Old 09-20-2011, 10:26 PM   #2041
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Originally Posted by TEiN View Post
It can be done in a forum, just not in this thread.


Here's the one thing you refuse to consider as the Ultimate Source of ALL ASSNESS: It's you. Instead of creating, you insist on copying, and because you can't copy you blame magic tricks that you don't know as the culprit instead of your lack of talent. It's you.

You don't want help, you want sympathy for your endless quest for elusive "tone". It's nothing more than an excuse so you don't have to admit that the real problem is a lack of talent. Don't make recordings! Blame it on not having the right "tone"! Don't make progress, regurgitate the same dead horse arguments you've been beating on for a year. Your recordings sound like ass because there's nothing worth recording.

Prove me wrong.

Make a recording. Something simple. Spend an hour. Just you on guitar. Forget about tone. Post the recording. Let others help you with ideas to make it sound better.

Bah... but you won't do it. You'll post a bunch of excuses why you can't instead, because you don't want help, you want sympathy.
Oh, dude, I don't claim to have any talent. I'm decades out of serious practice. But if a simple 3 chord riff doesn't have the tone, the tone isn't present.

I'm not saying, "Geez I'm the next Satriani" or anything like that.

I'm saying the tone and playing response is getting in the way of my progress.

It's also why I make a careful distiction between "tone" and "playing gesture". I know what my faults are. At the same time I can also tell when I'm not getting desired response or tone.

There is a difference and I'm aware of it. I'm not sure some other folks are herein. And certainly audiences generally don't know. They only know, "sound good" or "sounds crap" in most cases.

But sure, here's a 5 or 6 year old track done in the first month or so after I got some DAW software and first started in. Trying to cover a Rush tune with midi soundfonts and hand played tracks.

Of particular aggravation is the amp sim track doesn't match the quality nor tone value of the soundfonts.

There are lots of other eff ups that this thread would've helped at that time, if but the ridiculous amount of 'verb on the drums. But used on verb for everything. Had just started. Was trying to read the guitar parts from the midi as it scrolled by.

Not the issue though., the issue is the sound coming from Guitar Rig.

Sure, have fun ripping me new one, LOL!

In the interim, haven't found any better tones. My playing has come back somewhat, but gave up on covers. Takes to much time to transcribe them.

http://wikisend.com/download/295130/Fly By Night Cover.mp3

Tried to base the tone on this recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUx2zUbl_ro&feature=fvst

Ended up a little hotter though.

Was recording via phones.

If you can stand that one, I'll post some other personal attempts that aren't covers from that period, but they ain't great.

Anyway, gonna drop of for the eve.

If I don't get back for the well deserved flames for a bit, real life may be intruding.

P.S. I don't have a problem saying I lack talent, I do lack talent LOL!.

But c'mon, how much talent is in the riffs for "Louie Louie" from a guitar virtuoso standpoint, or "Smoke on the Water"? That sort of talent's not required for a hit or even a song that people like. How many #1's to the Satriani type "finger tone gods" have?

I'd think it takes a catchy tune done with good sounds to reasonable production specs, right?

Anyway, the talent part can be fixed by personal effort.

No amount of sweating over composition and wiggling my fingers makes a Strat sound like a Ricky, a Fender Twin sound like a JCM800, or whatever.

Last edited by flmason; 09-20-2011 at 10:55 PM.
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Old 09-20-2011, 11:32 PM   #2042
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I'm saying the tone and playing response is getting in the way of my progress.
Well then it just wasn't meant to be was it...
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Old 09-21-2011, 09:32 AM   #2043
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flmason was the first person I ever put on an ignore list, and looking back thru the last 10 pages I can see why....

Really, I can FULLY understand where you are coming from, but like TEiN said, and I think he is right, you are not even listening OR trying idea, you are just typing to "hear" yourself type, looking for other to go round & round about....nothing..

Post a track that you HAVE NOT LABORED OVER and let the pros on here help ya out, really....these guys are good....
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Old 09-21-2011, 10:17 AM   #2044
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I absolutely despise every single hurtful personal attack I've ever read on this forum. Every attempt to humiliate disgusts me. No exceptions.
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Old 09-21-2011, 11:20 AM   #2045
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Originally Posted by flmason View Post
There's so many tunes on the radio right now wherein the playing gestures are inaudible, I just don't know what to say. Yeah, some genres are aren't like that, but a lot of plain ol' current pop is about removing such things.
Wrong. Playing gestures are audible in every song ever made. Playing "gestures" as you obtusely choose to refer to them as, include everything from how you physically make the sound, to the choices you make during your performance (regardless of where that performance is). In the case of the guitar, every gesture made is unique, a song is truly never played the same way twice. Knowing this...I would never spend as much time and effort recreating as you have. I would simply work on. This has been your musical and apparently financial undoing.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
Consider that one of the most used tools going is a compressor... something that is often used to *remove* dynamics. Or essentially make the dynamics flatter because the artist didn't do it flat to start with.
There are near infinite ways to use compressors. To say that you use compressors to "remove dynamics" is technically correct, but completely ignores the human element. You need to go back and re-read Yep's discussion on compression and approach it, not from the standpoint of a man in a lab coat, but from the standpoint of an artist, trying to achieve a sound. Understanding that ONCE AGAIN, there is literally no CORRECT way to do this.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
So one distinction between commercial sound and garage band is obviously, reduced dynamic range, flatter evener sound levels, a crushing out of extraneous gestures.
Your assumption that commercial sound is a limited category of "acceptable production" is such a blatantly narrow view of music I can't even begin to address it. Clearly your goal is to figure out how to make a label recognize you, by limiting yourself to a set standard of constraints that you think will be accepted as "commercial enough". This is such a ridiculous way to pursue the musical art form I don't even know what to say. But that is also MY opinion, and you are clearly free to wallow in the depths of your search for an effective way to copy other people's tone.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
Well, if you folks can't hear the chintzy tone, nothing I can say can make you hear it that way. Won't try. Can't believe everyone has such a hard time separating "tone" from "playing gesture". Seems plain as day to me. Yes, I follow your point about the camera mic.
Clearly I can hear that the recording is limited. But given the constraints, I understand why. Your problem is that you want to have the same constraints, but don't want the limitations. And this is somehow logical to you...fascinating.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
Oh I can make it "work". But what do you do when you play a D on the 5th fret as written, bend it to try and make it growl as original artist does... and it has a buzzy sound rather than a growling sound, and 72 other amp sims have the same basic tonality coming out of them? Even the one supposedly emulationg "star player's" amp?
Then clearly your conclusion is that amp sims don't work the way you want them to. Use a real amp, put it in your closet, and cover it with 4 or 5 thick blankets so you don't bother your neighbors.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
I can hear the fizz in Iommi's "live recording" for the Classic Album series. Don't hear it in the release... SAME PLAYER, not even me. So some studio technique may be in effect.
There are so many factors that go into why you hear something in a live performance that you don't hear in a studio that to attempt to go into details on every single case you bring up, would be fruitless. Better to unerstand the basics of recording technique, to include the theory behind why certain tools are used, and apply that theory. If music were a simple "copy this formula and you'll sound professional" then everyone would do it. But clearly it is more difficult than that, and requires near master's level understanding to effectively apply techniques that are based on a clear understanding of the theory of recording, and a clear understanding of the design elements of your gear.

