jesussaddle
Power User
I really had my doubts. I play through a classic BC Rich Bich with a couple of Seymour Duncan's; in bridge position I have a "Fred" pickup. Classic Van Halen I, the original "brown sound" has always been a sound and feel that was "not quite there" in any of my amps, stomp boxes, or amp modelers, including the Axe FX Ultra and II. While the feel has improved tremendously, something about the IRs just wasn't giving me exactly the right tonal spread, noticeable in the low-mids as "muffled where it shouldn't be", and in upper EQ ranges as "overbright where it shouldn't be", etc. When using a phaser at about 30 percent of max speed, the watery feel I was looking for wasn't happening either.
Not wanting to be disappointed I was a bit hesitant.
Last night I gathered my courage and collected up some isolated tracks. This morning I decided to make this my first project of the day. I dragged the Rockstah mod 5 mp3 Audio Sample #2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaXTPKmMtC8 (I know mp3's are non-ideal) into Ableton's Audio Track 1, and went into prefs and switched my Fireface 400 ASIO driver out for the Axe II ASIO driver.
Recalling into Axe FX II memory "The Brown Sound" patch, I raised up the Master Volume a little bit - (In the past I've found that 2 to 4 o'clock is all useable - for different things - here I chose 2.5 to 4 o'clock, forget right now exactly where it wound up). I bypassed everything except the amp and cab. I swapped out the cab block for a tone match block. Went into the PROCESS page of the block (sorry can't remember and selected USB as reference source. Went back to the CAPTURE page, then began playing back the Rockstah Mod 5 clip, being sure that it was playing back at a reasonably audible level, for computers to "hear". A moment later I pressed X to start the capture of the reference signal, being careful to let the wave play through so that chords, low notes and high notes had all been played by Mark, pressing X again to stop before any silence happened. Next I remembered to bypass the tone match block, then began playing my guitar before pressing Y to start capturing the local signal, again to avoid any silence throwing off the result. After a few seconds I pressed Y again. Then I pressed ENTER.
Then I turned on the reverb and delay, turned up the delay in the mix, and shortened it to about 300 ms, and activated the phaser. Liquidy shiny and warm. At this point I had something that sounded very good. To touch it up I raised Sag to about 12 o'clock, raised the dynamics to about 2 or 3 o'clock (for kicks I guess), and tried the tone out. It sounded above expectation. It was clear throughout the low-mid range, not muffly, and bright but not jagged in the high range.
I tried the impedance matching and found that for more of an eruption-esq sound it helped to bring it up just a hair (about 12:30 o'clock at most maybe) for more of a showy, flashy compressed lead, but really the default worked for penetrate the mix when those notes need to hold and create a strong harmonic foundation. Probably going back and forth between master volume and transformer match would be a good idea before making these comments. They're first impressions only.
Next I saved my tone match as an IR and moved it to USER IR 1.
Finally I turned off the phaser, and tried the flanger block, thinking along the lines of Ain't Talkin' About Love. Its the only part of the equation that's not working out exactly yet, but it was at this time that I began having Axe Edit woes, and had to reboot several times. Twice I would load my O/S, reboot Axe II and try and do a major edit in Axe Edit, it would hang.
Ultimately I wanted to move the Flanger to after the tone match block and dragging it there was what was making Axe Edit crash. Probably I should just stop trying to drag things when Axe FX is the "source" in Axe Edit. As for the flange, I think it needs to be clearer and in front of the amp it isn't very clean. I also think it may need to be off from center. The phaser seems to work best in front for what it does here.
Well, if anyone has suggestions about what to do with the Flanger placement and settings to nail "Ain't Talkin'" I'll appreciate them. In the mean time Tone Match block is a new friend. I mean it took me about 5 minutes to dial in something I've wanted for 30 years
Next I have a Rory Gallagher wave file from just before he died when his single coils were burning up. Think he'll mind if I try and cut out the drums, bass and vocals, and make an IR out of it?
Really, I think that people with similar pickups would actually be able to usefully exchange Tone Matches. Is it conceivable that there could be a place on the forums where people who have a particular "class" of pickup and placement could find each others tone match presets? To post a Tone Match when 98 percent of everyone that will be searching for it won't get the intended result is understandably a waste of time. On the other hand, if I knew there were "Fred" (pickup) tone match block presets out there that I could search for I would think they might be almost reliable. I realize its where the pickup is in relation to the bridge, string type, pick type, tuning, body and neck wood, floating vibrato bar, and on and on. But aren't the guitar pickups, placement and strings more than 50% of the equation? Just thoughts.
