Is Axe Fx too perfect sounding?

They spent hundreds of thousands recording RATM and Korn and probably aimed for "perfect", but our little $2600 box out perfects it
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Not quite. If they aimed for perfect, they'd auto-tune, loop and time align everything. These imperfections is what truly makes music sound more alive, musical and human, in my opinion.
Same can be said about gear perfect imperfections.

In the case of Korn - When making the album I mentioned ("Remember who you are"), They wanted this album to sound more like their first two albums so they intentionally avoided pro tools stuff to avoid the overproduced vibe. It was all about a good performance, and not "Fix it in the mix later". They recorded everything on tape with analog gear and left many unintentional noises and performance imperfections. I really like the vibe this album has.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8VDZ0aNIcw
 
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Eanna said:
I a/b the AxeFX & my Mesa Studio Pre -> into Mesa 50:50 power amp -> Palmer PDI-03 (or a 2x 12" cab) the difference is still noticeable and a slight harshness (sterility) is still apparent in the top end (AxeFX power amp modelling & cab switched off)....
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Then quit shutting off the good parts. :p


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No problem here... on the right night I can make anything (modeled or real) sound not good. I don't mind the help.
 
If we were talking about the Axe Ultra I would say yes or maybe? but the Axe II has the raw amp sound if that's what you are after, and can also be very polished if that's what you are after. There is absolutely nothing else out there this versatile for amp and effect tones.
 
BrainalLeakage said:
Then quit shutting off the good parts. :p


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Ha yea! Just to clarify, I was using the AxeFX as a preamp into the 50:50 power amp, etc, and comparing it to the Mesa Studio Preamp into the same rig. Have to say the AxeFX Mesa gain tones were fantastic and were soooo close, that master volume control is a really useful tool now...
 
FreeMind said:
Not quite. If they aimed for perfect, they'd auto-tune, loop and time align everything. These imperfections is what truly makes music sound more alive, musical and human, in my opinion.
Same can be said about gear perfect imperfections.
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So by your logic Meg White is probably a better drummer than Neil Peart because she is far, far more imperfect, and therefore makes the music sound more alive, musical and human ?

Likewise, when did "imperfect" gear become a "thing" ? outside of the skinny jean wearing hipster crowd that loves "lo-fi" crap ?

Used to be when an amp was unstable et al., you took it to a good tech to get it resolved. Now you apparently can rent it out to Ross Robinson and Korn because they want "imperfect" gear ?

Axe models high end gear in excellent working condition and suddenly that is a bad thing because we'd rather have models of amps badly in need of service ?
 
FreeMind said:
Not quite. If they aimed for perfect, they'd auto-tune, loop and time align everything. These imperfections is what truly makes music sound more alive, musical and human, in my opinion.
Same can be said about gear perfect imperfections.

In the case of Korn - When making the album I mentioned ("Remember who you are"), They wanted this album to sound more like their first two albums so they intentionally avoided pro tools stuff to avoid the overproduced vibe. It was all about a good performance, and not "Fix it in the mix later". They recorded everything on tape with analog gear and left many unintentional noises and performance imperfections. I really like the vibe this album has.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8VDZ0aNIcw
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Are you using a DAW software? Maybe you should use some of these techniques with the analog gear KORN likes and the line outs on the Axe, no digital outs?
 
coldstar said:
I'm reminded of a couple of things:

First, something a salesperson a music store told me a long time ago - "You can always make clean sound dirtier, but it's really hard to make dirt sound clean". If your guitar sounds too polite, mix in some white noise. Get some un-potted, mircrophonic pickups. Got into the advanced amp parameters and set some non-ideal values. Record in an un-treated room with a really loud speaker, so the guitar interacts with it. Get the whole band together and record a track live into a couple of room mics.
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That is a good answer. It is very easy (and cheap) to stain a clean signal, but it is extremely difficult to clean a stained signal. Or… using the vocabulary that I’ve learnt from another thread: “sometimes you cannot unfuck what’s already been fucked” :)
 
Rotti said:
What do you think I'm doing here?

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Im guessing you are passing time chatting about a device the you are interested in (like most of us here) - Unless you are part of the Fractal mothership, in which case you are prob at work?
 