YES...gear is important. However...more important is the artistic vision it is being used to portray.

If I tell you to paint the best looking apple you can and hand you a finite set of tools to do it with. What do you do? Bitch that the tools don't mathematically meet the needs of the request and spend 10 years talking about why they don't? Sounds like a waste of time. Even if I handed you blue paint and a piece of sidewalk to paint it on and a piece of a tree branch to use for your brush. You can still do the BEST YOU CAN to paint the apple...within the constraints you're given. A true artist would consider his tools, and take a unique approach to painting the apple. BThose constraints obviously automatically limit your capabilities to "copy an apple". You want constraints, but you want to "copy the apple". Analogies suck in most cases...but you're quite good at dodging the point when we talk music by hiding behind comments like "math explains all things, so you should be able to explain to me how to do something musical with math". Asinine.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
Yes, essentially he "finds" it, rather than preconcieves it. Fine when you are breaking new territory. Not so good when you are trying to recreate an existing flavor.
So stop trying to copy and just choose something that sounds good to you.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
If you can't define it in objective terms, you really don't know what you have. If you can at least narrow it down to a repeatable recipe, well then at least you can repeat your discovery.

Geez, isn't all scored music one big formula sheet?
Absolutely not. Scored music is not a "formula". Scored music is the best way we have of visually representing a musical piece. But as soon as that scored music is actually played, the human element is much more important to the sound than what is on the paper. And you can't REASONABLY assign a formula to it. Perhaps in a few centuries, or even decades we'll be able to formulize "human action and decision making" but I hope to be long gone before then.

Your semantic argument that "everything has a formula" may be technically true, but what in the blue heavens is the point of that discussion TODAY? Because TODAY we simply can't develop a formula for everything. Sorry.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
But, since it seems many tools in use sound live, nothing like thier ultimate ends on studio recordings, I still have to come back to, "The processing is where the difference lies". Simple subtraction, I'd think.
Yes. If you're trying to recreat a specific thing. You can use the same gear, and the same settings on that gear to ensure that the sound processed by the gear will be processed the same way. And if you play the piece of music the same way as the original it should sound the same. So if you have a specific sound that you want to recreate. I'm sure that you could post an example...and then someone could tell you what parts and pieces are required to recreate that sound. And someone else could probably hand you the score for it.

But that's not what Yep was trying to do in this thread. Which is why you are ONCE AGAIN drastically OFF TOPIC. Go make a thread...post an example of a sound you want...and then ask people to tell you how to do it.

Once you start talking about CREATING...all of the above goes out the window.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
But ultimately I'd think the two should converge, no matter which direction the artist chooses. Strikes me as a matter of intergrity to the audience, unless one comes out like the Stones often do and say, "Well folks recording is just a different thing." Now clearly it is, but I think it's somewhat ingenuous if an artist puts up a studio album as a true representation, knowing it's not.
Integrity to the audience?!? Really?? Do you really get the impression that the folks at a Stones concert are listening and saying "man I feel as though Mick Jaggar has really lost integrity becaue this performance does not sound exactly the same as it does on the CD I have at home". Wow...

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
To illustrate... many commercial mixes have a clear frequency graph that runs from -3db to -6db slope to the right. Approximately pink noise curve. So's knowing that... I can aim for it with whatever tools I have at hand.
And what if your music doesn't sound good when you do that? Because aiming for a frequency response graph on a "commercial" recording of a man and one guitar, that is the same as a frequency response on a "commercial" recording of a 6 piece metal band backed by an 80 person orchestra, is a recipe for musical disaster.

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
A specific example. Frequency analysis of "Eruption" shows a fairly flat frequency graph of to 5.2Khz.... then fairly sharp shoulder. Something I can aim at.
What if you're recording Fur Elise on a pipe organ?

Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason
Graph of DLR singing "Runnin' with the Devil" Looks low shelved in a way wherein the second harmonic is stronger than the tonic. Again, finding *that* out helped my vocal tweaking for dense mixes.
But it won't work on a vocal mix of an opera singer recorded in a concert hall that needs to cut through the sound of the house orchestra, which was recorded on a lavalier mic. I promise.
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Old 09-21-2011, 11:27 AM   #2046
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So for those in the thread that are trying to pull a lesson out of all of this...here's my conclusion:

Clearly the devil is in the details. But if the details become your primary reason for never accomplishing anything...the details are the devil.

Yep discussed this already as well. Not progressing because you are continually hung up on your gear is a self-imposed limitation. Literally your own head getting in your way. A point made more painful when you start to blame other people for not telling you how to progress.

There is another thread currently ongoing in the lounge that discusses "the art of good enough". Clearly some never reach "good enough", and likely never will. The reason for that is because they choose not to focus on the reason why we make music, but instead to focus most of the effort on the reasons why a specific thing sounds the way it does. If you make gear, thi sis probably a good thing...If you're an artist of any kind (to include mixing/mastering engineers/producers etc...) and you forget the first, and become obsessed with the second, you will likely become stuck with neverending GAS.

(Hehe...neverending gas...it seems I have that affliction sometimes!)
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Old 09-21-2011, 11:29 AM   #2047
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Originally Posted by gtrdrt View Post
I absolutely despise every single hurtful personal attack I've ever read on this forum. Every attempt to humiliate disgusts me. No exceptions.
Even when your own comments are attempts at humiliation ^...for the record.

Welcome to an internet forum. People get passionate. Where was that video Strunkdts posted about people being offended...

EDIT:

Ahh there it is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cycXuYzmzNg

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Old 09-21-2011, 01:35 PM   #2048
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Even when your own comments are attempts at humiliation ^...for the record.
If you don't mind taking it to another thread, I'll respond.
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Old 09-21-2011, 01:59 PM   #2049
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For the love of all that is good and holy.... Talk about an epic trainwreck of a thread
Please, moderators, lock this now! Yep is off the discussion and probably bitterly disappointed at this awful mess. The last pages are painful to read (very funny too but that's just my warped sense of humor)
It brings me sour memories about the Line6 forums years ago and the never ending feuds with Hadley Hockensmith and his "de-fizzing" gizmo and also the never ending ramblings of one FLMason about the same stuff we have been reading here

This is, or was, one of the most useful forum threads I have ever read, let it die with digni..

...just let it die. Now. Please
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:10 PM   #2050
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Depends on your standard.

Objectively I hear great technique with crap tone.

Whether you want to call the *whole thing* crap is a judgement call.

