PEQ recommendation for muddy hollowbody sound

Surefire641

Surefire641

Member
I've got my AX8 sounding pretty good on my standard presets. I normally use a Suhr Standard or Modern with a DSH+ in the bridge. When I switch to my PRS Hollowbody II, the bass on most of my settings gets very flubby and almost sounds distorted. While I acknowledge its a pretty broad question, is there an EQ curve recommendation I can use with the PEQ block that will return some of the bass definition without me necessarily having to tweak every preset? Adjusting for presence, and the usual treble/mid/bass just doesn't seem to get it right and ends up too thin or weak sounding. The guitar sounds great through my actual amps, but isn't making friends with the Axe just yet. I've also tried playing with low cut frequency, but I'm looking for a more general solution as I'm kind of a newb with EQ.
 
If it's a resonance issue, you can find the offending frequency with a Filter or PEQ block at the beginning of the grid. Set it up as a peaking filter with a fairly narrow bandwidth (high Q value) and turn the gain for the filter up high. It's usually easier to find a resonance by accentuating with a boost rather than cutting it. Turn the frequency knob back and forth through the frequency range until you find the spot where the resonance gets really bad. Once you know where the resonance is located, you can then reverse the boost down into a cut and adjust the Q until you are happy with the results.
 
I’m less than a week in on the AX8, myself: but I can think of three things to be looked at in the overall context of the hollow body as you describe.

1. The first thing I'd look at: Does a different speaker cabinet model or lowering the resonance of the one you are using pretty much solve the problem? This might be the case, since it sounds good with your other guitars. If speaker cab (or cab model) resonance and the guitar resonance are in the same range this would be causing a super-additive effect overpowering the bass and lower midrange. If this is the case, then the required PEQ tweaks will also be much less.

http://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/about-speaker-lf-resonance.78003/

2. IME: With hollow and semi-hollow bodies the bass energy might not be expressed primarily as the fundamental: but in the harmonic series: for example: a G2 is 103z, but may give a larger peak at G3 207 hz or G4 415 hz: so rolling off the amp’s bass doesn’t address the right frequencies: Using mr_fender's method - you'll probably find a PEQ attenuation somewhere between [ballpark] 100-180 hz low and 400-600 hz high will reduce the excessive energy causing mud and distortion, and retain the fundamental of the bass. It will depend on the resonance of the guitar, as well as the specific amp etc.

3. There are advanced settings regarding the power amp that can reduce the propensity of the low end to distort. I haven’t dug into this sort of thing yet: but there are posts and threads to that effect on the forum.

You’ll get it solved. I’m quite the semi-hollow body aficionado myself, so I’ve encountered your problem with real amps, but not with the models I’ve used in the AX8 thus far.
 
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I tried all of the above, with some positive results although the guitar still just seems way too flubby and without definition. I'm starting to think its the pickups. The 57/08 pickups appear to be the culrpit, especially when the model is normally very bright and chimey (Matchless, Vox), these just are mush.
 
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