How to dial up the Brown Sound in ten minutes

Great job. Really appreciated. Personally, I think you still need to adjust your IRs slightly (just A/Bd against some VH originals). But that is total nitpicking/personal taste. Definitely heard a lot of 'real amp' VH attempts that do not even touch this and the tutorial aspect is just fantastic.
 
zenaxe said:
Great job. Really appreciated. Personally, I think you still need to adjust your IRs slightly (just A/Bd against some VH originals). But that is total nitpicking/personal taste. Definitely heard a lot of 'real amp' VH attempts that do not even touch this and the tutorial aspect is just fantastic.
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Thank you for watching! I appreciate the feedback.

As I said in the original video, the process would get us to 90% of the original VH early tone. I think I even closed the video by saying that the originals were a good bit brighter still. What I found is that, when I try to get to 95-99% of the original recorded tones, the feel becomes harsh and stiff.

I think this makes sense, if we step back and look at what we're attempting to do. By attempting to exactly capture the sound of those original tracks (and for those who haven't listened, it's worth pulling them up on YouTube for a careful and critical listen) we are trying to imitate the amp, the cab, the mics, the preamps, channel strips, EQ's, and any post effects like compression and 'verb. And then whatever add'l fixes and tweaks went into the mastering process after the mix.

That makes sense to us. This is not a new idea, and this is a discussion that has happened on this forum dozens of times.

But it misses a critical point -- Ed was playing to a sound that was effectively amp-->cab-->ears. Or, at best, amp-->cab-->mic-->ears, if he was playing through headphones.

When I try to match every last detail of those final recorded tones that were carved into vinyl, down to the final EQ shape, etc, it becomes a very unnatural experience from a guitar-playing perspective,and at the end of the day, I'm still just a guitar player. I can get REAL close by carving out even more low end, tweaking the highs, adding some preamp EQ in the cab block, and messing with a multi-band compressor afterwards. And there are times when I can get to 97% of that original tone -- it's so damn close! -- but the attempt to gain that additional 7% comes at a loss of playability, and to an extent a loss of fun.

In the end, for me, it becomes an academic exercise, and my curiosity dries up quickly. There is A LOT of much smarter folks around here -- much more talented, with better ears and experience -- and if they want to take my 90% and get to 100% I have no doubt that it's possible by using this amazing machine. :)
 
Poozer79 said:
That's an amazing tone!!! I'm gonna have to try this.

Edit: So, I gave it a try and as I said already, that is some seriously beautiful tone. However, this is literally the umpteenth video I've seen and copied the exact settings from and got a very different sound. Yes, I know, different guitars and different hands but I dialed in the exact settings in the video and seriously came away with a low gain/clean sound on the edge of break up!! Power amp modeling is on...Cab sims are turned on... At this point I'm starting to think there is either something wrong with my magic black box or I'm... well, you know (which at this point is very possible). The only way I can get close to this tone is if I turn the boost switch on, set the saturation switch to ideal and turn the saturation knob up to at least 4.

I'm seriously at a loss here [emoji19]. Either way, beautiful sound and playing and I really hope I can figure out what's going on with my setup "soon" so I can get tones like this.

Cheers 5150

P.S. Sorry for bombing your thread with this rant but I'm becoming massively frustrated with my inability to get these amazing sounds I keep hearing everyone else posting.
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No worries!

Quick thought: do you have the bright switch engaged? That contributes a lot of gain in this model, I find. What kind of guitar/pups are you using?
 
Moke said:
Nice video, what programs did you use for the screen capture and editing?

BTW, the 'ducking' in the reverb block won't do anything until you lower the 'Threshold' ?
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Yeah, that was something I forgot to do during the rush to get that first video done. I addressed in the second vid. Thanks for picking that up! I wouldn't want to confuse someone new to the idea.

So, the recording of this all has been a bit of a learning experience for me. This is not my strong suit. The bits with me playing guitar and speaking are recorded on my iPhone. The screen shots and sound from the Axe are recorded using Quicktime on my Mac. Then, I edit the whole thing using iMovie. It's quite fiddly however. I have to do a lot of cutting and so forth, because the iPhone captures the sound of my monitors in the room while Quicktime captures the sound directly. So when I'm speaking, you hear the mic capture from the iPhone, but when I play, you're hearing direct to my computer, and it takes some editing to cut it up and make it work correctly.

I'll have to find a better way to do this all, but for now, I've pieced it together and it works well enough. :)
 
Wow...nice video and patch 5150 ! Not only is it spot on EVH, but I'm finding it to be a bad-ass all around patch after throwing my favorite 80's type delay block in there parallel to the reverb. The string separation on this patch is just incredible! It's my latest favorite. lol
 
This may be stupid but i applied some of his tips, especially the 5 band passive EQ to some of my fender models and I thought it really made them come alive even more. Who knows, I mean we're all twisting knobs and asking ourselves "does that sound good?" I think it did so whatever. I dont know anything about tweaking the insides of the amp so watching somebody who seems to know what they're doing is pretty awesome. Thanks!!!!!!!!!!
 