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=503988 (Good samples even if they're mp3s...)
Not wanting to be disappointed I was a bit hesitant.
Last night I gathered my courage and collected up some isolated tracks. This morning I decided to make this my first project of the day. I dragged the Rockstah mod 5 mp3 Audio Sample #2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaXTPKmMtC8 (I know mp3's are non-ideal) into Ableton's Audio Track 1, and went into prefs and switched my Fireface 400 ASIO driver out for the Axe II ASIO driver.
Recalling into Axe FX II memory "The Brown Sound" patch, I raised up the Master Volume a little bit - (In the past I've found that 2 to 4 o'clock is all useable - for different things - here I chose 2.5 to 4 o'clock, forget right now exactly where it wound up). I bypassed everything except the amp and cab. I swapped out the cab block for a tone match block. Went into the PROCESS page of the block (sorry can't remember and selected USB as reference source. Went back to the CAPTURE page, then began playing back the Rockstah Mod 5 clip, being sure that it was playing back at a reasonably audible level, for computers to "hear". A moment later I pressed X to start the capture of the reference signal, being careful to let the wave play through so that chords, low notes and high notes had all been played by Mark, pressing X again to stop before any silence happened. Next I remembered to bypass the tone match block, then began playing my guitar before pressing Y to start capturing the local signal, again to avoid any silence throwing off the result. After a few seconds I pressed Y again. Then I pressed ENTER.
Then I turned on the reverb and delay, turned up the delay in the mix, and shortened it to about 300 ms, and activated the phaser. Liquidy shiny and warm. At this point I had something that sounded very good. To touch it up I raised Sag to about 12 o'clock, raised the dynamics to about 2 or 3 o'clock (for kicks I guess), and tried the tone out. It sounded above expectation. It was clear throughout the low-mid range, not muffly, and bright but not jagged in the high range.
I tried the impedance matching and found that for more of an eruption-esq sound it helped to bring it up just a hair (about 12:30 o'clock at most maybe) for more of a showy, flashy compressed lead, but really the default worked for penetrate the mix when those notes need to hold and create a strong harmonic foundation. Probably going back and forth between master volume and transformer match would be a good idea before making these comments. They're first impressions only.
Next I saved my tone match as an IR and moved it to USER IR 1.
Finally I turned off the phaser, and tried the flanger block, thinking along the lines of Ain't Talkin' About Love. Its the only part of the equation that's not working out exactly yet, but it was at this time that I began having Axe Edit woes, and had to reboot several times. Twice I would load my O/S, reboot Axe II and try and do a major edit in Axe Edit, it would hang.
Ultimately I wanted to move the Flanger to after the tone match block and dragging it there was what was making Axe Edit crash. Probably I should just stop trying to drag things when Axe FX is the "source" in Axe Edit. As for the flange, I think it needs to be clearer and in front of the amp it isn't very clean. I also think it may need to be off from center. The phaser seems to work best in front for what it does here.
Well, if anyone has suggestions about what to do with the Flanger placement and settings to nail "Ain't Talkin'" I'll appreciate them. In the mean time Tone Match block is a new friend. I mean it took me about 5 minutes to dial in something I've wanted for 30 years
Next I have a Rory Gallagher wave file from just before he died when his single coils were burning up. Think he'll mind if I try and cut out the drums, bass and vocals, and make an IR out of it?
Really, I think that people with similar pickups would actually be able to usefully exchange Tone Matches. Is it conceivable that there could be a place on the forums where people who have a particular "class" of pickup and placement could find each others tone match presets? To post a Tone Match when 98 percent of everyone that will be searching for it won't get the intended result is understandably a waste of time. On the other hand, if I knew there were "Fred" (pickup) tone match block presets out there that I could search for I would think they might be almost reliable. I realize its where the pickup is in relation to the bridge, string type, pick type, tuning, body and neck wood, floating vibrato bar, and on and on. But aren't the guitar pickups, placement and strings more than 50% of the equation? Just thoughts.
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=503988 (Good samples even if they're mp3s...)
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