Is it hard to get good tone with AXEFX using Carvin Neck Thru all Koa guitars?

Wow! Rocking Autograph - now that brings me back!

Funny, I keep hearing about Mark Day but never heard a clip before... Good stuff! Any links to patches?


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I have a Carvin Koa DC 400 active pickups and an added piezo bridge. I have a separate output for the bridge and I usually blend the two for an added dimension. It sounds fantastic on the axe. Warm luscious crunch to rich acoustic. With firmware 15 beta I cannot find a bad tone. My fingers hurt and my jaw hurts from smiling. Both the guitar and the axe fx are the best money I ever spent.
 
Rlarant can you post a video of it with the axe?

Mark Days presets are on axeexchange, but they are old I think from FW10 or 12, so I am wondering if it's even worth downloading any of his or anyones older FW patches when I get a unit because seems so much has changed since we are on fw15 now it'd be like starting from scratch with the patch and heavily tweaking it to get it to sound as it originally did. yes, no?
 
soon said:
SYMPHX...

What you said is some of the reviews I've been reading.... and then I came across this guy...

Got Metal! E minor Progression played on Carvin spalted maple UltraV guitar. - YouTube

He seems like an OK player, and he's playing through a Carvin Legacy similar to Vai's...

And it's a Carvin guitar and nicely recorded.

But my god, that guitar tone kind of SUCKS.

It sounds like everything you just described, thin, mechanical, lifeless...

I don't know if that's a result of his pickups which I think are stock carvins or if it's just a poorly set amp or EQ.

But that tone is pretty god awful.

I've got old bootleg recordings of Randy Rhoads that were poorly recorded by fans in the audience that have extremely poor sound quality but yet the tone that does manage to come through sounds better than that guys garbage.

A lot of people say CC Deville sounded thin or bright, but he had the tone of a GOD on the Poison CDs compared to this mess.

His videos are some of the best recorded examples I have been able to find though that are Metal/Hard Rock styled, but that tone is what I am afraid of being stuck with if I get a Carvin....
Click to expand...



First and foremost, in no context, no comparison, no alternate form of reality did CC Deville ever have a tone of a GOD. ;):mrgreen:)


Seriously soon, you do realize the audio from that YouTube clip you are blasting was recorded from the camera's mic, right? It is not "nicely recorded" as you put it, not even close. It is not a mic'ed recording and should not be judged against ones that are, especially professionally recorded and mixed ones. You are trashing a clip (and the guy who made it) based on what the camera's mic picked up. How can you judge the tone in that clip? Besides the actual guitar (which you can't even hear all that well), you have the acoustic sound of him hitting the strings (which means he probably isn't turned up very loud) and a backing track that is blasting in the background. He could be playing a Les Paul with 0.13 gauge strings through a Mesa Boogie Mark IV with the 750Hz slider on the graphic eq pushed all the way up, and it would probably still sound thin in that situation. Unless you were in the room when he was playing, you can't really say how it sounds. He may of had the best tone you have ever heard for all you know.

I would say to not even buy a Carvin. I have the feeling you wouldn't be happy with it no matter what. Based on your options for the Carvin, plus everything you are planning on having done after you receive it, it seems money isn't too much of an issue. So even if it's more expensive, I think you should do some research and find another builder. One who's guitars no one has ever posted anything negative about (good luck on that one), who will build the exact guitar you want from the ground up, and one you won't feel the need to modify as soon as you get it.

Good luck. :)






EDIT - Sorry, didn't check before posting to see I wasn't the first person to point out the YouTube clip was just a camera mic recording.
 
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I think it's going to come down to the tone of the wood and mostly the pickups. I have 2 Carvins, a CT6 and a C66C. They both have mahogany bodies and the CT6 has a mahogany neck with ebony and the C66C has a maple neck with rosewood. The Carvin distortion pickups sounded pretty good but I just love the tone of the Duncan SH11 (Custom Custom) so I switched them out in both guitars and they sound fantastic. I tried the Duncan distortion in the CT6 and thought it sounded terrible, so it's not just the brand but the magnets and winds as well. Once you find a PU you like in a guitar, I think it will work in any guitar. The Carvins are amazing build quality, light years better than your standard brands like Gibson & Fender and probably on par with Suhr and some of the other premier builders.
 
fatandugly...

well the only 2 pickups i really like is the Dimarzio Super Distortion Humbucker bridge and the neck position Texas Special single coil.

As far as the carvin video I posted, I meant it seemed kinda nice meaning better than most of the garbage people post on youtube.

I actually thought the amp was miced and that was where the audio came from, I didn't listen to it too intensely, the dude has about 15 Carvin guitars and amps, so I just assumed he would have mic'd it or recorded direct.

So yeah maybe it does sound better in real life than what the video depicts.

I'd still love to see some videos of you guys with your carvin DCs and the axe 2.

I will also add that it's odd that Mark Day played a Mexican Strat in that one video and a Suhr that cost about 3 thousand more and the mexican strat sounded just as good.

