High Gain tones sound distant and/or muffled?

Iron1

Member
I've had my Axe FX II XL + for a few months now and just absolutely love all the clean tones I can get with it. They have great clarity, musicality and atmosphere far beyond anything I've ever been able to get with any rig I've played through over the last 30 years. So in love with that aspect of this machine.

When I first got it, all the factory presets sounded really muffled, like you were listening to an amp that was in an isolation booth while you were in the control booth. All the high end lopped off and the overall tone just, well, muffled. Turned out the person I got it from had some really weird global settings that were Lo Pass/shaving the tones. So, I factory reset it and it seemed to fixed that issue, mostly.

However, I still seem to have this overall quality to the high gain tones I can only describe as sounding distant - like the amp isn't in your face but down the hall. Like an unwanted reverb effect. It reminds me of when we used to record band practice and if the mic was far away from the sound source it had a sort of distant quality to it where you can hear something in the upper registers that is more early reflection sort of stuff. Or, like the amp is recorded with a room mic, not a mic against the grill, if that makes sense.

Here's an example. 1st pass is with my old set-up and includes drums/bass. 2nd pass is with the FX/Drums/Bass. 3rd is old, no drums/bass, 4th is FX, no drums/bass.



If you're bored, here's an example of the clean to high-gain issue. The first minute of the song is cleans, then the high-gain kicks in:



It shows up no matter what amp/cab/mic/FX settings I use on the high-gain tones. I primarily use the Soldano, 6160 and Uber amps, but have that issue with every amp I've tried, including IRs.

I'm coming from a Helix, and still have some tone samples from it I reference and those don't have the issue in question. More confusingly, the clean tones don't have that issue either.

Any ideas what I need to do to rid myself of this?
 
Check the various high cut filters. Check high cut in Cab block (if you’re using IRs), the preamp high cut in the preamp page of the amp block. This one is my go-to as a lot of amps have it set low, and it really dulls out the sound (i think I am sensitive to high cuts and I hate a muffled sound).

master volume settings are important also, too high and it loses clarity/high end. For high gain stuff it defaults too high imo, I start at 1.00 and go up/down from there as needed.

presume you’re reducing the amount of variables by using the same impulses as with the helix?
 
Thanks, I'll definitely check those things out - having a cut filter unintentionaly on would explain a lot. Do have a few IRs I used with the Helix, but mostly with it I used L6 sims and with this I use Fractal ones. So, it's not exactly apples to apples, but I should still end up in the same realm, I'd think.
 
Well, didn't find much in checking those Hi Cuts. Was able to tweak a bit more, but still have that Room Mic versus Cab Mic effect... any other ideas? Or is it just a natural characteristic of how Fractal models the amps?
 
Can you upload the patch?
I can try... (this is just one, but I have like a dozen and they all have the same issue. Ones where I've edited a Factory preset, and ones where I've built 'em from scratch...)
 

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  • Sol88_UberT75_1.syx
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I can try... (this is just one, but I have like a dozen and they all have the same issue. Ones where I've edited a Factory preset, and ones where I've built 'em from scratch...)
It's definitely something on your end. This is what the patch sounds like completely as it was without adjustment (though I converted it using FracTool from your XL+ to my Mk1, and I'm running Ares 2.0 rather than Quantum 8/9 on your end).

It's a bright, articulate tone, even with my awful first-of-the-morning-and-I'm-sick-from-my-second-covid-shot playing. It's either how you're monitoring the sound, or for some reason you can't get a good sound with the old firmware. Try different monitoring (headphones, speakers, whatever), then try updating to the latest firmware and doing a complete system parameters reset.

Edit- check your reverb global mix parameter.
 
It's definitely something on your end. This is what the patch sounds like completely as it was without adjustment (though I converted it using FracTool from your XL+ to my Mk1, and I'm running Ares 2.0 rather than Quantum 8/9 on your end).

It's a bright, articulate tone, even with my awful first-of-the-morning-and-I'm-sick-from-my-second-covid-shot playing. It's either how you're monitoring the sound, or for some reason you can't get a good sound with the old firmware. Try different monitoring (headphones, speakers, whatever), then try updating to the latest firmware and doing a complete system parameters reset.

Edit- check your reverb global mix parameter.
Thanks for digging in, I'll see what firmware Im running and go from there. Will let ya know what I find. 👍

Edit: I just caught that you said I was running Quantum, but the unit says it's running Ares...
 
Edit: I just caught that you said I was running Quantum, but the unit says it's running Ares...
The specific preset I was sent was a quantum preset according to FracTool, but it shouldn't be a big deal anyways. I highly recommend listening on some different monitoring speakers, as I'm not getting the problem you're reporting. If the sound I recorded sounds the same as what you're getting from your unit, it's definitely your speakers, if the sound is what you want but different from your unit, try a full factory reset (firmware, system parameters, presets, etc.)
 
Have you dug into that massive pack of IR’s I sent you yet?
Yep!
The specific preset I was sent was a quantum preset according to FracTool, but it shouldn't be a big deal anyways. I highly recommend listening on some different monitoring speakers, as I'm not getting the problem you're reporting. If the sound I recorded sounds the same as what you're getting from your unit, it's definitely your speakers, if the sound is what you want but different from your unit, try a full factory reset (firmware, system parameters, presets, etc.)
Thanks for the info. What puzzles me is I can listen to the tracks I have linked in the OP and clearly hear a difference, so that would rule out speakers. I did record a new tracks after opening up the high-cut filters like Mnemonic recommended upstream and that certainly helped. IIRC, I edited the hi-Cs in the patch I sent you just prior to sending it, so maybe that was the issue all along... 🤷 ?
 
It's definitely something on your end. This is what the patch sounds like completely as it was without adjustment (though I converted it using FracTool from your XL+ to my Mk1, and I'm running Ares 2.0 rather than Quantum 8/9 on your end).

It's a bright, articulate tone, even with my awful first-of-the-morning-and-I'm-sick-from-my-second-covid-shot playing. It's either how you're monitoring the sound, or for some reason you can't get a good sound with the old firmware. Try different monitoring (headphones, speakers, whatever), then try updating to the latest firmware and doing a complete system parameters reset.

Edit- check your reverb global mix parameter.
Yikes, are you feeling better after that shot now?
 
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