Jay's two new free IRs

iaresee

iaresee

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Jay Mitchell put out two new IRs on TGP last night: https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/free-irs.2279603/

I swapped the JMCH IR into my Silver Tongued preset that's based around Deluxe Verb Vibrator amp channel. With his IRs I always reset the AMP block and start from scratch -- they definitely demand a different set of twists on the controls than any other IRs I encounter.

The JMCH sounds fine enough. It's not blowing me away. But it's solidly Fender-like and works well with my Silver Sky in the preset.

The IR curve itself is really interesting:

Screen Shot 2021-08-14 at 11.05.29 AM.png

That's a lot smoother than I usually see IR curves. I guess that's a property of far field IRs (which I'm assuming this is given the source). Or maybe it's artifically created (which would be hella interesting) using software?

For comparision here's what the two IRs I normally use with the preset look like:

Screen Shot 2021-08-14 at 11.06.42 AM.png

I'll continue to play around with these at some point this weekend, I'm sure.
 
Trying to figure out from tgp what these IRs are (what cab/speaker/mic/position).

Jay says "sounds like the cab it came from when you play through the cab" - what does that mean?

I'll try them out but not sure what they are.
 
And yet, no matter how many things are done with current IRs, nothing can replicate at this point the real feel and acoustic experiment of playing a real amp and cab in a room.
 
I'll be the first to concede that there's nothing like playing with a real cab in the room. However, I've found with a couple of IRs from Jay in the past that I was getting much closer than with a lot of other IRs. I may be wrong but I suspect that it has to do with his setups not coloring the sound quite as much as most IRs with various mics that color the sound. I haven't tried the latest ones he posted though. It's not exactly amp in the room - but they can sound more like a guitar cab to me.

I also know part of it is that I haven't played through a real 4x12 cab in many years. Come to think of it, I've not played through a 2x12 cab in nearly as long - my Boogie vertical slant 2x12 sat unused for years before I sold it. IOW, I've been using 1x12 cabs, FRFR, and/or my Genelecs exclusively for a long time. So I'm pretty conditioned to sounds coming from a fairly compact square box.

Another thing that I believe helps in all of this is that I've been fortunate enough to play a few larger venues enough times where I couldn't actually here my amp on most of the stage and had to rely on the sound from monitors. The first time you play a bigger room (or outside) with your 4x12 and it vanishes as you move around is definitely a surprise (and pity the fool that was in it's direct path).

I've had good luck with a lot of the builtin Fractal IRs and stuff from cab packs as well. There are no absolutes here for me. One things for sure, I don't have the patience to mess around with IRs like a lot of people do. When I find something I like, I just leave it be. Scrolling through the thousands of IRs I have wouldn't result in anything better anyhow, ear fatigue kicks in pretty quick.
 
Isn't the point of these IR's (I'll admit to being a little fuzzy on what he's trying to achieve) to rely on your FRFR to supply the "amp in the room" sound? Consequently, these IR's are intended to be devoid of any coloration that would normally come from the the room when shooting an IR, so any such room coloration only comes from your FRFR when using these IRs?

In other words, I don't think these IR's are intended to sound like "amp in the room". They are intended to be stripped down to just the sound of the speaker, so you'll get a truer "amp in the room" sound when you play them through your FRFR. This also means these are only intended to be used for live use, not recording.

Am I understanding this correctly?
 
GlennO said:
Isn't the point of these IR's (I'll admit to being a little fuzzy on what he's trying to achieve) to rely on your FRFR to supply the "amp in the room" sound? Consequently, these IR's are intended to be devoid of any coloration that would normally come from the the room when shooting an IR, so any such room coloration only comes from your FRFR when using these IRs?

In other words, I don't think these IR's are intended to sound like "amp in the room". They are intended to be stripped down to just the sound of the speaker, so you'll get a truer "amp in the room" sound when you play them through your FRFR. This also means these are only intended to be used for live use, not recording.

Am I understanding this correctly?
Click to expand...

That's the idea. But as @FractalAudio pointed out on TGP, the IR captured the sound from one vantage point so at best it's the AITR at a certain position, your FRFR is not likely to be anywhere near as directional as a guitar cab so you don't get the same AITR experience as you move around, and you're still going to get reflections from the FRFR but they won't match what the cab would have produced in the same environment. These don't have to be a negative though.
 
hippietim said:
I'll be the first to concede that there's nothing like playing with a real cab in the room. However, I've found with a couple of IRs from Jay in the past that I was getting much closer than with a lot of other IRs. I may be wrong but I suspect that it has to do with his setups not coloring the sound quite as much as most IRs with various mics that color the sound. I haven't tried the latest ones he posted though. It's not exactly amp in the room - but they can sound more like a guitar cab to me.

I also know part of it is that I haven't played through a real 4x12 cab in many years. Come to think of it, I've not played through a 2x12 cab in nearly as long - my Boogie vertical slant 2x12 sat unused for years before I sold it. IOW, I've been using 1x12 cabs, FRFR, and/or my Genelecs exclusively for a long time. So I'm pretty conditioned to sounds coming from a fairly compact square box.

Another thing that I believe helps in all of this is that I've been fortunate enough to play a few larger venues enough times where I couldn't actually here my amp on most of the stage and had to rely on the sound from monitors. The first time you play a bigger room (or outside) with your 4x12 and it vanishes as you move around is definitely a surprise (and pity the fool that was in it's direct path).

I've had good luck with a lot of the builtin Fractal IRs and stuff from cab packs as well. There are no absolutes here for me. One things for sure, I don't have the patience to mess around with IRs like a lot of people do. When I find something I like, I just leave it be. Scrolling through the thousands of IRs I have wouldn't result in anything better anyhow, ear fatigue kicks in pretty quick.
Click to expand...
100%. I am a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE fan of the 4x12 historically; but I have been playing a powered 112 of whatever sort really for at least 5+ years if not more and that feel and sonic impact of a 4x12 really just isn't my thing anymore.
 
hippietim said:
That's the idea. But as @FractalAudio pointed out on TGP, the IR captured the sound from one vantage point so at best it's the AITR at a certain position, your FRFR is not likely to be anywhere near as directional as a guitar cab so you don't get the same AITR experience as you move around, and you're still going to get reflections from the FRFR but they won't match what the cab would have produced in the same environment. These don't have to be a negative though.
Click to expand...
Eh it's all about degrees of approximation. As you said, a properly captured, reflection free, Far-Field IR will be the best approximation sans actually using a guitar cab.

I find Cliff's dismissive attitude towards this disingenuous given the time he has spent trying to improve amp modeling. One can as easily be as dismissive and just say... just use a guitar amp.
 
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