I have the same problem
Poozer79 said:
That's an amazing tone!!! I'm gonna have to try this.

Edit: So, I gave it a try and as I said already, that is some seriously beautiful tone. However, this is literally the umpteenth video I've seen and copied the exact settings from and got a very different sound. Yes, I know, different guitars and different hands but I dialed in the exact settings in the video and seriously came away with a low gain/clean sound on the edge of break up!! Power amp modeling is on...Cab sims are turned on... At this point I'm starting to think there is either something wrong with my magic black box or I'm... well, you know (which at this point is very possible). The only way I can get close to this tone is if I turn the boost switch on, set the saturation switch to ideal and turn the saturation knob up to at least 4.

I'm seriously at a loss here [emoji19]. Either way, beautiful sound and playing and I really hope I can figure out what's going on with my setup "soon" so I can get tones like this.

Cheers 5150

P.S. Sorry for bombing your thread with this rant but I'm becoming massively frustrated with my inability to get these amazing sounds I keep hearing everyone else posting.
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Great video and explanation! I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to do this, it is really helping me get close to the vibe, feel, and sound of my favorite guitarist. I have enjoyed the brown sound patches also from Rocco, Moke, and Narzugon. They have all taught me critical aspects of how to get closer to this great tone.

I play a 1999 Peavey Wolfgang archtop standard (which is a great playing and sounding guitar for the money, btw) and I installed a Frankie bridge pickup in it, and definitely had much lower gain with this patch, as this pickup is lower output than the dirty fingers. There is an easy fix though, for anyone who is having this issue. Just enable the Boost in the Amp page, which adds an additional 12dB of input gain, and turn on the Sat Switch. Or, if you don't want this much additional gain, if your pickups are in-between these two in output, then add the BB drive in front of the amp with the settings previously discussed in this thread and set the drive between 1.5 and 3. I tried both ways and they sound great and very similar. Also, for anyone interested, I added at the very front of he chain a cab block with the Santiago Echoplex EP3 IR (which is free and you can find in the forum), which I think adds a little additional vibe as well.

Keep making these vids, as the Axe is an amazing tool, but only if we learn and have the knowledge of how to dial it in correctly. Thanks again.
 
Poozer79 said:
That's an amazing tone!!! I'm gonna have to try this.

Edit: So, I gave it a try and as I said already, that is some seriously beautiful tone. However, this is literally the umpteenth video I've seen and copied the exact settings from and got a very different sound. Yes, I know, different guitars and different hands but I dialed in the exact settings in the video and seriously came away with a low gain/clean sound on the edge of break up!! Power amp modeling is on...Cab sims are turned on... At this point I'm starting to think there is either something wrong with my magic black box or I'm... well, you know (which at this point is very possible). The only way I can get close to this tone is if I turn the boost switch on, set the saturation switch to ideal and turn the saturation knob up to at least 4.

I'm seriously at a loss here [emoji19]. Either way, beautiful sound and playing and I really hope I can figure out what's going on with my setup "soon" so I can get tones like this.

Cheers 5150

P.S. Sorry for bombing your thread with this rant but I'm becoming massively frustrated with my inability to get these amazing sounds I keep hearing everyone else posting.
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Check your input level going in, input mode (is it set to stereo? change it to left only). If using active pickups check the battery.
 
5150 said:
In the end, for me, it becomes an academic exercise, and my curiosity dries up quickly. There is A LOT of much smarter folks around here -- much more talented, with better ears and experience -- and if they want to take my 90% and get to 100% I have no doubt that it's possible by using this amazing machine. :)
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No worries, man! Like I said, that was literally the ONLY vaguely constructive nitpick I could find. ;) You are getting great tones and you did a great job explaining how you got there. It was totally awesome to see someone get that tone to within 90+% in 10 minutes, which in the past many used to chase for years and not even get in that range! Looking forward to your future efforts!
 
I'm sure this is another dumb question from me, but, I am trying to follow 5150's video and my Axe-Edit screens do not match his. My parameter knobs are different and the pages are different. For example, when I click on amp there is no tone page seen in 5150's video. I'm on Quantum 1. Is he using an XL? Would make it different from my Mark II?
 
tonyi said:
I'm sure this is another dumb question from me, but, I am trying to follow 5150's video and my Axe-Edit screens do not match his. My parameter knobs are different and the pages are different. For example, when I click on amp there is no tone page seen in 5150's video. I'm on Quantum 1. Is he using an XL? Would make it different from my Mark II?
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I guess you are on AE 3.3 and the video was made with the previous version
 
5150 made this video with the beta of Quantum and the corresponding AE. His effects video has the final FW and AE. The settings knobs are there, just on other tabs/screens in the amp block ..... maybe the speaker block too ......
 
Wow! Very impressive... I just watched both videos (is the 3rd one posted yet?), and you did a great job of capturing the sound [emoji2]

Keep up the great work!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
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