Dialing in Reverbs for Live Shows (Basic Room, Effected, Mono vs Stereo, etc.)

[imrecs]

Dialing in my Axe FX for live shows. Will be going direct to FOH out of the Axe, and monitoring via In-Ears (no stage volume).

I’m setting up 2 reverbs.

A) A basic room sound to give the amp the feel of an actual amp in the room, as the dry signal is a bit too bone dry in our in-ears. Not sure if the room acoustics will provide this for the audience, but at least for our in-ears we need a sense of space. Any particular algorithms or settings you would recommend for this? I like the sound of the “medium room” and “rec studio C” so far. Will using them in the signal chain translate well to the PA if it’s mono? Any benefit to using the room parameters in the cab block? CPU is not an issue.

B) An “effected” reverb for when I want a part to have “reverb”. I tend to use mono delays though there are some parts where the rhythmic nature of the delay clashes, at which point I prefer a longer/wetter reverb. I’ve been using the Spring reverb thus far since it’s a mono reverb; though I’m really enjoying the Sun Plate and Cathedral, especially when running them in parallel and connecting the level to an expression pedal so I can blend in the level of ambience based on the song/part? Again, this sounds amazing in our in-ears, but wondering if there are settings or other algorithms that will translate best to the audience if the PA is mono.

I am blending 2 amps for my tone…not sure if there is any benefit of running one dry and the other wet (W/D or W/D/W setup?), or if I can just blend them to taste in a stereo cabinet and run the reverbs afterwards. Also, if the stereo reverbs may cause any issues for the front of house, we could always run some stereo reverb just on our monitor mixes, and give the FOH a bone dry signal and stick to mono spring reverb for the “effected” reverb.

What would you say is the best approach?

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Obviously, if you want your in-ears to have more reverb than the PA system, then you have to split your signal at the end of the grid into the optional reverb into an FXL block and use output 2 for your in-ears.

However, at this point, I would consider adding the extra reverb externally. Most digital mixers offer a great variety of standard reverbs for this purpose.

To answer your question: yes, the "room" parameter is more or less just a trimmed-down built-in room reverb to save CPU. If you have the CPU reserves, feel free to use a reverb block instead.

 

[UnsungHeroGuitars]

Quick thought on a related note, but from a slightly different perspective:

On most records, the guitarist and engineer dial up a great tone and apply effects as desired to compliment the great tone. Once the work is complete and the song released, they have no influence over what it's subsequently played through or in what kind of venue. They do not make different mixes featuring different effects to cover all scenarios.

I don't buy the "it's different for live" argument because whats a disco / club playing..? That's right, pre-recorded material and it sounds great - awful venues, crap systems and poor operation aside that is.

So, get the source sounds 'good' (that's entirely subjective of course) and present them through decent gear with the overall sound being the prime objective - with the lead vocal being king of it all - and hope that the room sounds good or is sufficiently treated. Feed that same overall sound into the ears, with some individual lifts if required. Beyond that, there's not much else you can control (generalisations and obvious considerations excepted)

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Quick thought on a related note, but from a slightly different perspective:

On most records, the guitarist and engineer dial up a great tone and apply effects as desired to compliment the great tone. Once the work is complete and the song released, they have no influence over what it's subsequently played through or in what kind of venue. They do not make different mixes featuring different effects to cover all scenarios.

I don't buy the "it's different for live" argument because whats a disco / club playing..? That's right, pre-recorded material and it sounds great - awful venues, crap systems and poor operation aside that is.

So, get the source sounds 'good' (that's entirely subjective of course) and present them through decent gear with the overall sound being the prime objective - with the lead vocal being king of it all - and hope that the room sounds good or is sufficiently treated. Feed that same overall sound into the ears, with some individual lifts if required. Beyond that, there's not much else you can control (generalisations and obvious considerations excepted)

I understand the idea behind this post; I really do, but live tone and professional recording are two completely different things.

A recording is heavily processed and more importantly compressed and also mostly has a wide stereo imaging.

Compared to that, a live tone is way more dynamic and the instruments blur heavily into each other, due to room acoustics and that you can't perfectly mix each other at the limits of stage volume. You can't just make an acoustic drumset more quiet in a live mix, if 90% of what you hear comes directly from stage anyway.
You can't apply all the neat tricks of post-recording on your live tone, simply because you have no way to do so. A reverb profile on a mixed production might sound great in any live venue. But this is because of all the other means taken to improve clarity, especially EQing all the different drum mics.

So unless your live venue is a record studio, chances are you might encounter clarity issues that won't get better with additional reverb slapped onto the PA.

 

[imrecs]

Quick thought on a related note, but from a slightly different perspective:

On most records, the guitarist and engineer dial up a great tone and apply effects as desired to compliment the great tone. Once the work is complete and the song released, they have no influence over what it's subsequently played through or in what kind of venue. They do not make different mixes featuring different effects to cover all scenarios.

I don't buy the "it's different for live" argument because whats a disco / club playing..? That's right, pre-recorded material and it sounds great - awful venues, crap systems and poor operation aside that is.

