Tips for using Mesa sims

First, excellent post by shrediknight.

Second, Concerning the gain level, I created a patch today basically using shredi's settings plus cliff's envelope trick, and I've been keeping the gain around 5-6. I experimented dialing it down to the 3's, and it ended up making the palm mutes too thin. Also the pickups I'm using are alnico 2's.
 
Went and checked all my settings. It all checks out.

Maybe it's my cab. Who knows. Perhaps my EMG's are hotter than I think...but I doubt it. Could just be an anomaly.
 
james... said:
[quote="shredi knight":21eslu2b]
[quote="james...":21eslu2b]
-I have the gain on like 3.76 and it's still too much for me. Any problem with bringing it down to say 2? Would this be detremental to the tone?
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Really? Well, that would be detrimental to my my tone. That amount of gain would be a semi-heavy crunch tone at best for me. Definitely not enough for leads or heavy rhythms (and to boot, I have high output pickups, plus on-board active electronics that boost them even more). On my Mark IV patch, I have the gain at 6.81. Now I’m the first to admit, that like Petrucci, I play with too much gain (not to mention too much delay). I don’t think it’s just that though. Marco Sfogli’s “Andromeda” patch (which is similar to the tone I go for) has even more gain dialed in that my Mark IV patch. Are you sure you have the Drive block’s Drive control all the way down to 0?
[/quote:21eslu2b]

Now THIS is interesting.

I have the gain on 3.5 and it's SATURATED. I'm talking soaked. Harmonics are effortless. It's truly getting into Dream Theater territory. The drive is at 0 yes. I'm using EMG's but they aren't that hot to be honest. Definitely not hotter than your stuff.

I'm truly perplexed as to how this could be. I will go back and triple check my patch. Maybe there's something I missed. But as it stands I am playing with all your settings and my gain is at 3.5... But I promise you I am getting some really high gain. Sounds like Lamb of God saturation[/quote:21eslu2b]

I don't know man, 3.5 sounds like my patch when I have my guitar's volume knob rolled down almost all the way. I shouldn't have that it wasn't enough for playing leads. I can cope with that amount of gain with the bridge pickup, but the tone is too weak when you switch to the neck pickup. There's not very much sustain and the notes have that "plucky plucky" clean sound and feel to them. That's mainly why I use so much gain, because I have to have that "John Petrucci", totally saturated liquid neck pickup tone.
 
shredi knight said:
I don't know man, 3.5 sounds like my patch when I have my guitar's volume knob rolled down almost all the way. I shouldn't have that it wasn't enough for playing leads. I can cope with that amount of gain with the bridge pickup, but the tone is too weak when you switch to the neck pickup. There's not very much sustain and the notes have that "plucky plucky" clean sound and feel to them. That's mainly why I use so much gain, because I have to have that "John Petrucci", totally saturated liquid neck pickup tone.
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Wild huh? It must be my guitar and cab. I should make a clip to prove it, but I am using all your base setting with 3.75 gain now, and sure enough it's nailing the Petrucci tone. I'm amazed at the harmonics with this amp. The pinch stuff is coming out like crazy.

Anyway...I have a comment about the wiki.

This page
http://axefxwiki.guitarlogic.org/index. ... known_amps

and this page
http://axefxwiki.guitarlogic.org/index. ... imulations

-need to be joined. I want to make some MAJOR headway on this section of the wiki. IMO this is the key to getting good amp tone without spending hours blindly dialing junk in. We need a page like this full of benchmark settings and tips for all the amp sims. And it wouldn't help to have one for effects too, but that's an afterthought.

I think tomorrow I'm going to really play with the Hiwatt and do a write up on it as an experiment for this.
 
I'd be interested in hearing a clip just out of curiosity of the tone you're getting with my settings (and how saturated it is).
 
Hi Shredi,

When you turn the bias down are you trying to get the Boogie cold bias effect? I’d like to get the bias sounding hotter do I need to turn the bias up?

Thanks, Paul
 
aircadet said:
Hi Shredi,

When you turn the bias down are you trying to get the Boogie cold bias effect? I’d like to get the bias sounding hotter do I need to turn the bias up?

Thanks, Paul
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Turning it up gives it a "hotter" bias, though Cliff's description in the release notes of the effect of turning it down seems more like what comes to mind when you think "Hotter", and more desirable (at least to me) than turning it up:


....Lower values of bias increase the amount of crossover distortion, add “hair” to the sound and make the power amp more “explosive” since the transfer function slope increases with input level. Higher values of bias yield less distortion, “rounder” sound, more linear response and a more compressed feel........
 
shredi knight said:
aircadet said:
Hi Shredi,

When you turn the bias down are you trying to get the Boogie cold bias effect? I’d like to get the bias sounding hotter do I need to turn the bias up?

Thanks, Paul
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Turning it up gives it a "hotter" bias, though Cliff's description in the release notes of the effect of turning it down seems more like what comes to mind when you think "Hotter", and more desirable (at least to me) than turning it up:


....Lower values of bias increase the amount of crossover distortion, add “hair” to the sound and make the power amp more “explosive” since the transfer function slope increases with input level. Higher values of bias yield less distortion, “rounder” sound, more linear response and a more compressed feel........
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That part of the manual always confused me a tad with the terminology.
 
Thanks Shredi. What about the switch on the back (pentode or Triode I think) which control would effect that?

Thanks again. Paul
 
Hi Shredi,

I listened to your clip. Seems you're not going direct (I can hear your guitar strings plus some chair noise ;-)), plus there is a high frequency very prominent (even when you're not playing). Still sounds great.

