My attempt at "Dumble" sound--Talk to Your Daughter

B

bjjp2

Power User
Short clip. Not posted for playing. Not posted for timing. Not posted to show I can play like Robben Ford. Posted to see if people think I'm on the right track in trying to get a good "D" sound out of the II.



Edited to add: OK, here's one with a little more drive, a little more presence and a little wetter. Sounds a bit closer to the original to me.

 
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I'm a bit of a Robben fan. That's all my creds on this review of your tone. (Nice playing BTW)

Too dark, too close. RF has this "in the room" sound which uses I guess a long pre-delay on the reverb or a short slap back echo, whichever you like best, which opens up the space. Maybe it's the lexicon or the way he's mic'ed in the studio, but that's a big part of his sound. The cab has some room to breathe, you could call it.
I'm such a fan of his that I've tried to squeeze most of the ability of the Axe to reproduce not just a generic D sound, but Robben's specifically.
You're on the way, but for sure you need to brighten it up and add effects.
I suggest that when you're done with your tweaking session and recording, you take a short break and then re-AB.
Also - what guitar are you using?

Lastly, one more point. If you listen carefully to the solo on this song, you can hear a mid spike when he hits certain notes. Almost as if there was a stuck-in-the-middle-wah. I don't know if that's done with a time based or filter effect (EQ or setting on the Lexicon) but it's definitely part of his tone. Could also just be a TBX type tone on the guitar. I don't know. That's still elusive to me.
I've kinda stopped chasing his tone when I faced the fact that I'll never played like him LOL!

Good luck, and I hope the above helps.
 
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Good playing man. I have been hoping someone can nail this tone with the Axe-fx II and post the preset.

Just took a quick listen to actual song and A/B'd it with yours. You are getting in the ballpark but it still needs some work. The first thing that I noticed is the actual lead tone on the album is more aggressive with more overdrive(gain). The album also sounded bigger, maybe more presence and more reverb is needed. Robben is known to use Celestion G12-65 speakers, so maybe using a IR with those may help.

Here is a link to a video of him describing his rig:
Robben Ford Rig - Part 2 - YouTube


From the video, if you look close, it looks like he has the dumble settings set to:
volume - 6
treble - 5
middle - 5
bass - 7
level - 3.5
ratio - 3.5
master - 3.5
presence - 6

A Larry Carlton video showed very similar settings but with a little more treble and master volume.

Good luck. I hope you can dial it in closer and post another clip and preset of course.

(Edit: The previous poster had a good idea about letting the cabinet breathe. Maybe try using a Redwirez room mic IR along with a close mic.)
 
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Thanks for the very valuable and insightful comments.
I also think a big part of his sound is that (if I'm correct) he plays with his fingers, which I can't really do.

Guitar was a Hamer Studio (dual HB).

Edit: Also, I should clarify, I'm not necessarily trying to duplicate the specific tone on the original song, as opposed to something I like that's "dumblish". I just happened to find a backing track for that song.
 
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I think the tone fit the piece.
Great playing & programming, not drowning in delay and reverb. Refreshing!
 
Yes it's too "dry and up front" but the core tone is there and that's the most important part.

The rest is easily "fixable".

Good tone and good playing.

:razz
 
Nice patch name. I agree with the "in the room" sound comment and mid spike bit from Patzag. I don't know how much of the mid spike is the particular amp and how much is Robben's ability to phrase with the knowledge that certain articulation will bring that out.

I know you're not putting it out there for a critique on the playing, but listening reminded me of one thing I learned (and have to continually relearn;-) when I learned the solo for one of his little instructional lessons. The lesson for me is that he speaks very clearly in phrases with super precise articulation. In the example you played, the phrases kind of blurred into one another and the shape of the articulation was a bit blurry. Sometimes it's hard for guitar players, myself included to breath, but particularly in blues it makes all the difference. It take a ton of patience to work on phrasing lines with the precision that Robben has AND leaving the spaces, too, at least for me it does.

Thanks for sharing your work on that sound. Robben has some of the best tones of anyone, particularly live.
 
OK, here's one with a little more drive, a little more presence and a little wetter. Sounds a bit closer to the original to me.

 
I think it sounds great! One thing that's helped me is to turn up the room level % up. I used some settings Scott posted around here somewhere and they really gave some "breath" to the cabs.

Room Level: 50%
Room Size: 2.00 (I'd probably increase this)
Mic Spacing: 20%
 
mmcm4 said:
I think it sounds great! One thing that's helped me is to turn up the room level % up. I used some settings Scott posted around here somewhere and they really gave some "breath" to the cabs.

Room Level: 50%
Room Size: 2.00 (I'd probably increase this)
Mic Spacing: 20%
Click to expand...

I'll try that--thanks.
 
Robben seems to use a 125 ms mono delay on occasion to add a "room" sound, it's not in your face or anything, dial it back and blend it in to taste. Give that a shot.
 
Awhile back on the RF forum his tech said his 2290 delays are 116ms for general stuff, 168ms for solo and 248 for 'special'. Repeats are at 1-1/2.

A good example of an RF stuck wah is on Bad Sign.
 
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