, but boosting the highs did work (it preserved the low mids, which were fine to begin with). In fact, a mild, low-Q boost centered around 2 KHz might work even better
"Mud" refers to congestion in the lower midrange (sometimes called the "mudrange," it extends from roughly 250 Hz to 500 Hz, depending on who you ask).The very definition of muddy implies a lack of clarity, which is often perceived as a lack of high-end. The term is often accompanied by descriptors such as dark and muffled. That said, there's no hard and fast definition of muddy, however feel free to post what you consider an example and I'll be glad to show you how I'd resolve it with a high-end boost, that is unless there really is too much low-end / low-mid energy, in which case cutting may also be apropos.
That school is well-represented in the live-sound business, too.In recording, there is a huge school of subtractive (cut) only EQ.