How to fix bad sounding palm mutes in certain presets

prizzy

Member
Hello everyone. I have been trying to find answers to this online, but I may not be saying it correctly, and calling it the right name.
I have tried listening through headphones, and a bunch of different setups.
When I play palm muted low notes it sounds horrible. I reminds me of when I was a kid and turned my stereo up too loud. But the sound is coming from the axe fx 3. It doesn't do this on all the presets, just a few. I noticed if I turn the speak drive up it make it worse, but the speaker drive is 0 already. I tried cutting the lows also. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 
Sounds like you’re clipping an output or an input somewhere. Check out the meters page and see if anything is in the red. If that’s fine how are you recording or listening to your Axe? USB? Into an interface?
 
Sounds like you’re clipping an output or an input somewhere. Check out the meters page and see if anything is in the red. If that’s fine how are you recording or listening to your Axe? USB? Into an interface?

The axe fx is plugged into the computer using the usb cord. The output on the fractal goes to studio monitors.
 
Can you export and upload that preset, assuming it wasn’t paid for doesn’t have any cabs that were paid for as well? Sounds like it’s clipping.
 
i think it's just too much gain.

turning off the drive block helps a lot. you're really overdriving the input of amps that are pretty gain heavy to begin with.

the IIC+ amp sounds worse: its Drive and Overdrive are almost maxed, and the Input Trim is turned up. i don't think that amp handles too well with gain that high, then you overdrive the input more with the Drive block.

try reducing gain, bypass the Drive block.
 
+1 on too much gain.

Many players crank gain to get more compression and fatness but that has unwanted sideeffects.
Instead you can add an EQ and boost the lows (125 and 250 up?, and maybe some 4khz to replace the nasty highs of the distortion block) and add a compressor after the amp block (try the mbc?) and lower the gain some in return.
It's also a small balance with the lows entering the amp block. When they are not enough you still get tempted to crank gain too much, but when the are too much you get undefined mellow attacks. Add an EQ before the amp, lower gain and play with 125 and 250?

But otherwise, if you need all the gain use a different amp type that can take that much. Friedman HB or HBE or Atomica high or alike.
 
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There's a pretty high amount of gain. Nothing ridiculous, but it definitely contributes to the mushy quality of the mutes. Biggest problem is the low end going into the amps. Using the Micro Drive (a full range boost) as your boost in front of the amp, you're pushing a lot of low end into the amps and it's making them fart out. Raising the low cut in the drive block helps a lot. You've also got an extra 5 dB boost on the lows in the drive block tone controls. Pushing lows into a high gain amp is a recipe for farty tone. Instead, boost the lows with post gain EQ to add more low end, either with the Output EQ in the amp block, the cab block, or an EQ after the amp block.

Set the drive block low tone control to zero and set the low cut in the drive block to around 120 Hz or so. Back off the drive block level to about 6. Tightens right up.
 
It does sound like some I/O clipping.

That aside, I've found the quality and "thickness" with palm-mutes varying greatly with different cab IRs. Depending on the mic and placement it can help you get a good starting point to what you're going for. I would get that dialed-in before I started messing with speaker drive and the various EQ settings. Then you can fine-tune from there.
 
Thank for eveyones input. I was out of town with my daughters golf this weekend.

I'm gonna read through and try the advice.

The stock preset USA IIC+ and Recto 1 and a few others do sound like this also. That's why I thought maybe I have something setup wrong. The red light on the input doesn't come on.

What is a JTV?
 
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James Tyler Variax - The longest thread in any forum I've ever read was a palm mute issue on a JTV-89. I was just wondering.
 
Cab block 24db/oct low cut at 150hz. Toit.
Like a toiga?

A similar low cut before the amp will help, and a multi-band compressor after to reduce the low-mudrange when that band is hooting while leaving the sound fuller when below the compression threshold in that band. I set mine like this:
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I also use a PEQ with these settings for the low/high cuts:
Screen%20Shot%202020-10-04%20at%208.17.32%20PM.png

This lets me also use a control knob to be able to add an EQ boost/cut in the boom/shrill ranges, so that it doesn't sound quite so anemic when played at "don't wake the OL" volumes. It's not perfect, but it does help to make a preset dialed in loud sound passably decent for plunking around at midnight without getting a visit from the local po-po....
 
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Im using an Epiphone LP standard. So at the end of that thread it was the guitar?
Throughout the entire thread! It was quite a while ago now, but "explanations" of the physics behind why it was happening with the piezos of the E and possibly A strings was, well, interesting. Strangely, my 89 (and others) defied physics and never had the problem. At the end of the day, the company had no real resolution. If you had a bad one and you were outside of any return policy, you were stuck with it. As a result, I don't buy gear from that company anymore, and I posted as much on their forum (same user name).
 
Dang. It seems like this should be an easy fix. This unit is amazing.
I haven't had any luck with the suggestions so far. I decided to try a factory preset, and this is the sound. Still bad. This is bumming me out a bit.

 
Dang. It seems like this should be an easy fix. This unit is amazing.
I haven't had any luck with the suggestions so far. I decided to try a factory preset, and this is the sound. Still bad. This is bumming me out a bit.


Are you clipping the input? What is your I/O Input level set to? Is the input red light showing on the Axe front panel?
 
Do us a favor and upload a DI recording of your guitar. That will allow us to re-amp the signal and afford us much better insight into the issue.
 
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