If your standard is liberal and you appreciate his skill: No

If you standard is, "Does this prove equipment doesn't matter" then it fails and you have to say, yes end result is crap. Because the tone is pretty poor. Even Joe makes a comment on the difficulty of playing that guitar at the very end.

For me it's not "No" or "Yes". It's great playing with the end result negatively impacted by the tools.
Is it Crap or not?

The audience will have no trouble to choose. If commercial is what you want, you have to make the call.
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:14 PM   #2051
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For the love of all that is good and holy.... Talk about an epic trainwreck of a thread
Please, moderators, lock this now! Yep is off the discussion and probably bitterly disappointed at this awful mess. The last pages are painful to read (very funny too but that's just my warped sense of humor)
It brings me sour memories about the Line6 forums years ago and the never ending feuds with Hadley Hockensmith and his "de-fizzing" gizmo and also the never ending ramblings of one FLMason about the same stuff we have been reading here

This is, or was, one of the most useful forum threads I have ever read, let it die with digni..

...just let it die. Now. Please
No one, I repeat no one is making you read it. Don't like what I have to say, fine, block my ID, LOL!

As for Hadley, no idea if his device works. But he was nice enough to offer to give me his home number and discuss LA with me when I moved to the area.

As for Fizz discussions on Line 6 BBS's there were "gazillions" of participants. The problem exists. It's real, folks would like solutions. The amount of talk about it over there just reinforces it as a valid issue in guitar based rock.

How much more proof do you need?
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:15 PM   #2052
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Is it Crap or not?

The audience will have no trouble to choose. If commercial is what you want, you have to make the call.
It's crap tonality with great playing. Up to your standard whether the whole thing is crap.

Applying a standard of, "Is it commercial enough for airplay?" Have to fail it.
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:18 PM   #2053
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flmason was the first person I ever put on an ignore list, and looking back thru the last 10 pages I can see why....

Really, I can FULLY understand where you are coming from, but like TEiN said, and I think he is right, you are not even listening OR trying idea, you are just typing to "hear" yourself type, looking for other to go round & round about....nothing..

Post a track that you HAVE NOT LABORED OVER and let the pros on here help ya out, really....these guys are good....
Sure Smurf, tell ya what. Pick a backing track. Define the riff, if it's in my ability, I'll come back with same riff on same backing track.

No promises. I really am going down the tubes and don't know when I'll have to pack and leave for work elsewhere.

Keep in mind I'm no GIT or Berkelee grad or even a Junior College grad in music. Just self taught. So go with something any 10 year old could play.

But I don't know what to say. If it's still bad after laboring over it, what good is a less labored over track, that's even worse?

Anyway, I see you came back for more, as apparently I'm not on your block list anymore, LOL!
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:19 PM   #2054
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It brings me sour memories about the Line6 forums years ago and the never ending feuds with Hadley Hockensmith and his "de-fizzing" gizmo and also the never ending ramblings of one FLMason about the same stuff we have been reading here
Enlightening, so helping him is utterly useless. Thanks for the heads up, I'm done.
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Old 09-21-2011, 02:21 PM   #2055
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Well then it just wasn't meant to be was it...
Yes, perhaps. LOL!

But "meant to be" is a whole other discussion. Way off topic, but we could say a murder was meant to be, simply because it happened. But that would offend our sensibilities (I hope anyway).

If one quits under said premise then everyone would say, "quiter". So it's a bit of a catch, no?
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Old 09-21-2011, 03:05 PM   #2056
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Originally Posted by DerMetzgermeister View Post
For the love of all that is good and holy.... Talk about an epic trainwreck of a thread
Please, moderators, lock this now! Yep is off the discussion and probably bitterly disappointed at this awful mess. The last pages are painful to read (very funny too but that's just my warped sense of humor)
It brings me sour memories about the Line6 forums years ago and the never ending feuds with Hadley Hockensmith and his "de-fizzing" gizmo and also the never ending ramblings of one FLMason about the same stuff we have been reading here

This is, or was, one of the most useful forum threads I have ever read, let it die with digni..

...just let it die. Now. Please
Just unsticky it.

For the record I appreciate flmason's posts and love to discuss gear (though I don't think this is really about gear, it's more about the philosophy of why and how to make recordings). I do feel he's hijacked someone else's thread a forum faux pas in my book. But really I don't hold any animosity towards HIM. I just disagree with some of his conclusions about what does and does not qualify as technique.

And you truly don't have to read any of it if you don't want to. However, I agree that forcing it to remain at the top of the thread list is probably not the best at this point. I could recommend unstickying it...and replacing it with a single locked post (because clearly we are incapable of muddying up this topic) that contains a link to Smurf's PDF files.
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Old 09-21-2011, 03:30 PM   #2057
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Wrong.
Umm... I thought you were saying there is no right or wrong in all this?

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Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Playing gestures are audible in every song ever made. Playing "gestures" as you obtusely choose to refer to them as, include everything from how you physically make the sound, to the choices you make during your performance (regardless of where that performance is). In the case of the guitar, every gesture made is unique, a song is truly never played the same way twice. Knowing this...I would never spend as much time and effort recreating as you have. I would simply work on. This has been your musical and apparently financial undoing.
My financial undoing isn't related to all this, LOL! It's the impact of the recession vrs. my skillset.

I bring it up because cut and run time is getting very near. No idea when I'll be bugging out, and thus whether or not I'll get around to Smurf's requests. This may be last hurrah for me.

I know what a playing gesture is. But ultimately I'm really talking about *timbre* in and of it self. Think a capo holding the string down if you have to. A single note, simply played, mechanically if neccesary, to get the idea across.

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Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
There are near infinite ways to use compressors. To say that you use compressors to "remove dynamics" is technically correct, but completely ignores the human element. You need to go back and re-read Yep's discussion on compression and approach it, not from the standpoint of a man in a lab coat, but from the standpoint of an artist, trying to achieve a sound. Understanding that ONCE AGAIN, there is literally no CORRECT way to do this.
Yes, I understand the difference between "technical compression" and "coloring compression". Point is, most commercial releases are highly compressed vis-a-vis "Put a mic in the room and go" recordings.

Sure, idealogically there's perhaps no "correct" way to do it. But there are long standing conventions, starting with say A440 and just tempermant.

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Your assumption that commercial sound is a limited category of "acceptable production" is such a blatantly narrow view of music I can't even begin to address it. Clearly your goal is to figure out how to make a label recognize you, by limiting yourself to a set standard of constraints that you think will be accepted as "commercial enough". This is such a ridiculous way to pursue the musical art form I don't even know what to say. But that is also MY opinion, and you are clearly free to wallow in the depths of your search for an effective way to copy other people's tone.
No interest in labels whatsoever. It's just for my own passion. At this point a long running research project. I'll never have the time and $$$ to be a commercially viable performer at the local pub let alone have label interest.

