IRs: How to avoid overkill and time suck?

What these dudes are telling you is spot on. When I first got my Axe-fx II, my main purpose in acquiring it was to record music.

There was one big problem before. Even though I had worked with audio before, and I had certainly played a lot of guitar in my day, I had never mic'ed up a cab and recorded it. Ever. Not once. So IRs REALLY didn't make sense to me, and I was left wondering, when I had purchased 500 frickin' IRs from redwirez, how in the hell I was ever going to find a sound I liked. So I talked with a bunch of dudes and read as much as I could with the clear goal in my mind that I was shooting for a modern hard rock and heavy metal type of sound. There were many different opinions on how to get where I was going, but the more I learned, the more I started to realize that less was really more. I mean, I was mixing like 5-6 mics from 2-3 different cabs chasing that "Grail Tone" that I'd heard about. It was absurd. I still wasn't happy. I then realized that for most guitar tones that I had heard recorded, they were USUALLY recorded very simply - SM57 and Royer 121. Occasionally they would throw something else in, but I learned that as far as staples go, IRs of cabs with those mics made me a lot more happy.

Things have really changed in past 8 months or so - more useable IRs, studio mixes, ultrares - believe me when I say it's a hell of a lot easier to find a good IR now than it was before. For what I'm after, OwnHammer High Gain Essentials takes the cake for me - almost every IR sounds good, and there's limitations so I don't spend my time jacking around in MixIR or some other nonsense program trying to figure out how much "2 feet from the back of the cab" I can mix in to finally get the cab thunk where I need to with the IRs I mix up. Really, the recipe that works best for me is as follows:

1. Diezel 4x12 Chinese V30s with an SM57 - usually position 2 or 3.
2. Mesa 4x12 English V30s with Royer 121 (for which there's only one position)

- I usually use the 5881 tube preamp files that he loaded up - I like the way they sound.

After that, very little EQ in the DAW. A low pass anywhere from 8-12 kHz and sometimes a high pass, MAYBE a slight cut in the 250-500 range.

Just read as much as you can though and have a clear goal in mind for what you are trying to sound like - you will get there!
 
Unless I'm in the mood to fiddle and explore, it's plug and play for me. Most of the presets are pretty solid and just a little tweak will get you sounding great. Then it's all about the performance which is where most of the tone that anyone cares about is.
 
Thank you, everyone!

Now, about mismatched cabs: Sometimes, it's just plain obvious. But, why? I don't recall the mismatch so much with real cabs. No matter, but still something I'm trying to figure out.

What are some aspects that make certain IRs, even ones that are not recommended cab/speaker types, sound better than others? Of course, "better" is a strongly subjective term. Maybe "more natural" would be a better way to describe it.
 
Totally understand the point of the OP. The Axe can be really time consuming and one can easily get carried away and 'cross that line'. You have to find the right balance between playing and turning knobs so to say. For me the Axe sometimes has too much options which can be really distracting. Same for amps and effects. That's why I still like simple (good sounding) pedals.

Love what the Axe can do and think it's the best thing I have bought in years but lately I loose a bit of interest because of this. And also because of the changes you have to make to your presets again and again every update which takes away valuable time. I much more prefer spending that time on playing.
 
pima1234 said:
Thank you, everyone!

Now, about mismatched cabs: Sometimes, it's just plain obvious. But, why? I don't recall the mismatch so much with real cabs. No matter, but still something I'm trying to figure out.

What are some aspects that make certain IRs, even ones that are not recommended cab/speaker types, sound better than others? Of course, "better" is a strongly subjective term. Maybe "more natural" would be a better way to describe it.
Click to expand...

I am not sure exactly what you mean here, because some of my best tones are from "mismatched" speaker types. In my opinion, for what I'm after, I haven't heard a terrible tone using vintage 30s. In fact, with that previously mentioned mix, I'm almost always happy with the tone that comes out. The context of what I currently want out of my guitar tone is very specific. All my cleans, all my mildly driven, all of my high gain stuff - I use the same cab mix. That may change when I'm done with this record. For me, it's the same reason I don't ever, EVER, EEEEEVER reamp. Recording is in the moment, and if I didn't nail it that time, I need to record it again. It's just like writing music. If I just keep scrapping what I started and write something completely new, I'll never get anything done. So what if it isn't the greatest, most awesome, most epic piece ever written. It's like one of my conducting instructors said - "Perfect is the enemy of good."

I realize that this is all very personal. You should take my words with a grain of salt and find something that works for you. Which begs the question: what exactly are you trying to do? What tone are you after? Why are you going through thousands of files trying to find tones?
 
Like trying to use a Fender-type cab with a Marshall or higher gain amp (of course that's not really going to work).
 
At one point, I just realized that IRs are nothing else than EQ flavours. And if I want to change my EQ, I do so with the EQ block.

That's why I made a collection of 10 go-to usercabs spanning all kinds of music styles. Most of them from CK's collection and then do minor adjustments to the amp block EQ when I found one that fit the style.
I just select one and then I stick with it.

There is no point trying to find that "perfect" IR for every preset for all the subtle nuances, when in the end, you get lost in the mix anyway.

There's just too many variables to consider to waste time on selecting and trying out new IRs. If you change the amp, you most likely want to change the IR again afterwards. At some point, you just have to limit yourself in order to not get lost in endless tweaking.


