Recording Guitar

[Jazzcrisis]

Originally Posted by Ironmalk

Ok so I normally use guitar amp sims fro my recordings (mainly metal). I recently started playing around with impulse responses to emulate cabs.

To get the individual guitarists sound I would need to record their rig. Due to space limitations I simply can't have guitar amps in the room. My mate for example owns a JCM 800 and has his own particular sound.

My question is:-


Would it be a viable option to DI the JCM 800 head straight into my DAW via my ISA 1 and use an impulse response that matches his cab?

thanks guys

Ironmalk

You can't run a guitar head, and especially not a tube one, without the cabinet. It has to have a load on it or you'll blow it up.

[Ironmalk]

thanks for that mate - glad I found that one out

[kludge]

It's not necessarily a Bad Thing to get a guitarist to play with new sounds in the studio. What sounds great live doesn't always translate in recordings. Or as I sometimes say, you can't stuff a Marshall stack inside a pair of iPod earbuds.

If you're using amp sims, I've found you can make them sound MUCH better by running through a lowish-gain drive pedal first to get some initial dirt and smooth out the tone. A touch of analog really helps.

[tINY]

Impulse response techniques don't work for non-linear systems. So, eliminating the cab, you loose the non-linearities of the speaker system (and these are not insignificant for most guitar rigs...).

If you want to use the DI to get something close, you need to load the amp with a cabinet. If you have 2 or 4 speakers, wiring half of them out of phase will decrease the sound significantly.

Alternately, you could simulate a speaker load like this: dummyload


-tINY

[kludge]

Originally Posted by tINY

If you have 2 or 4 speakers, wiring half of them out of phase will decrease the sound significantly.

That's a GREAT idea!

[mattjew24]

With my 6505 combo I use the direct out into my interface and then put KEVLR impulse loader with Andy Sneap Edge impulse... It's as F******* metal as you can get without micing a cab.

[Ironmalk]

thanks for all your advice guys, really appreciated

[Nizzyo]

Why don't you get a small tube amp and an sm57? You'll get a better, more natural sound!

[Ironmalk]

thanks Niz, will look into that.

[fastlanestoner]

I don't think the DI on most amps sounds that great but its worth a try. Either way I would go with real mics or stay all digital

[NoPro]

Originally Posted by Nizzyo

Why don't you get a small tube amp and an sm57? You'll get a better, more natural sound!

Yes!

[zzzxtreme]

I did a live recording for a band few months ago, all direct to the sound card high-Z input

then they use amplitube and izotope to process the di tracks, I thought it sounded great

(forward to 0:30)
Nightcrawler: Demo Teaser - YouTube

[RCM - Ronan]

The Palmer speaker simulator is not as good as a cab but its pretty darn usable in a pinch.

Palmer Speaker Simulator