Pretty much same as someone who paints for themself and perhaps some friends. I lived in OC for 4-5 years. Never once bothered to go over to LA and get involved in any of it. Even with friends I worked with who did rub elbows with "big name" artists. I'm not in the echelon, never will be.

This thing about "my unique tone" you have going on. Always believed in it to a point. However it's as much the playing response that's at issue as well. Anyway, I think Kiss immortalized the search for "the sound" in the song "Beth", LOL! It's part of the culture of Rock, at least.

"Beth, I hear you callin'
But I can't come home right now
Me and the boys are playin'
And we just can't find the sound

Just a few more hours
And I'll be right home to you
I think I hear them callin'
Oh, Beth what can I do
Beth what can I do"

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Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Clearly I can hear that the recording is limited. But given the constraints, I understand why. Your problem is that you want to have the same constraints, but don't want the limitations. And this is somehow logical to you...fascinating.
No, don't *want* to have the same constraints. Just have them as a matter of circumstance. But I keep getting told it doesn't matter, so I keep trying, but... keep ending up with similar results data, LOL!

It's not just limited, that we can blow off on the mic. The specific timbres, various noises etc. aren't right. The guitar seems to be cheaply made at the very least.


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Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Then clearly your conclusion is that amp sims don't work the way you want them to. Use a real amp, put it in your closet, and cover it with 4 or 5 thick blankets so you don't bother your neighbors.
Would love to. Have a 30 watt Marshall boxed up right here. Would have the police here in 3 minutes.

Here's the thing though. Mic'ed up 2203's, Fenders and Ampegs back in the 4 track to cassette days... same fizz as Pods. So the hope is, same "magic" studio techniques can fix either.

Hypothetically the sims and impulses are supposed to cover the room and micing details.

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Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
There are so many factors that go into why you hear something in a live performance that you don't hear in a studio that to attempt to go into details on every single case you bring up, would be fruitless. Better to unerstand the basics of recording technique, to include the theory behind why certain tools are used, and apply that theory. If music were a simple "copy this formula and you'll sound professional" then everyone would do it. But clearly it is more difficult than that, and requires near master's level understanding to effectively apply techniques that are based on a clear understanding of the theory of recording, and a clear understanding of the design elements of your gear.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, except when it's some old Delta Blues recording or a punk or alternative recording, or something. All groups of performers that typically are not very musically educated, let alone masters of theory.

I do wonder if Sam Phillips, over at Sun was an electronic engineer?

Geez, one of the biggest mythos in the biz is, "A bunch of guys holed up in a warehouse looking for the sound."


[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]
YES...gear is important. However...more important is the artistic vision it is being used to portray.
[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]

Absolutely, no argument there. Gotta know what you are trying to achieve at some point. But seriously, had distortion not been tripped over, would rock have happened? Hmmm...

And how much do people pay for 450 year old Stradavarius?

Think of it this way...

If I want to paint a car BLUE. But only have an airbrush an RED paint. No brushwork is going to give me a BLUE car. Further, I might even be willing to take a "crappy BLUE" paint job, just at long as it's BLUE.

I.e. timing difference (streaks?), wrong notes (fisheyes?), etc. may not matter to me, since if I had BLUE paint, I might be able to sand and paint over and over, until my painting technique was good.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
If I tell you to paint the best looking apple you can and hand you a finite set of tools to do it with. What do you do? Bitch that the tools don't mathematically meet the needs of the request and spend 10 years talking about why they don't? Sounds like a waste of time. Even if I handed you blue paint and a piece of sidewalk to paint it on and a piece of a tree branch to use for your brush. You can still do the BEST YOU CAN to paint the apple...within the constraints you're given.
Wow, I wrote the above before I red this, LOL!

Sure you can paint it, but as above, if the requirement is for a color you don't have, you're kinda screwed vis-a-vis the desired color.

You're analogy is off though. Supposedly I'm using tools marketed to do the job "correctly" as it were.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
A true artist would consider his tools, and take a unique approach to painting the apple. BThose constraints obviously automatically limit your capabilities to "copy an apple". You want constraints, but you want to "copy the apple". Analogies suck in most cases...but you're quite good at dodging the point when we talk music by hiding behind comments like "math explains all things, so you should be able to explain to me how to do something musical with math". Asinine.
Not assinine at all. It's flat out emotional garbage to suggest that math is not applicable. I mean tell that to Bach, who came up with even tempermant or Pythagoras who came up with just tempermant.

Sheet music is a recipe.

Your statement above sounds more like an artistic rant, "What I do cannot be quantified, I'm special, mystical, blah blah."

Sure... tell that to the Reaper Developers or the Developers of Blender. No math, no algorithms, right. I think even Rupert Neve would cringe.

Chuck Berry himself said his *math* teacher was one of the biggest influences on his playing, LOL!

It's assinine to deny that mathematics describes the underpinning of well, just about everything...

Ever heard of Fletcher-Munson?

You've never counted out a measure?

{Continued...]
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Old 09-21-2011, 03:31 PM   #2058
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[Continuing...]


Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
So stop trying to copy and just choose something that sounds good to you.
I think everyone starts with copying, except for folks who go chop down a tree or some such and devise thier own instruments.

There's a huge catalog of existing sounds that are just fine already out there. No need to reinvent the wheel... just get one's hands on it, LOL!

I mean geez, do painters go out and reinvent "red" or just buy some carmine red?

As an aside how many grads do GIT and Berkelee turn out every term, who are technically excellent, and all sound like Muzak. They all seem to go out and get Ibanez's and the rest is history. (Not to say I haven't met some seriously good grads from both, but there is a homogenousnous to the tones they seem to create.)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Absolutely not. Scored music is not a "formula". Scored music is the best way we have of visually representing a musical piece. But as soon as that scored music is actually played, the human element is much more important to the sound than what is on the paper. And you can't REASONABLY assign a formula to it. Perhaps in a few centuries, or even decades we'll be able to formulize "human action and decision making" but I hope to be long gone before then.
I do believe, given all the italian(?) terminology in scored music, that the composers were trying to limit the performer's input. That's what the musicians were in those times. Performers, not artists.

MIDI instruments can do a fine job of capturing and documenting human elements, BTW. The lead in the track I posted above was done with MIDI. I never played it.

What's *reasonable* depends on circumstance. 40 years ago it wasn't reasonable to record music on a computer, now it is. The marketers are claiming they've nailed it... and yeah Version 4 nails it better than version 3... but oh yeah we told you Version 1 was the shiznit....

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Your semantic argument that "everything has a formula" may be technically true, but what in the blue heavens is the point of that discussion TODAY? Because TODAY we simply can't develop a formula for everything. Sorry.
The point of that discussion is to get past all this "magic artist", "Neo-60's" thinking and get down to identifying what really works, repeatably, reliably. Generally good attributes in most endeavors.