Now that I have this selection of go-tos and stick with it, my workflow couldn't be faster:

Heavy? I pick the Dollar and Pound IR from CK.
Clean? Just take the Vibrato IR.
... you get the idea.

Then I scroll through the amp list blindly with all settings on default and just stop where I think it sounds good. If an amp block doesn't sound good with default settings, why bother with it? There's always one that does.

The whole process doesn't take longer than 5 minutes.
 
pima1234 said:
When I've recorded electric guitars by miking amps, it didn't take me long at all to get a good sound, let alone just useable, decent sounds.

[...]

Now, I find it fairly easy now (finally) to dial in pretty good sounds with the Axe FX, even just using the included IRs. Shoot; even the many free ones available can sound awesome (and I think we're all really grateful for those, so thanks to all who have shot all these great new UR and HR IRs).
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As I read the excerpted statements above, I ask myself "What's the problem?" If you're getting satisfactory results, why spend time looking for something better? If that's a pursuit that entertains you, it's entertainment and not "work". If it doesn't entertain you and you're satisfied with your current results, there's a Frank Zappa title that might apply here. :)
 
It's like painting to me - or any creative endeavor. Know what you want first, then get there. Then stop.

For all the thousands of hours people think you need to put in to listen to every IR; you just need some grounding in reality of what speakers sound like, how they are mic'd in the studio and live and then what mic's/preamps go with them and where to put them.

Engineers make a living on this stuff; so it's not simple by any means.

But with the mix paradigm introduced, you just need to find a few of those of a given speaker that work and then once you get one that works - stop. And play.

For the assumptions about what I do (having been a very long winded proponent of IR's since 2007) 'in the rabbit hole' chasing this or that; with the current generation of IR's, I have about a dozen that work exactly for what they are supposed to do for the amp tones I like, and I use them. I check out new IR collections as they come out, but only add them to the collection I actually use if they are doing something closer to what the sound in my head is like.

It's both knowing what you want and then recognizing it once you have found it. With the massive number and quality available now from all over the place including user IR's and third party (including Own Hammer, Fractal, TAF, Red Wire, etc) get what you need out of there based on what you know. And lacking 'knowing', just check the wiki for suggestions or ask someone that does know and trust your ears.

I've been typing the same things for decades now on forums - know what you want, trust your ears and learn as you go.

The more you know, the easier it gets.
 
After a year and 1/2 with the Axe FX II, I've went through all the stock IR's as well as hundreds of user shared, and finally I bought my 1st cab pack a couple weeks back with cab pack 5. Honestly though, I only use about 50 IR's total, and 35 of those are of my own cabs, which I shot with Cab Lab. I had originally done some quick shoots after buying cab lab with an SM58 Beta, but I redid them using a reference mic, which to me captures the cab better, and did my own mixes.

As it turns out, that JCM800 cab with g12-65's that I've been using for 20+ years is the tone I'm accustomed to, and as such, IR's of that cab "do it" for me. I have 15 single IR's and 10 Mixes from just this Cab I use on the majority of my patches since shooting the IR's. I also did 2 other cabs I own ( Stock Marshall 1960B and a 1960B with V30's), which many others have done of the same cabs, but I used a reference mic so there is no SM57 or the like baked in.

So, my recommendation is, if you have a favorite cab or combo speaker, either try to use IR's of those, or make your own. It's always nice to venture out, but It's always nice to come home too.
 
I bought the Redwirez Big Box back when they were all the rage. After the initial coolness factor wore off, I got frustrated with the endless "mix this", "try this" black hole of options and eventually gave up. Ever since, I have had no interest in purchasing another third party cab pack and have been perfectly happy with stock cabs.

My thought is that if the IR is the most important aspect of tone as many have stated, then Fractal should continue to up the ante of quality IR's that come stock with the unit. That's why I appreciate the added cabs included with recent firmwares, especially the mix IR's.
 
Webb said:
I bought the Redwirez Big Box back when they were all the rage. After the initial coolness factor wore off, I got frustrated with the endless "mix this", "try this" black hole of options and eventually gave up. Ever since, I have had no interest in purchasing another third party cab pack and have been perfectly happy with stock cabs.

My thought is that if the IR is the most important aspect of tone as many have stated, then Fractal should continue to up the ante of quality IR's that come stock with the unit. That's why I appreciate the added cabs included with recent firmwares, especially the mix IR's.
Click to expand...

I'm in the same camp. Between the Axe itself having 70 bajillion variables and all the IRs that are available, I can't even put a number on the variations of speaker/cabinet combinations. At some point, you just gotta say "STOP IT!" and take a standard. All the variations are maddening. You gotta shit or get off the pot. Otherwise, you'll never get anything done.
 
Its been educational for me. I recently DL'd Cab Pack 5 and was a bit overwhelmed with the choices/combinations/mic positions. But after messing with them for a while, I started to sense and learn the characteristics of the Mics themselves, and also the positions. Like I know the cone position could be used for some "body" and bass freqs, while the cap and cap edges can be used for "clarity". The 4047s have nice attack for palm mutes, the 57s are very clear/high freqs. Im not a fan of the 421 and the e906. So from there I can fine tune the search thru these hundreds of IRs based on the characteristics of the mics and positions which will make future endeavors less overwhelming.
 
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