Funny story about how the Axe FX won - again!

jiggajewjay

Inspired
I had a client over at the studio last night. He is a heavy gigging musician who ONLY uses tube amps and vintage guitars from pawn shops. I suppose you can say that he fancies himself a purist. We started off last nights session with me micing up his Marshall amp with an SM57 and Beyerdynamic M160. The problem was that his amp started acting strange and making noises so i told him "listen bro the session is dead in the water unless you want to try the Axe FX" He looked at me as if i asked him to eat shi#. At first he was adamant and refused to even plug into it. So I turned on the Axe, and dialed up the same model Marshal amp and i used an m160 and SM57 in the IR. suddenly hes like " hey maybe i can try that, but im telling you now that i am using this as scratch tracks only!". i said okay lets record "scratch tracks". We did. He loved them and we are using them on the song. Love my Axe!

Y'all think that i should inform the client that i have been using Auto-Tune and Melodyne on his vocals for the last 2 years? He has no idea b/c i use it subtly but i would love to see his face scrunch up when he finds out the truth. He is one of those annoying yuppy purists that doesn't use his ears to find tone- if its a tube amp and sounds like shi# he loves it - if its digital and sounds amazeballz he hates it. - Glad i was able to prove that punk wrong! :)
 
I melodyned the vocals I recorded for this person once. She was recording their "first dance" song for her wedding. She got lots of compliments on the performance apparently. Never told her. The marriage didn't last. I've always worried I was slightly responsible having helped her start her journey predicated on a lie. :D
 
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Y'all think that i should inform the client that i have been using Auto-Tune and Melodyne on his vocals for the last 2 years? He has no idea b/c i use it subtly but i would love to see his face scrunch up when he finds out the truth.
No ... definitely not IMO. He's a client so you take his money and do the job to the best of your professional ability to produce his work.

I have a few very annoying clients (not music related) I'd love to bring down a bit by exposing to them the remedial work I need to do on their supplied material - but I'd rather just take their money and reduce any chance of them bad mouthing me/my business if we were to end our working relationship on a sour note.

Some people 'know it all' ..... so there's absolutely no need to inform them they don't ;)
 
I melodyned the vocals I recorded for this person once. She was recording their "first dance" song for her wedding. She got lots of compliments on the performance apparently. Never told her. The marriage didn't last. I've always worried I was slightly responsible having helped her start her journey predicated on a lie. :D
haha!! good one Ian
 
Also had that client once, i said she was off-pitch, she said no i'm a good ear and i sing on pitch. I said variaudio never lies... Then they recorder somewhere else happily :)
 
I use the Antares plug on almost all lead vocals. More prominent on some that others.

I think for country in particular, that slightly auto-tuned nasal vocal has become popular and expected on some records.
 
It's all about the tone, not about a particular piece of equipment. Or, if it sounds good, it is good.
 
I use the Antares plug on almost all lead vocals. More prominent on some that others.

I think for country in particular, that slightly auto-tuned nasal vocal has become popular and expected on some records.

the trick with auto tune is to place Melodyne in the first slot on your chain, and correct the obvious incorrect notes first. this way Auto Tune (placed after Melodyne in the chain) will correct an almost perfect vocal take. This will eliminate those random weird notes that Auto Tune chooses. I find this to be the best way to take any turd and polish the hell out of it :)
 
Also had that client once, i said she was off-pitch, she said no i'm a good ear and i sing on pitch. I said variaudio never lies... Then they recorder somewhere else happily :)
I am chock full of these clients. I make most of my money in the studio from out of tune singers looking to make it big by singing over YoutTube playbacks. its pathetic but it makes me a nice amount of money (for a side gig)
 
I've had a few musicians that were amazed at the tones I got out of this wonderful black box. It still kicks butt!!
 
I think the problem so many people have with Modelers and digital effects is the sheer choice of options. Unless you really really know what your doing. Jumping into a buffet of advanced options is just overload for most. For so many things Diming the knob isn't going to be the solution. Its the time you take to subtly tweak your settings to your ear, and your instrument. For this reason so many people pickup up a digital tool set, and sound like shit, then complain that its crap. Purely based off a lack of understanding.
 
I melodyned the vocals I recorded for this person once. She was recording their "first dance" song for her wedding. She got lots of compliments on the performance apparently. Never told her. The marriage didn't last. I've always worried I was slightly responsible having helped her start her journey predicated on a lie. :D

Once again proving that love will come and go, but digital is forever, baby! Lol
 
I think the problem so many people have with Modelers and digital effects is the sheer choice of options. Unless you really really know what your doing. Jumping into a buffet of advanced options is just overload for most. For so many things Diming the knob isn't going to be the solution. Its the time you take to subtly tweak your settings to your ear, and your instrument. For this reason so many people pickup up a digital tool set, and sound like shit, then complain that its crap. Purely based off a lack of understanding.

I've always assumed that most guitar players have the idea solidified in their minds that "all digital guitar tech always = crap" because they've been rightfully disappointed by basically every piece of digital guitar tech ever produced right up until products like the Axe-Fx and the Kemper came along and refuse to believe it's even possible for digital anything to sound good.

And they of course disregards simple truths like "almost every amazing guitar tone you've ever heard, you've heard coming from either a CD or mp3, which proves that it's at least possible for pleasing guitar sounds to come from a digital source one way or another" without necessarily considering that it's just that the software that attempts to recreate these tones hasn't been up to snuff until recently."
 
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I've always assumed that most guitar players have the idea solidified in their minds that "all digital guitar tech always = crap" because they've been rightfully disappointed by basically every piece of digital guitar tech ever produced right up until products like the Axe-Fx and the Kemper came along and refuse to believe it's even possible for digital anything to sound good.

This of course disregards simple truths like "almost every amazing guitar tone you've ever heard, you've heard coming from either a CD or mp3, which proves that it's at least possible for pleasing guitar sounds to come from a digital source one way or another, it's just that the software that attempts to recreate these tones hasn't been up to snuff until recently."
You have to remember too, that a stumbling block for these people might not be tone but the feel and responsiveness of effects. It gets misdiagnosed as tone problems in some places, cause of a lack of knowledge to communicate what they are experiencing.
 
We always called these guys cork sniffer's. It's a shame they miss out on all the cool stuff like the Axe fx from not letting there ears give it a chance.
 
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