[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]
Yes. If you're trying to recreat a specific thing. You can use the same gear, and the same settings on that gear to ensure that the sound processed by the gear will be processed the same way. And if you play the piece of music the same way as the original it should sound the same. So if you have a specific sound that you want to recreate. I'm sure that you could post an example...and then someone could tell you what parts and pieces are required to recreate that sound. And someone else could probably hand you the score for it.
[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]

Bro, I'm not even really worried about recreating some cover. I just want the palette of colors. Having sat there and played a track over and over, transcribed it to tab, etc. Life's too short for that.

In fact it's another failing of the Pop industry, least last I looked. Accurate transcriptions are ( used to be ) hard to find.

The classical guys have that covered much better. Heck the Tin Pan Alley guys I think probabaly had it covered better.

Probably the result of more and more "non-masters" getting into the art, especially in the 60's. The singer songwriter thing and all. Think I saw an interview with Brian May were he said he basically, rarely "works out" a part. He just "goes with it".

Anyway a side goal is to not have to have "specific gear". Digital was "supposed" to be the great leveler.

One of my subtexts is that the music industry and equipment industry peddles a *lot* of BS.

I've even heard no less than Robert Plant say, "This is the most contrived business on the planet."

I for one would like to see the BS cut down. But can't do that until you have a clear fix on reality.

[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]
But that's not what Yep was trying to do in this thread. Which is why you are ONCE AGAIN drastically OFF TOPIC. Go make a thread...post an example of a sound you want...and then ask people to tell you how to do it.

Once you start talking about CREATING...all of the above goes out the window.
[QUOTE=Gizzmo0815;816944]

Geezus. I'm talking about re-CREATING commonly accepted palettes of tones. Each genre has some of those. Country pops to mind as one of the most stereotyped. Hair Metal is another, and so on.

One reason folks recordings sound like "ass" (Geez I hate the title of this thread) is that they've missed the iconic tones of the genres they are aiming at.

Very few folks are out there actively trying to create new genres these days. Most everyone got into this stuff because of someone else's work they heard.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
Integrity to the audience?!? Really?? Do you really get the impression that the folks at a Stones concert are listening and saying "man I feel as though Mick Jaggar has really lost integrity becaue this performance does not sound exactly the same as it does on the CD I have at home". Wow...
Nope probably not. That's yet another form of integrity breach. Except that the Stones generally don't claim thier recordings are representative of thier performances.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
And what if your music doesn't sound good when you do that? Because aiming for a frequency response graph on a "commercial" recording of a man and one guitar, that is the same as a frequency response on a "commercial" recording of a 6 piece metal band backed by an 80 person orchestra, is a recipe for musical disaster.
I think your stretching to make a point here.

Most *dense commercial releases* do have very similar over all curves. Sure, once you start getting more sparse, the curve becomes moreso peaks and valleys.

If I recall correctly at one time there was an RIAA standard that perscribed a rolloff on the left at 58 hz and the right at 14khz for vinyl, no less.

Look here's a good analysis of a famous player's tones:

http://www.amnesta.net/edge_delay/

Granted it's not the whole band, but this is what a good analysis tends toward.

I'd even be willing to bet Edge himself would approve, as U2 has one of the most consistent live shows I've ever seen, and they put a lot of effort and offstage personnel into making it happen.

http://www.amnesta.net/edge_delay/


Quote:
Originally Posted by Gizzmo0815 View Post
What if you're recording Fur Elise on a pipe organ?

But it won't work on a vocal mix of an opera singer recorded in a concert hall that needs to cut through the sound of the house orchestra, which was recorded on a lavalier mic. I promise.
As above, of course we know it won't. Not the same thing as a dense commercial pop mix.

I believe that -3db per octave rolloff is so common the folks over at Izotope put that line right on the graphs in Ozone.

At the very least there's several different rolloffs selectable in Voxengo SPAN.

I was listening to the radio today. Metallica's "Sad But True", Beatles "Hey Jude" and Stained, "In Your Eyes" played back to back to back. They sounded like they all had similar commercial coating to them.

Granted that might have as much to do with the station as the original recordings. Maybe mastering process. But those three recordings are decades apart, and sat right next to each other fine.

There is a similarity in this stuff. The heydey of experimentation *seems* to be long over.
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Old 09-21-2011, 03:50 PM   #2059
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Awesome. I understand what you're saying. I disagree with your philosophy...all of my supporting arguments are above ^.

Cheers!
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Old 09-21-2011, 04:17 PM   #2060
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Enlightening, so helping him is utterly useless. Thanks for the heads up, I'm done.
Whatever, LOL!

Same platitudes here as there. Nothing's changed.

The hope was that folks targeted at "recording" rather than PODs would've defizzed 1000's of tracks by now. Guess I was being too much of an optimist.
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Old 09-21-2011, 04:24 PM   #2061
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Originally Posted by flmason View Post
It's crap tonality with great playing. Up to your standard whether the whole thing is crap.

Applying a standard of, "Is it commercial enough for airplay?" Have to fail it.
Still its on "air" on youtube, has a good ammount of views and people click on "I like it".

So why did you fail it and why does the audience disagree?
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Old 09-21-2011, 04:40 PM   #2062
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Ever heard of Fletcher-Munson?
Their last album sucked.
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Old 09-21-2011, 04:51 PM   #2063
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Still its on "air" on youtube, has a good ammount of views and people click on "I like it".

So why did you fail it and why does the audience disagree?
I'd fail it against a standard of "commercial airplay" quality, as noted above.

Why?

Well, let me pull it up.

1) Of course we both know the micing is bad for this purpose.
2) So through that prism it's hard to know why it sound "tin-y", etc.
3) There's some sort of really high frequency squeel in the entire track
4) The notes on unwound strings sound "plinky"
5) Sounds like it HPF'ed way to far up.
6) The wound strings sound blanketed.
7) The distortion character is a lot like the Line 6 "Insane" model, too many bad upper harmonics.
8) It's not technical term, but it just sounds "cheap". (The tone.) It lackes the "richness" of the release.
9) The sound coming out of some of the downward long slides is well, not musical. More like a high frequency noise in a bad way. Sort of like strings that are one guage too light, though underwound single coil pickups. Perhaps even fatigued or overly tight. Or like the bridge is made of some alloy that is "ringy".
10) The chord at the end lacked mids.

Surprisingly I didn't notice any really bad room nodes.

Note, there's no way I could do what he just did ever, LOL!

Like I was saying, it's great playing, but the sound that's being played or recorded just falls short of typical industry airplay tracks.

In the end, this is one of his trademark tracks, so he's played it a million times. He's going to be able to pull it off on any reasonably set up electric guitar. But I truly doubt he'd have written it with said rig.

BTW, I don't dislike it. I think it's rather educational. Since there's little production "trickery" it's well, lit, etc. it's a great reference vid.

For example, nothings been done to make it look like, "geez his fingers are really moving fast". So it's an honest representation of what it takes to do this track and style.