So, get the source sounds 'good' (that's entirely subjective of course) and present them through decent gear with the overall sound being the prime objective - with the lead vocal being king of it all - and hope that the room sounds good or is sufficiently treated. Feed that same overall sound into the ears, with some individual lifts if required. Beyond that, there's not much else you can control (generalisations and obvious considerations excepted)

This is actually a perspective that applies to my project. Basically our group functions like an electronic artist would work; playing pre-recorded/mixed/heavily studio produced tracks/stems in a live venue, though with the addition of live drums and guitars.

In our studio recordings, I track the guitars through the Fractal and use the same presets/tones for live....The drums are obviously a bit of a wild card as they're the only acoustic instrument live...though for everything else that is going to the PA, it's basically like an electronic artist set with live guitar playing rather than pre-recorded guitar.

When I track guitars for the studio sessions, I record bone dry or with delay, and then apply reverb in the mix...often sending it via an aux to a stereo reverb that other elements are also going to, to gel everything into the same space. this changes song to song, so for live I'd like to have 2 global reverbs...one shorter verb that's just a "room" sound, and one longer one like a plate/larger space. If I use the Sun Plate and Cathedral for longer verbs, and the medium room or rec studio C for shorter ones, will I be fine if it gets summed to mono at the PA? I would reduce the stereo spread to 0% on the verbs, but I like the stereo effect in my in-ears, and i assume if it gets summed to mono it would be the same as setting the stereo width to 0% anyway, right?

 

[unFILTERed]

I prefer blending room mic IRs or the room parameter in Cab block...reverb block is too cpu hungry and for this purpose i dont think that it makes too much off a difference, i mean u dont need all these parameters in the rev block just to give a depth/room space to your guitar signal for live usage...but yes i think also it makes things better when you add some room sound to guitar beside the bigger reverbs...also for recording/studio it helps alot but i get better results with plugins in the studio for reverbs and delays.

 

[imrecs]

Just found an interesting quote from Jimmy Herring, a guitarist who uses the Axe FX for reverb only with a real amp:

"The solution was to convert the external spkr. jack on the back of the amp to a Line Out. This made it possible to go from the line out, to a digital reverb, then to a Mesa Boogie stereo power amp which is connected to two 2x12 cabinets. The shaky stages didn't bother the digital reverb. It worked great. Plus, this way, the twin was bone dry, no verb, and the other cabs could have reverb only. That way, if you're playing in a big boomy room, the sound guy can just turn up the dry amp, but YOU can still hear all the reverb you want, without it going through the PA. A typical problem when playing those big boomy places is: Out front it's really boomy and there's a lot of natural reverb in the room , but on stage, you can't hear enough reverb. So you turn your reverb up so it sounds right to you, and your sound guy is drowning in verb. By doing it this way, you eliminate that problem."

So I guess the "bone dry" sound I'm hearing in my in ears might be ideal for a venue where there will be natural verb? Maybe just with a little bit of a room parameter in the cab block, or blending a room mic IR for a little bit of "air"?

And then if I want a wetter sound I can use a reverb plugin on an aux in Ableton where we mix our in ears, and send the bone dry guitar to the FOH...and then just have a plate or chapel available for when I want to use reverb as an effect...that verb could be stereo for the in-ears, and then if it gets summed to mono at the PA, it will be fine right?

 

[UnsungHeroGuitars]

This is actually a perspective that applies to my project

I thought it might...

The drums are obviously a bit of a wild card as they're the only acoustic instrument live...though for everything else that is going to the PA

Tame that wild beast then!

Of course, easier said than done as drummers have even more preconceptions / prejudices over 'direct vs acoustic' set ups than guitarists do!

I'm not suggesting a Simmonds kit with hex pads or even a Roland effort with a frame and little pads, I'm talking something that still looks the part, but triggers samples instead. Again, by 'samples' I don't mean Alesis D4, I mean Superior Drummer or similar

That kit is practically silent - the only acoustic sound is sticks on cymbal surface and a little impact on mesh heads with DDrum triggers and Alesis Surge cymbals. Perfectly controlled.

When I track guitars for the studio sessions, I record bone dry or with delay, and then apply reverb in the mix...often sending it via an aux to a stereo reverb that other elements are also going to, to gel everything into the same space. this changes song to song, so for live I'd like to have 2 global reverbs...one shorter verb that's just a "room" sound, and one longer one like a plate/larger space. If I use the Sun Plate and Cathedral for longer verbs, and the medium room or rec studio C for shorter ones, will I be fine if it gets summed to mono at the PA? I would reduce the stereo spread to 0% on the verbs, but I like the stereo effect in my in-ears, and i assume if it gets summed to mono it would be the same as setting the stereo width to 0% anyway, right?

If you go the whole hog and have everything running through your own digital mixer, you can blend everything perfectly and yes, even have an overall reverb if you like to suit various venues or in-ears etc etc etc

It works for smaller venues right through to this sort of place:

How many changes to reverb mix did we ever make for different venues..? None

Overall EQ etc, yes of course, that might need attention from venue to venue, but not one change for effects. Worked for hundreds and hundreds of gigs too

 

[imrecs]

That's dope though we're definitelly sticking to a live kit for now.

Thinking that I should just use a bit of the room parameter in the cab block to give it a less bone dry sound to both in ears and FOH...like Metallica's tech recommended in a post....then I can put some stereo reverb on an aux to my in ears to simulate the ambience of the venue from audience perspetivce if I want more ambience.

Read that the Edge's Fractal rig is mono. Does that mean he's setting any axe fx reverbs to 0% stereo width?