Friedman Naked / APC Tones

I have searched through the forums and have seen posts talking about the Friedman Naked in regards to Billy Howerdel's APC tone. I know there is not currently a Friedman Naked amp model, but If I were trying to get close, which one of the Marshall or Friedman amps would I be best to start with?

If anyone has tone matched one, I'd love to try that as well. I checked the exchange and saw nothing there.
 
That i do not know :)
They sound almost the same. To pick the IR file.. is the hard part (i dont know) hehe
 
Hey guys. I'm a noob here on the forums, I don't even have an AXE FX (yet). However, what I do have...

...is the Friedman Naked amp. Currently I'm still saving up for an AXE FX, but when that day doth come, I will absolutely profile it and upload it. I'm working on selling off my speaker cab and some other stuff to pay for the AXE and hopefully (whenever it hits the markets) the fractal nucleus so that I can continue to use my Naked, but damn...AXE FX are not cheap : (.

Until that day, some tips: other than the Naked, the biggest part of Howerdel's tone is the pickups (Tom Anderson H3+ in the bridge, H1- in the neck). According to Tom, he no longer uses that pickup array and has switched to a less hot bridge pickup--I forget if it was the H3 or H2+--and I believe the H1 in the neck. However, if you want the Mer De Noms and Thirteenth Step era tones, the H3+ and H1- are accurate. Also, he is a greenback user, not V30. This works for some peeps and is a tad dark sounding for others. I personally find the Naked--which is by nature a darker sounding amp--going through purely greenbacks to be perhaps just a bit too dark--not super versatile--but the best combo is a compromise: cab with 2 V30s and 2 Greenbacks. If you can find an IR of a cab with that array...I think the word is bangarang? The other thing to bear in mind is that Mer De Noms was largely recorded and engineered using an early version of POD farm, GRM Tools/Ultra Tools plugins, and lots of layering the same guitar parts (like 8 times for rhythm, sometimes up to 16 times for lead). Pretty incredible to think Billy was able to get such outrageous tones in the early days of amp modeling software. For Thirteenth Step the guitar tones on the record were from the Naked, but they continued to GRM Tools for effects. But yeah...in a nut shell.

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I have had Daniel from Silent Underground Studios build a custom preset and custom IRs to help try to put together the Judith tones. I have a PRS Singlecut with the H3+ and the H1- pickups.

In the latest rig rundowns they simply state they are using the anderson pickups but did not metion they had changed from the H3+ setup, just that they are pretty hot.
 
If you ever decide to sell that PLEASE LET ME KNOW

If that day does come, I certainly will! Honestly though I'm super happy with it, not very likely that I would. Even though Dave no longer makes the production model, you might be able to get him to give your amp his APC mod or possibly have him build you your own one off Naked if he can find the spec vintage transformers and if you have the $$$$. The other option is to contact Naylor Amplification, the Duel 100 is pretty close. The naked is a Naylor SD100 preamp mated with a 1978 Marshall JMP output section.
 
I have had Daniel from Silent Underground Studios build a custom preset and custom IRs to help try to put together the Judith tones. I have a PRS Singlecut with the H3+ and the H1- pickups.

In the latest rig rundowns they simply state they are using the anderson pickups but did not metion they had changed from the H3+ setup, just that they are pretty hot.

Yes, I saw that too. My intel is several years old now. I talked to Tom Anderson directly about BH's pickup set and he said...

"he changed the pickups form what he was originally using to HO1- and H2+."

To which I asked when BH made the change, and he said "it's been several years ago that he changed. the h01- is going to be a bit weaker and not as deep on the bass. the h1- is a bit more scooped while the ho1- is more middle focused. h2+ is not as hot but has a better spread on all tones, still not a weak pickup by any means."

Granted, this correspondence with Tom was in 2012, so by my best guess that puts that particular pickup setup 2008 onwards until that point in 2012 when I contacted him. He could have very well changed back to the H3+/H1- set at this point in time. I have the H3+/H1- in my LP and I love em!
 
I have had Daniel from Silent Underground Studios build a custom preset and custom IRs to help try to put together the Judith tones.

