Carefully crafted TM patches no good live?

Billbill

Power User
I've read many times on here about guys making reference to patches that are crafted with tonematch blocks don't work very well in a live setting. I'm assuming it's due to certain frequencies in the patch missing due to that patch being tuned to CD quality sound and when used live frequencies from other instruments like drums and bass or whatever else, simply smear that studio quality tone you've created out of the mix. Is this accurate?
 
Partly IMHO. Each tone is EQ'd to fit that particular mix. But a good tone is a good tone...

When I first got my Axe-Fx, I tone matched a whole bunch of tunes that we played. Most were very accurate. But in a live (and loud) setting, the tone differences were too different, especially at gig volume.

I ended up going for a happy medium. I eventually found an IR mix that I settled on for my basic sound. It's the same IR in my 'JCM-800' preset (and many others). Then I would blend that IR with the tone matched sound in various ways, at different percentages. I ended up with the 'Vibes' of the different tunes, buy with more continuity.
 
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Partly IMHO. Each tone is EQ'd to fit that particular mix. But a good tone is a good tone...

When I first got my Axe-Fx, I tone matched a whole bunch of tunes that we played. Most were very accurate. But in a live (and loud) setting, the tone differences were too different, especially at gig volume.

I ended up going for a happy medium. I eventually found an IR mix that I settled on for my basic sound. It's the same IR in my 'JCM-800' preset (and many others). Then I would blend that IR with the tone matched sound is various ways, at different percentages. I ended up with the 'Vibes' of the different tunes, buy with more continuity.
Hmm good info, thanks for sharing your experiences Moke
 
I've read many times on here about guys making reference to patches that are crafted with tonematch blocks don't work very well in a live setting. I'm assuming it's due to certain frequencies in the patch missing due to that patch being tuned to CD quality sound and when used live frequencies from other instruments like drums and bass or whatever else, simply smear that studio quality tone you've created out of the mix. Is this accurate?

When I first got the Axe-Fx I thought tone matching some of my favorite players was a blast, but you're right: matching it CD quality or YouTube quality recordings leaves a lot to be desired. My experience is the same as Moke. You can get close, get the vibe, but I have found it much more rewarding to take the time to try and match the sound through the use of the amp models, cabs, and parameter tweaking. Not only can you nail pretty much any tone that way, but you get the full rich, almost 3-D sound that I find difficult to achieve with Tone Matching. Even tone matching to a .wav doesn't yield the results as well as just building a patch, at least to my ears. I have also had decent results mixing tone matching with Cabs, but I think that defeats the purpose of the TM block.

Now, what I do think is pretty rad, is the ability of the Axe-Fx to match an amp. I need to get better equipment to do it, but, I've seen some damn good results using the live matching feature. When you match to a recording it only matches 1024 data points IIRC, and with the live amp matching, I think it's 8092 data points. Hence, why the results are so much better. If I'm wrong on this, I'm sure someone will correct me.

The last amp match I did turned out okay, but I think I could improve the way I did it a lot, so I will be trying again when I have better equipment to do it with. You can also amp match a whole setup; so if you have a particular amp with a particular pedal that you like, you can amp match the whole signal chain, not just the amp.
 
When I first got the Axe-Fx I thought tone matching some of my favorite players was a blast, but you're right: matching it CD quality or YouTube quality recordings leaves a lot to be desired. My experience is the same as Moke. You can get close, get the vibe, but I have found it much more rewarding to take the time to try and match the sound through the use of the amp models, cabs, and parameter tweaking. Not only can you nail pretty much any tone that way, but you get the full rich, almost 3-D sound that I find difficult to achieve with Tone Matching. Even tone matching to a .wav doesn't yield the results as well as just building a patch, at least to my ears. I have also had decent results mixing tone matching with Cabs, but I think that defeats the purpose of the TM block.

Now, what I do think is pretty rad, is the ability of the Axe-Fx to match an amp. I need to get better equipment to do it, but, I've seen some damn good results using the live matching feature. When you match to a recording it only matches 1024 data points IIRC, and with the live amp matching, I think it's 8092 data points. Hence, why the results are so much better. If I'm wrong on this, I'm sure someone will correct me.

The last amp match I did turned out okay, but I think I could improve the way I did it a lot, so I will be trying again when I have better equipment to do it with. You can also amp match a whole setup; so if you have a particular amp with a particular pedal that you like, you can amp match the whole signal chain, not just the amp.
Thanks for sharing your experience bro! I found great results doing tonematches with patches created with the technique u described by using my own method then illl use that and do the TM over again and it's almost scary how accurate the TM is.!!!
 
Thanks for sharing your experience bro! I found great results doing tonematches with patches created with the technique u described by using my own method then illl use that and do the TM over again and it's almost scary how accurate the TM is.!!!

Nice man! Yes, it took me about two or three hours total. In that time I probably did 10 amp matches because I kept tweaking things, but I made the mistake of not adjusting for the differing gain structures between the model and my real amp. But, like I said, I need some better equipment to make it work to its full potential. When I matched my amp, I didn't shoot an IR of the cab separately, I captured everything all at once which doesn't yield the greatest result. But it was good enough for me to get the sound I needed at the moment.

Next time around I'm going to get a better mic, a nice power amp, a DI Box and a few other little things and do it up right. :-D
 
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