Maybe that's the power of the AxeFX, to make almost anything sound good.
 
ptgold said:
Dude Keep it Simple

If it sounds good somewhere else...itll sound good throughout the AXE
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I dont think he has heard it anywhere else, its the problems always with buying "site unseen" in fact ironically hearing unheard. My carvin never sounded the way I wanted in any amp, again this is NOT to say anything about ALL carvins, Just mine never was great for high gain. Nothing horrible, just never gave me satisfaction. If anything though, the axe is so clear and detailed, it will bring out the worst or best of minor differences in guitars, from woods to of course pickups (I doubt however fret types). Of course eric Johnson can hear the difference between an energizer vs duracell 12 v (or something outlandish like this).
 
Well, this isn't going to help things.

I dug out my koa carvin and did a couple quick clips thru the Fender Deluxe stock preset. Only adjustments are to the tone knobs, and I think I tweaked the MV and Input gain down a bit. The Carvin has an active system and it took me a while to figure it out again, but it pans between the neck and tone pups, and has bass and treble boost or cut. Also pup phase and bass / treble boost, for each pup. Pretty cool. But the recording is pretty thin sounding as I was short on time and my wife went on an unexpectedly short shopping trip. Go easy on me, I don't play knopfler or practice cover tunes, pretty much a tv theme noodler...

This is the Carvin koa DC200 1994 vintage, active electronics, heavy as a brick shithouse (seriously, heaviest guitar I have) Just the Fender Deluxe model and stock FAS cab.

https://soundcloud.com/sanityclause/carvin-fender-deluxe-sultans

To get a comparison, I plugged in my Melancon Classic w/ vintage blues pups. This is probably my fav guitar atm. Really nice feel and sounds better. Same preset, didn't change anything on the AXE, only minor adjustment to the guitar tone knobs and boosted level on AXE to ~match the Carvin.

https://soundcloud.com/sanityclause/melancon-strat

Sorry for the clams, but I thought this may help you a little. Although once I dug the guitar out, I realized the one you are planning on getting is going to be totally different. First off, this is the heaviest koa I've held. I have a six string koa bass (Carvin) that is lighter than this guitar. Also, the active electronics are totally different than any passive system. Really a pointless comparison, I guess, this guitar is probably closer sounding to granite than to any wood. But I like it.
 
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Randolfo...

Thanks for making that clip!

I've never liked active pups.

But, I like the 2nd clip a little better than the first on, the 2nd sounds less bright and fuller sounding.


Also as far as CC,
I love his solos on:

I Won't Forget You
Life Goes On
Nothin But A Good Time
Fallen Angel
Every Rose Has Its Thorn
Somethin To Believe In
Cry Tough
Ride The Wind

I think he's one of the top 10 guitarists of all time.
And I think those are among some of the best guitar solos ever composed, they are very catch & memorable and easy to hum, perfection.
I think CC is one of the most underated guitarists of all time.
I think most people just give him a hard time because they don't like his early glam clothes, makeup and blonde hair, but I love it all.
As soon as I get a Axe XL first things I will be doing is tone matching CC Deville and also Randy Rhoads Tribute spotlight solo, I've read the majority of all the threads in this forum, and I don't think anyone here has ever bothered making serious tone matches or patched of those things. But I intend to.
CC's tone on the above solos is so beautiful, right up there with Vai's For the Love of God & Tender Surrender.
 
Like others said, I wouldn't sweat it either.
Generally speaking, a koa guitar is going to sound a lot like a mahogany guitar, albeit prettier. The real difference, to an arguable degree, will come from the pups you load it with.
That said, Cliff pretty much nailed it: if you can get a good sound with it through toobz, you'll get a good sound with the AFX.

Now, as for CC...
I'm not of the mindset to pointlessly bash another guitarist. There are many out there worse than he. All you need to do is spend an afternoon at Guitar Center to confirm this.
But he completely punted away the solo on Every Rose Has Its Thorn. Could've been a majestic standing on a mountain top with 10,000 of Steve Vai's hair fans blowing you in the face kind of epic solo to end all solos.
But he punted it away instead.
Maybe he was too wasted in the studio to go on...?
 
I have at least 12 Carvins... neck-throughs, C66's, Bolt's... varieties of wood bodies... Alder, Mahogany, Ash... they ALL sound great with the AxeFX.

Picking the right amp with the right cab sim is most important... some cabs can make any guitar sound dead... but it's all personal preference..
 
Here's another video by that same guy as before, but this time it's just guitar (no backing track and also recorded with just a camera mic). For me, the first words that come to mind about the tone are not "God awful" or "thin":



(Skip ahead to 1:12 when he turns the wah off)

 
You can get good tone from any guitar if it sounds like what you're after. But then... how will you know?

If there's one thing I've learned through the years it is this: buy guitars that come with a return policy, or those that you can play before buying.
 
Good guitars will sound good. Period. Carvin makes a nice guitar. It will sound different than a LP , Strat or EBMM. That's good.
 
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