That's awesome! Good on you for taking the helm. I was just watching that video on Youtube and I couldn't tell exactly what was going on in the workstation with the switching back and forth, but it looked like he has the APC Mogg files that he's using to replicate the tone. Certainly the best reference material to work with! It might be an ever more accurate match than trying to profile the Naked. I've taken it in to Interlace Audio (Kris Krummett and Stephan Hawkes) to profile it on the Kemper, and I can tell you we spent hours and hours over the course of several days trying to get an accurate profile of this amp and for whatever reason...it's just a difficult beast to capture. The best one we captured still just didn't have that special sauce and lacked the true Naked essence. When I get an AXE I know I'll probably dump a lot of time into profiling, and I'm bent on not releasing it until I'm confident that it as close to perfection as I can get it.
 
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Are there any parts in APC where his tone is completely isolated? I've had great results tone matching and mixing that with the the usual axe fx chain.
 
Are there any parts in APC where his tone is completely isolated? I've had great results tone matching and mixing that with the the usual axe fx chain.
Ah...that I'm pretty sure is a no, at least for gain tones. Even in the most minimal instrumental passages there aren't any that come to mind where it is literally ONLY guitar besides the clean intro to Orestes and The Outsider, or the bridge in Thomas. You can download the MOGG files for a few of there songs and reference the combined L/R guitar tracks from the mix, but not individual/unlayered single guitar tracks.
 
Ah...that I'm pretty sure is a no, at least for gain tones. Even in the most minimal instrumental passages there aren't any that come to mind where it is literally ONLY guitar besides the clean intro to Orestes and The Outsider, or the bridge in Thomas. You can download the MOGG files for a few of there songs and reference the combined L/R guitar tracks from the mix, but not individual/unlayered single guitar tracks.

Thanks man! Didn't even know that was a thing. Already found something to work with.
 
That's awesome! Good on you for taking the helm. I was just watching that video on Youtube and I couldn't tell exactly what was going on in the workstation with the switching back and forth, but it looked like he has the APC Mogg files that he's using to replicate the tone. Certainly the best reference material to work with! It might be an ever more accurate match than trying to profile the Naked. I've taken it in to Interlace Audio (Kris Krummett and Stephan Hawkes) to profile it on the Kemper, and I can tell you we spent hours and hours over the course of several days trying to get an accurate profile of this amp and for whatever reason...it's just a difficult beast to capture. The best one we captured still just didn't have that special sauce and lacked the true Naked essence. When I get an AXE I know I'll probably dump a lot of time into profiling, and I'm bent on not releasing it until I'm confident that it as close to perfection as I can get it.

Nathaniel it's possible that Cliff might want to model your Naked. Don't want to speak for him or Fractal but customer owned amps have made their way into the collection.
 
Feel free to give this a try. All blocks used are standard. Haven't delved into the effect side of the patch. I know his delay signal detunes slowly and has some chorus but I'm yet to figure out how to do it. Used the MOGG files from the outside for tone matching. For his cleans he uses a fender head in the fractal. Should be an octa fuzz thrown in there for some parts of his songs.
 

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Nathaniel it's possible that Cliff might want to model your Naked. Don't want to speak for him or Fractal but customer owned amps have made their way into the collection.

Potentially! I wish I could just do it myself, but damn I'm just having a hard time pulling the trigger on an AXE FX (difficult to come up with a reason why it's something I NEED and explain that to my wife while we're in the process of buying a home). I do need to send the amp down to Dave after the holidays when I have a little free cash on hand to give it a tune up though. Maybe after he's done working on it and before he ships it back to me I can be in speaks with Cliff and arrange for him to run it through its paces for a profile. I assume Cliff is in the L.A. area?

Ok, so in the meantime for those that have BIAS from Positive Grid, I have an amp match that I made and posted to tonecloud yesterday--which is surprisingly a closer match than I was able to obtain given several sessions with the Kemper at a studio's A Room. It's still not perfect (missing some of that sweet resonance in the low end and not quite as smooth high end, doesn't ring out or sustain quite as much) I'm convinced that it is largely because the amp match function is based upon a capture of an averaged EQ curve, but I'm actually pretty impressed with how close it was able to get. Dialed the tone with my LP Classic with Tom Anderson H3+ bridge/H1- Neck which sounds great (that's a huge part of BH's tone) so if possible use these or similar for best results. Take it for a spin, search "Umbra Drive" on tonecloud.
 
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Nathaniel... would you be willing to share your profile with me. I just did a quick profile of mine but i am very curious how yours sounds being done in a professional studio.
 
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