And yes, your tone has not a lot of bass, but I think it would fit very good into a mix.
 
aircadet said:
Thanks Shredi. What about the switch on the back (pentode or Triode I think) which control would effect that?

Thanks again. Paul
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F-ck if I know man, I've never actually played one and am talking completely out of my a$$. :lol:

I'm just a huge fan of the Mesa Mark series tone. I've done a lot of reading about them, have lots of clips, and have spent a lot of time with the USA Lead amp sims trying to get that tone to come out of my Axe FX.





hhjh.de said:
Hi Shredi,

I listened to your clip. Seems you're not going direct (I can hear your guitar strings plus some chair noise ;-)), plus there is a high frequency very prominent (even when you're not playing). Still sounds great.

And yes, your tone has not a lot of bass, but I think it would fit very good into a mix.
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I'm guessing you didn't read the part of my post that talked about the clip:


shredi knight said:
Here's a crude clip of the tone I'm getting with the USA Lead 1 amp sim (Mark IV). it's just the audio extracted from a video shot with a digital camera. Not the best sound quality and it sounds way better in person (it sounds a little brighter than it actually is in the clip), but it gives a decent idea of what the tone is like in the room.
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That very prominent high frequency is my digital camera.

Thanks for commenting on the clip though. I thought either no one listened to it, or no one wanted to say anything because it sounded so bad. ;) It actually has more bass that it sounds like. The camera kind of killed it. You can feel that nice "Thump" in your chest when you play, even at low volume.
 
Yes, you are right, I didn't read that part.

But a big thanks to you, yesterday I took your recommendations and got a very nice tone (I double checked this morning before going to work, if I still find it nice). I'm not usually a high gain guy, but this is cool ;-)

And since I didn't just upload a syx file, but turned all the knobs myself, I feel a bit more comfortable with the preset by knowing how you achieved that tone.

Again, big thanks to you!
 
Best... thread... ever :shock:

I followed exactly Shredi's words + added le special Cliff tip for low ends, it totally kicks a$$ !! And I thaught my Mesa patches were pretty good... I have to cancel my 1 year birthday with my girlfriend, I have some patches to tweak now... Priorities first :mrgreen:

Thanks a lot to Shredi and to everyone giving tips and tricks, and to Cliff & Co for this fabulous big boys toy, it's unbelievable !

/me happy tonight :D
 
shredi knight said:
As far as the USA Lead sims (Mesa Mark series) go, I tend to approach them like the real things. Here's my list of tips:


- Keep the amp sim's Bass low. Anywhere from 0-4 is typical with Mesa users, with 2 seeming to be the most common. I have the Bass around 2.00 on my patches. Mid anywhere from 5.00 to 8.00, and Treble fairly high (from 6.50 to 8.50). I personally have the Treble on my patches between 6.50 - 7.50, depending on the USA Lead sim. This is how the Mesa Mark series amps are typically set up. I also have the Presence at 2.52 (between 2-3 seems typical on real world settings). I have the Tonestack Type set to Passive and the Presence Type set to Active.

- Keep the power amp Master relatively low so most of the gain is coming from the preamp stage of the amp sim. Mesas are about preamp distortion, not power amp distortion. Typical settings I've seen on the Mark series are between 3-4 (I set the Master at 3.23).

- Mesas are set with a very cold, fixed bias. I've researched this a lot and the consensus seems to be that it is 200-205, so you might experiment with turning the amp sim's Pwr Tube Bias parameter down (I have mine at 0.205).

- This isn't specific to just the Mesas, but to the high gain amp sims in general: Try turning up the Transformer Match parameter. I read where someone on another forum described it as the "Mojo" control, and that's pretty accurate. I can't describe too well what it does to the tone, it just makes it sound better. More lively and 3-D sounding. I set it at 6.38 on the USA Lead 1, and 6.85 on all the other Mesa Mark sims.

- Use the Parametric EQ after the amp sim to simulate the Mesa Mark's on-board graphic eq and the Mesa "Classic V" eq curve:



MesaEQ2avatarxxx2.jpg




The supposed real frequencies and Q's can be found on the Axe FX Wiki, but I never liked how they sounded. I just use the actual frequencies as they appear on the front of the Mesa amps (like in the above pic) with the Parametric's default Q's (with a couple of exceptions) and it sounds pretty close to me (I can give you the exact settings I use if you want).

- I always use a Drive block before the amp sim (all high gain amp sims, not just the USA Leads) to tighten up the bass and give the tone more punch (Drive at 0.00, Level 10.00). I like to use the Full OD, with the Clip Type changed to HV Tube.



Here's a crude clip of the tone I'm getting with the USA Lead 1 amp sim (Mark IV). it's just the audio extracted from a video shot with a digital camera. Not the best sound quality and it sounds way better in person (it sounds a little brighter than it actually is in the clip), but it gives a decent idea of what the tone is like in the room. I'm running the Axe FX through 2 Dynaudio BM5A active studio monitors. I recorded this at low, conversation volume. Ignore the aimless crap playing: :roll:



(Right click and save as)

http://www.lightningmp3.com/live/file.php?id=20921
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hey shredi, got any tips for the Mesa Rectos?
 
I tested with with the Recto New and the USA II+ 2 (just changing the amp), it gives pretty good results too :twisted:

I think we have here a very good Mesa recipe !
 
mortega76 said:
Maybe I missed it but... I can't seem to find the Shredi's patch anywhere, only the 7.04 cab.
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I haven't posted it yet, just (most of) the key settings. :D




rsf1977 said:
hey shredi, got any tips for the Mesa Rectos?
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Not really. I shot my wad with the Mark IV settings. :p
 
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