NeoSound said:
Are you using a DAW software? Maybe you should use some of these techniques with the analog gear KORN likes and the line outs on the Axe, no digital outs?
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^^ this
get in a studio, record to tape, use analog outboard gear... problem solved.
 
The Axe Fx is perfect enough for me and thousands of others, including many professionals.
 
To the OP (Freemind), my .02...

Thought #1: With Fractal the 'some people say' is pretty much never valid unless it is specified what firmware was being referred to. The sound of AxeFx II v1 is nowhere the same as v9, or v11 or v19 or now Quantum v1. The primary thing Cliff has been striving for (IMO) is to really capture the rawness and unpredictability of tube amps, and each firmware has been a change, and a step towards that ultimate goal. What was *possibly* true months ago really has no bearing on what the unit will sound like *today*.

Thought #2: It seems one of your questions really centers on IR vs. a mic and in-the-room-with-reflections, etc. Plain fact is that an IR is limited in the amount of time (samples) it can capture, so no -- an IR will not sound like an amp with a distance mic in a reverberant room as it will truncates sound beyond its maximum. Is it possible to simulate that sound in the box using either the cab block room parameter or an appropriately set reverb block or mixing a near-field IR with a far-field IR? Sure it is. It is also entirely possible (and likely) that the AxeFX will be recorded dry and all ambient treatment applied after the fact by the producer/engineer using either plugins or even the venerable technique of playing the track through a monitor in a reverberant chamber and capturing ambiance that way. Or maybe even just skipping an IR and using a real mic/cab combination in the perfect room. There are no limits as to how the box can be used to achieve the desired endpoint.

Thought #3: "Some people" are intrinsically opposed to modeling, and will always come up with some reason (valid for them, I guess) as to why it will not replace their cherished electrons in glass tubes. My answer is: Who cares? People can believe anything they want and they are entitled to that belief. Others can argue against that belief and that is also perfectly okay (if rather tedious.) Life is too short, gear is not religion and whatever works for one person can only realistically be regarded as *their* particular truth, not a global truth.

Play music, have fun, who cares how you reach musical nirvana as long as you get there?

TT
 
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FreeMind said:
But an IR? Does it capture all that?
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No, it does not as you have stated it. That's why I'm saying to takes more than just the IR to accomplish a more "live" sound. You need to work on creating a space that makes it sound less sterile. That means using the a combination of the following: reverb, delay, cab room, IR's and eq. Obviously you won't get all of that from just an IR. Very rarely would I use just Amp and Cab without creating the space (unless that's the desired effect). Most of the presets in the Axe and what people share for the most part do not have this treatment. Nor are the IR's captured in a way that works out of the box for me. I tone match quite a bit (using the tone match block as well as doing it by ear) and the AxeFX is quite capable. It's not easy though. Nor was it easy to get all of those studio recordings to sound like they do.

If you really want to know, post some raw amp/cab sounds without a mix and people here will be happy to match it in the Axe. It's much harder to match a sound from a mix.
 
F yeah, quantum for the win :p

Anyway, for people who think the idea of perfect imperfection of gear is something retarded, here are some axe amp block tips:
Always use "ideal" saturation, comp type switches and power tube types. Turn off preamp, power and supply sag. Completely turn off everything in the speaker page and so on :p

How does that sound to you?
These are the imperfections of a tube amp that help it sound good...
 
FreeMind said:
F yeah, quantum for the win :p

Anyway, for people who think the idea of perfect imperfection of gear is something retarded, here are some axe amp block tips:
Always use "ideal" saturation, comp type switches and power tube types. Turn off preamp, power and supply sag. Completely turn off everything in the speaker page and so on :p

How does that sound to you?
These are the imperfections of a tube amp that help it sound good...
Click to expand...

I use only "ideal" saturation. I actually use authentic on pretty much everything but that, but I never like the way sat switches worked on real amps.

If you turn off preamp, power, and supply sag, you have basically turned off everything that makes up the power amp sims. You might as well use an external power amp at that point. And what "everything" are you talking about in the speaker page? The only things I use there are the high, and low cuts. I set to none, which pretty much deactivates everything but the high and low cuts.


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