I'm thinking the places you'd spend the most time are getting it memorized in the first place, since it's *his* composition, secondly the bends, and lastly the wah inflections.
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Old 09-21-2011, 04:51 PM   #2064
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Their last album sucked.
I guess, but I'd think every engineer on the planet makes use of it.
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Old 09-21-2011, 05:07 PM   #2065
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[QUOTE=flmason;817168]QUOTE]
And now for what we CAN do:

On your Fly By Night recording.

The tonal quality sounds pretty decent to me, would never complain about it if someone used it.

Still, it lacks presence, I would tamper with an eq on mids, maybe boosting presence range only on the introduction. And the reverb is too long, sending it further back into the mix. You could consider using almost no reverb on the first riff to bring it right on the face and then add just enough reverb to put it back in its place when the melody begin.

There is a difference on how you do the second chord on the main riff from the first time (at 00:02) and the second time (at 00:09), the first has more power on the lower notes of the chord, the second has more power on the higher notes. The difference is not welcome since the second one has other instruments comming into the scene and it distracts the listenner to have another detail to pay attention.

I didnt pay attention to it through the whole track, but any other UNPLANNED inconsistences on the rythm part will disturb the listenner in a bad way. Rythm guitar main purpose is to create a pattern that the audience can follow and predict. A planned and well executed change in some spots on the song will sound amazing. Random changes will break the rythm and sound like mistakes (and they ARE).

This includes all arpeggios.

When the vocal melody begin, the guitar riff goes of tempo, you changed chords faster than you should (at 00:22). This is a great mood breaker. The mistake isnt that great, is just a little bit too fast, it will not sound plain wrong, without a close listenning, no one will notice, but it will leave the feeling that there is "something missing", as you often state.

When the other instruments come into play on the original, the guitar track levels are lowered a little bit to make room for the drums fill in. I didnt notice this happening on your track (maybe because of the drums quality?).

Now for the MOST important and urgent problems on the track:

The drums are plain horrible. When they begin, they set the whole recording as amateur and "ass" sounding. Nothing you can do with the guitar will save the track with that cymbal going on.

The vocal melody itself is dull, lacks expression, and also would render the whole attempt useless. No one will listen to the whole thing with this annoying synth going on. The track would be better without it, this way someone could sing over it.

This is what I can figure with the poor speakers Im on right now. Hope it helps.
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Old 09-21-2011, 06:42 PM   #2066
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[QUOTE=shoyoninja;817190]
Quote:
Originally Posted by flmason View Post
QUOTE]
And now for what we CAN do:

On your Fly By Night recording.

The tonal quality sounds pretty decent to me, would never complain about it if someone used it.
I guess. Sounds "sterile", "thin" to me, rhythm guitar that is. The other instruments were largely well done soundfonts so I was relieved of the job of making them good tones, for the most part. The Merlin Vienna Soundfont is a pretty good one IMHO. Perhaps backing off the amp gain would help?

The sound following the palm mutes is too "splatty". This is an area that real Fender amps with 'verb I've used seem to do much better than sims.

The other problem I was feeling was that the hand played tracks don't have the same sonic polish as the soundfonts.

Quote:
Originally Posted by shoyoninja View Post
Still, it lacks presence, I would tamper with an eq on mids, maybe boosting presence range only on the introduction. And the reverb is too long, sending it further back into the mix. You could consider using almost no reverb on the first riff to bring it right on the face and then add just enough reverb to put it back in its place when the melody begin.
Interesting idea. At that time automation was something I hadn't figured out yet.

Quote:
Originally Posted by shoyoninja View Post
There is a difference on how you do the second chord on the main riff from the first time (at 00:02) and the second time (at 00:09), the first has more power on the lower notes of the chord, the second has more power on the higher notes. The difference is not welcome since the second one has other instruments comming into the scene and it distracts the listenner to have another detail to pay attention.
OK, assness playing, noted. Was pretty much aware of the timing errors.

[QUOTE=shoyoninja;817190]
I didnt pay attention to it through the whole track, but any other UNPLANNED inconsistences on the rythm part will disturb the listenner in a bad way. Rythm guitar main purpose is to create a pattern that the audience can follow and predict. A planned and well executed change in some spots on the song will sound amazing. Random changes will break the rythm and sound like mistakes (and they ARE).

This includes all arpeggios.
[/QUOTE=shoyoninja;817190]

OK. Concepts noted. Aim for more consistency in the chording.

Quote:
Originally Posted by shoyoninja View Post

When the vocal melody begin, the guitar riff goes of tempo, you changed chords faster than you should (at 00:22). This is a great mood breaker. The mistake isnt that great, is just a little bit too fast, it will not sound plain wrong, without a close listenning, no one will notice, but it will leave the feeling that there is "something missing", as you often state.

When the other instruments come into play on the original, the guitar track levels are lowered a little bit to make room for the drums fill in. I didnt notice this happening on your track (maybe because of the drums quality?).
True, I went with "set it and forget it levels". Didn't know how to do automation at that time.


Quote:
Originally Posted by shoyoninja View Post
Now for the MOST important and urgent problems on the track:

The drums are plain horrible. When they begin, they set the whole recording as amateur and "ass" sounding. Nothing you can do with the guitar will save the track with that cymbal going on.
Agreed. Given my purpose I didn't care then. Was happy to get anything actually done. At this point, yeah, it sux.

What I hadn't learned yet was that different drums/cymbals suffer the amount of reverb differently. Ran all of channel 10 through the same verb. Too much of it.


Quote:
Originally Posted by shoyoninja View Post
The vocal melody itself is dull, lacks expression, and also would render the whole attempt useless. No one will listen to the whole thing with this annoying synth going on. The track would be better without it, this way someone could sing over it.

This is what I can figure with the poor speakers Im on right now. Hope it helps.
Yeah, was flipping through sounds for the melody. At the time seemed OK. Didn't want to leave the melody out. Only had a two conductor mic at that time, and can't sing anyway, LOL! Been trying in recent times, but it's an uphill fight.

Was pretty much aware of the major failings and let them go at the time. Was about tone hunting.

Thanks for taking the time. Nice analysis. Good points.

Definitely will keep the points on timing and rhythm guitar in mind. Tend to agree that rhythm tracks can make or break a tune. I'd say second only to vocals being poor.
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Old 09-21-2011, 07:47 PM   #2067
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I've come back to this thread every day like a junkie!
Yep has done something outstanding here. It is a real shame that you don't have the decency to start your own thread despite advice, invitations or pleading with you.

For all you have postulated and argued, the inevitable solution is to use your ears.
Music is a hearing art, and any formula developed must pass though the crucible of does this sound good to me. Is this worth keeping? How can i change this for the better.

