VirgilGuitar
Inspired
After owning the Axe-FX Ultra for over a month now, I have been able to get my digs into the unit for some serious recording situations. I started a CD project in May of '09 and have had several things come up in my life, including health issues, laziness and eventually putting everything on hold until I was able to afford (Then wait on the availability) of actually getting this unit.
For the past week or so, I have really dug deep into the tones of the unit to get the guitar sounds I have been looking for with 2 songs on the CD and have been really happy with the results. 1 song that I posted a few weeks back is actually now finished, but I am wanting to get it professionally mixed and mastered with the rest of the songs and simply keep moving forward with the CD. Since I play instrumental rock guitar, the tones are especially crucial, with having solos, rhythm AND FX, I am really falling in love with some of the amps/cabs/flexibility of the AxeFX. One of the things I have been especially concentrating on is making the lead guitar not sound "crackly, fizzy, etc." with some good sustain and spending the time to achieve the tones wanted is a full time job for sure, but this project has been a challenge from the start, with allot of elements I am having myself do to make a project that I will be proud of in the end. Last year, I purchased a stereo for my truck that takes a USB stick, so I can simply plop the songs I am working on there, instead of burning cd after cd of "work in progress". It seems to be pretty easy and Mother Earth may even send me a ""Thank You Note" in the end.
Listening to these 2 tracks yesterday while rolling down the highway was pretty awesome, because it was the first time I actually enjoyed the tones coming out of the solo and rhythm tracks I have been recording. This process can be tedious at times, because I don't know about anyone else, but after recording for a few hours, the ears can turn to mush and sometimes I have to wait till the next day to really hear what I have done. I am not rushing things but am moving forward, but all in all the AXE-FX has been a blessing with what I am trying to work on here and I am achieving some of the tones that I have been hearing on recordings through these years with my own unit. I have been starting out with the basic Amp/Cab bank that I posted here: http://fractalaudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=20601 And then have basically just adding a slight delay/verb to the stock cabs/amps, with some minor tweaks on the Amps if I want a little sustain and with the cabs, sometimes, I will make them into "Stereo" and/or simply change some mics up to hone in closer to what I am looking for. I have always been a person to max out the tone & volume on my guitar, but I am learning the benefits of rolling those back at times to get the tone I am looking for. There are so many options with this unit, that I will NEVER fully explore EVERYTHING it has, which is fine by me - eventually, you just have to "Go with it" and just hit the record button.
One of my newest epiphanies with this unit is simply this: Since I do MAINLY recording, I could have bought 1 amp & cab and screwed with it for hours on end to get the tone needed for a particular song and would have paid about the same amount for the AxeFX Ultra, but then I would have ONE AMP. Now that I have access to ALL of these popular amps/tones/fx, I realize what a value this unit is. It would have cost me the price of my house, which wouldn't even fit all of those amps. When I first got into home recording 17 years ago, I had a Marshall JCM 800 and a Carvin 4x12 cab and remember sitting there for a long time trying to get tones out of that thing and now, Fractal (Cliff) made this guitar-slinger's life a bit easier, with tons of flexibility.
BTW, I even snuck in "Poltergeist Pig" in the song that's finished (hehehe)
For the past week or so, I have really dug deep into the tones of the unit to get the guitar sounds I have been looking for with 2 songs on the CD and have been really happy with the results. 1 song that I posted a few weeks back is actually now finished, but I am wanting to get it professionally mixed and mastered with the rest of the songs and simply keep moving forward with the CD. Since I play instrumental rock guitar, the tones are especially crucial, with having solos, rhythm AND FX, I am really falling in love with some of the amps/cabs/flexibility of the AxeFX. One of the things I have been especially concentrating on is making the lead guitar not sound "crackly, fizzy, etc." with some good sustain and spending the time to achieve the tones wanted is a full time job for sure, but this project has been a challenge from the start, with allot of elements I am having myself do to make a project that I will be proud of in the end. Last year, I purchased a stereo for my truck that takes a USB stick, so I can simply plop the songs I am working on there, instead of burning cd after cd of "work in progress". It seems to be pretty easy and Mother Earth may even send me a ""Thank You Note" in the end.
Listening to these 2 tracks yesterday while rolling down the highway was pretty awesome, because it was the first time I actually enjoyed the tones coming out of the solo and rhythm tracks I have been recording. This process can be tedious at times, because I don't know about anyone else, but after recording for a few hours, the ears can turn to mush and sometimes I have to wait till the next day to really hear what I have done. I am not rushing things but am moving forward, but all in all the AXE-FX has been a blessing with what I am trying to work on here and I am achieving some of the tones that I have been hearing on recordings through these years with my own unit. I have been starting out with the basic Amp/Cab bank that I posted here: http://fractalaudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=20601 And then have basically just adding a slight delay/verb to the stock cabs/amps, with some minor tweaks on the Amps if I want a little sustain and with the cabs, sometimes, I will make them into "Stereo" and/or simply change some mics up to hone in closer to what I am looking for. I have always been a person to max out the tone & volume on my guitar, but I am learning the benefits of rolling those back at times to get the tone I am looking for. There are so many options with this unit, that I will NEVER fully explore EVERYTHING it has, which is fine by me - eventually, you just have to "Go with it" and just hit the record button.
One of my newest epiphanies with this unit is simply this: Since I do MAINLY recording, I could have bought 1 amp & cab and screwed with it for hours on end to get the tone needed for a particular song and would have paid about the same amount for the AxeFX Ultra, but then I would have ONE AMP. Now that I have access to ALL of these popular amps/tones/fx, I realize what a value this unit is. It would have cost me the price of my house, which wouldn't even fit all of those amps. When I first got into home recording 17 years ago, I had a Marshall JCM 800 and a Carvin 4x12 cab and remember sitting there for a long time trying to get tones out of that thing and now, Fractal (Cliff) made this guitar-slinger's life a bit easier, with tons of flexibility.
BTW, I even snuck in "Poltergeist Pig" in the song that's finished (hehehe)