Tools to affect the sound, to define, preserve,transform the sound are critical: the most important tool are your ears. Whether its a guitar of choice through amps and mics of choice to a board or DAW of choice, the necessary final authority is a pair of EDUCATED ears. If there are recording studio tricks that define a commercial sound, its fair to say that the formula to preserve the sound came after pairs of ears found value in the sound and found a way to make it repeatable.

Given that there are thousands of instruments in hundreds of genres and sub-genres of commercial music being delivered by a plethora of platforms with their own limitations, any talk about definitive commercial sound is not set in concrete. It cant be!

One must point out too, that at point of delivery, your 'commercial sound' is subject to the quality of the amp, speaker and idiosyncrasies of the listener. it comes back to a pair of ears.
not being an American or first world citizen, I have a different view of whats commercial. here in Jamaica, when the studios started recording and developing reggae, the bass guitar was considered too loud for first world ears and impossible to record, but we did it because it SOUNDED GOOD to us.

Jamaica redefined the bottom end of recorded music for the world. Jamaica redefined what was commercially viable for the b side when we started out with instrumental cuts featuring the artistry of the engineer. King Tubby's and Coxone could use the same tracks on the same board and sound completely different, down to the spectographic analysis.

There was a time in early disco - dance music when commercial difference in sound were defined by whether the percussion had wood blocks or agogos.
The point is pairs of ears made the decision and other pairs of ears[consumers] agreed. You have to use your ears!

Have you ever listened to Augustus Pablo on melodica? No matter what the engineer does it still sounds like a $20 keyboard instrument on his records. Despite this he has left a mark and a string of hits becqause he heard a commercial potential in the instrument that others did not. Yamaha was grateful,believe it.

In the end, FL, Your ears are the most valuable tool and certainly the final arbiter of your 'sound'.
No matter what we think, or how much we like what we hear,if you are not satisfied. you will not be happy or fulfilled. You are likely to continue searching for the elusive 'tone' in your mind. Tone is your obsession not music:your quest is tangential not central to this discussion. Please take it elsewhere.
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Old 09-21-2011, 07:56 PM   #2068
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It brings me sour memories about the Line6 forums years ago and the never ending feuds with Hadley Hockensmith and his "de-fizzing" gizmo and also the never ending ramblings of one FLMason about the same stuff we have been reading here
Ok, since you brought this up. Let's dig into it. Gotta defend myself here.

On Hadley and his device:

1) Hadley is Neil Diamond's guitar player. He created some analog device some would say is a 2nd order filter. The guys over at Fractal Audio/AxeFX did an analysis on it.

2) Hadley's claim was that Line 6 equipment created what he called "Orphaned Highs" on high gain patches.

3) Turns out he was correct in my experience, though I never got to tell him that. No idea if his device fixes it. But an equalizer set to similar response as the AxeFX people cited did help quite a bit.

4) My beef with Hadley was his bogus "cosmic" advertizing. "Orphananed Highs" and the "Harmonic Converger" terminology... when it was... a 2nd order filter.

5) However, I intimated to Hadley he should market the thing if it worked and he believed in it, "screw what the forum says" I think is what I wrote exactly.

On "Fizz" as it got dubbed over there.

1) Still using the same software, still having the same issues with fizz, which I don't think are ammenable to playing gesture cures. By god, if they are please show me that! LOL!

2) The hope was some true producers would turn up herein that had dealt with this issue, whether in digital or analog domain... and had a cure that allowed you to keep what one aims for when cranking the gain anyway... sustain, usually.

3) Folks speak of notching, masking etc. Have tried those and others. Unsuccessfully for the most part. That is if the standard is that the sustain stays, the tone stays, the fizz goes. Commercial recordings, heck Youtubes of Andy Timmons seem to say it can be done. No one seems to know how though.

So's to all you engineering types out there that expect to produce "heavy guitar" that doesn't use the fizz as does some newer metal, would seem you want to know how to deal with it.

In fact, I'd tend to think guys like Sneap and Lange probably making a good living knowing how. Slipperman likes to claim maybe 25 people on the planet really know how to do heavy guitar. Can't say on that.

As to the sustain part, Ken Fisher (rip) mentioned in an interview he intentionally designed the sustain into his designs.

So hopefully that covers the issues.

To sit here and give me flack because I've tried to research the same problem in two places is lame. It's pretty much something the 'net enables folks.
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Old 09-22-2011, 05:23 AM   #2069
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Come hither gentle Mason
We can steer this yacht together
O'er seas of tone and splendour
6 lines trailing for our dinner

But our hooks they go unfurnished
With any good commercial sonics
So our bellies go unnourished
Curse the tackle vendors promise!

But hark!, no sooner spoken
Doors of heaven are flung open!
Raining secrets most forbidden
Sacred wisdom, gold and dripping

Yep and friends beam down upon us
Crafting tones so pro and valid
That the tears they flow unbidden
And the choir of angels singing
Are auto-tuned with such precision
That our memories are forgotten
And we drift in bliss forever...
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Old 09-22-2011, 11:14 AM   #2070
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I absolutely despise every single hurtful personal attack I've ever read on this forum. Every attempt to humiliate disgusts me. No exceptions.
I don't get it...did someone respond to you badly?
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Old 09-22-2011, 01:03 PM   #2071
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Originally Posted by foliage View Post
Come hither gentle Mason
We can steer this yacht together
O'er seas of tone and splendour
6 lines trailing for our dinner

But our hooks they go unfurnished
With any good commercial sonics
So our bellies go unnourished
Curse the tackle vendors promise!

But hark!, no sooner spoken
Doors of heaven are flung open!
Raining secrets most forbidden
Sacred wisdom, gold and dripping

Yep and friends beam down upon us
Crafting tones so pro and valid
That the tears they flow unbidden
And the choir of angels singing
Are auto-tuned with such precision
That our memories are forgotten
And we drift in bliss forever...
LOL!

Bravo.

[Applause]

Now if someone could do it in that cartoon character Stewey's voice.

Heck of a first post.

Wish I had the voice over skills to do it justice.
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Old 09-22-2011, 02:59 PM   #2072
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I don't get it...did someone respond to you badly?
No, no one has responded badly to me that I can recall. To others, though, I think some respond with useless personal attacks instead of sticking to issues. I don't like the hurtfulness of such attacks, and I don't like the uselessness of them. They just clutter things up. They put people on the defensive and as a result can prolong things that might be better off not being prolonged.
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Old 09-22-2011, 03:41 PM   #2073
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For all you have postulated and argued, the inevitable solution is to use your ears.
Music is a hearing art, and any formula developed must pass though the crucible of does this sound good to me. Is this worth keeping? How can i change this for the better.

Tools to affect the sound, to define, preserve,transform the sound are critical: the most important tool are your ears. Whether its a guitar of choice through amps and mics of choice to a board or DAW of choice, the necessary final authority is a pair of EDUCATED ears. If there are recording studio tricks that define a commercial sound, its fair to say that the formula to preserve the sound came after pairs of ears found value in the sound and found a way to make it repeatable.

Given that there are thousands of instruments in hundreds of genres and sub-genres of commercial music being delivered by a plethora of platforms with their own limitations, any talk about definitive commercial sound is not set in concrete. It cant be!

One must point out too, that at point of delivery, your 'commercial sound' is subject to the quality of the amp, speaker and idiosyncrasies of the listener. it comes back to a pair of ears.
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Old 09-22-2011, 04:02 PM   #2074
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Come back Shane...come back!
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Old 09-22-2011, 05:57 PM   #2075
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OK, Got Ya gtrdrt....
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Old 09-29-2011, 06:59 PM   #2076
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Wow, I had just discovered this thread about a week ago and have made it through to page 15 so far. One of the best threads I've ever read and out of curiosity I clicked on the last page and saw all this crap. Now I know that I can't look forward to the end of the book. How disappointing. Yep, if you still check in on this thread I would like to say "Thank you". I will keep reading until your posts stop.

Last edited by Rockindaddy; 09-30-2011 at 06:20 AM.
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Old 10-04-2011, 07:47 AM   #2077
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I've come back to this thread every day like a junkie!
Yep has done something outstanding here. It is a real shame that you don't have the decency to start your own thread despite advice, invitations or pleading with you.

For all you have postulated and argued, the inevitable solution is to use your ears.
Music is a hearing art, and any formula developed must pass though the crucible of does this sound good to me. Is this worth keeping? How can i change this for the better.

Tools to affect the sound, to define, preserve,transform the sound are critical: the most important tool are your ears. Whether its a guitar of choice through amps and mics of choice to a board or DAW of choice, the necessary final authority is a pair of EDUCATED ears. If there are recording studio tricks that define a commercial sound, its fair to say that the formula to preserve the sound came after pairs of ears found value in the sound and found a way to make it repeatable.

Given that there are thousands of instruments in hundreds of genres and sub-genres of commercial music being delivered by a plethora of platforms with their own limitations, any talk about definitive commercial sound is not set in concrete. It cant be!

One must point out too, that at point of delivery, your 'commercial sound' is subject to the quality of the amp, speaker and idiosyncrasies of the listener. it comes back to a pair of ears.
not being an American or first world citizen, I have a different view of whats commercial. here in Jamaica, when the studios started recording and developing reggae, the bass guitar was considered too loud for first world ears and impossible to record, but we did it because it SOUNDED GOOD to us.

Jamaica redefined the bottom end of recorded music for the world. Jamaica redefined what was commercially viable for the b side when we started out with instrumental cuts featuring the artistry of the engineer. King Tubby's and Coxone could use the same tracks on the same board and sound completely different, down to the spectographic analysis.

There was a time in early disco - dance music when commercial difference in sound were defined by whether the percussion had wood blocks or agogos.
The point is pairs of ears made the decision and other pairs of ears[consumers] agreed. You have to use your ears!

Have you ever listened to Augustus Pablo on melodica? No matter what the engineer does it still sounds like a $20 keyboard instrument on his records. Despite this he has left a mark and a string of hits becqause he heard a commercial potential in the instrument that others did not. Yamaha was grateful,believe it.

In the end, FL, Your ears are the most valuable tool and certainly the final arbiter of your 'sound'.
No matter what we think, or how much we like what we hear,if you are not satisfied. you will not be happy or fulfilled. You are likely to continue searching for the elusive 'tone' in your mind. Tone is your obsession not music:your quest is tangential not central to this discussion. Please take it elsewhere.
That's a great (and very interesting!) post.

About this thread, I think that Yep's post are a must read. Everything else is part of the discussion. But when you get Yep's message, you can go from there and WORK.

Stop typing now, everybody, and RECORD MUSIC!!
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Old 10-20-2011, 07:08 PM   #2078
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...So a side trek that I'm sure is of interest to many other hobbyists as well is... "Well, can it really all be done in the box to a commercial level of quality as the digitial tools manufacturers would suggest, or is that a just marketing BS?"...
To the degree that you are asking this question fairly, and in a true, open-ended, "can it be done?" sense, the answer is an unequivocal yes. Def Leppard's biggest records were made with a Rockman, which is about the crappiest amp-emulator money can buy by any sane measure. If you are hell-bent on proving that point of whether a cheap amp sim can produce decades worth of hit-song revenue, the answer is yes, and the coffin is nailed shut by that example alone. If a series of categorical multi-platinum classic guitar-rock albums can be made with a Rockman, then anyone with a POD has no excuses. Of course, they had Mutt Lange producing.

Nobody brags about using a POD, nobody puts that in their liner notes, but plenty of people have done it.

If you want proof-of-concept, there it is. End of story.
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Old 10-20-2011, 07:32 PM   #2079
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I hope I'm not breaking etiquette, but have a listen to something at http://soundcloud.com/danielgrin.

Listen to the guitars and drums on Good Feeling or Rumman and tell me if they were done ITB with sims or something else. This may or may not be a trick question.

If this post annoys anybody, I will remove it.
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Old 10-20-2011, 07:55 PM   #2080
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I keep checking back on this thread every few weeks or so, and keep feeling like it should be locked and un-stickied.

I don't think there has been any useful information for the past 5 pages, maybe ten, and usable content was thinning out rapidly long before that. It's become a picayune debate over the bottomless philosophy of guitar-tone. Nobody is even pretending to discuss anything like "how-to" anymore. The occasionally insightful posts are increasingly abstract things that deserve their own threads. The overwhelming majority of recent posts are a waste of time to even read through.

Nobody on the internet ever concedes a point. They either keep arguing or stop posting. I don't think anyone in the history of internet ever admitted they were wrong, they just move the goalposts or nit-pick at details or accuse each other of personal shortcomings or whatever. IRL, you have to do things, or people just stop listening to you. On the internet, you can always have the top post and get a response just by finding something wrong with the previous one.

This was a good thread for a while. People asked good questions, contributed good insights and useful info, and I am proud to have started the discussion and to have had some part in keeping it going. But the last half of it is really just an uninformative, dead-horse-beating, low-level internet-feud. It's like the same five people posting ever-more wordy and picayune re-statements of the same un-resolvable arguments. The best that can said for it is that people haven't started calling each other "ampfags" nor posting racist pictures with lolcats meme-writing.

This was never a thread about how to make a starter violin sound like a Stradivarius, nor about how to make a garage-sale piano sound like a Steinway, nor about how to make an untrained singer with a reedy voice sound like an operatic mezzo-soprano.

There are topics that have been discussed and debated for thousands of years and that will likely be debated for a thousand more. And some of them are interesting and important.

But in the meantime, somebody has to grow the cotton that makes our underpants, and somebody has to dig up the stuff that makes our computers and iphones, and somebody has to harvest and refine the rubber that makes our tires, and somebody has to record the music that people are actually making. That's what this thread was originally about, how to make better recordings.
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