bright heavy guitars "out of the boxes" trick

[pete]

how do you guys get the guitar widening to that thrice out of the boxes guitar sound? I tried with duy wide but above 25% of wideness it kinda starts to sound weird...

any tricks around here?

[wheever]

Double tracking, with the tracks panned hard left and right. You could also add a 3rd track in the center.

There are a zillion permutations of this, depending on what you're shooting for.

[Brad McGowan]

On all the Thrice records I have I clearly hear only a handful of guitar parts that are highpassed and panned hard right and hard left. The left and right sides are usually playing two distinct parts so that helps the separation. It's all about arrangement. Dual mono never sounds as big.

Brad

[Mike Brown]

Reamping really helps in the doubling process to really get them tight and huge... use subtly different amp settings / mics to get subtle differences in the tone so they will sound huge and not just louder.

[ryanojohn]

I'd say the answer is M/S Mastering...

[NathanEldred]

Originally Posted by ryanojohn

I'd say the answer is M/S Mastering...

I think just fixing the mix in the first place is far more effective and safe than M/S mastering. If he's happy with his center, all it's going to do is weaken the center if the sides are brought up in mastering. There could be information on the sides too that shouldn't be brought up (cymbals, ride, hh, etc). IME it's only for extreme cases where the mix is done and mastering is the last step to 'fix it' (because as a mastering engineer, I highly recommend that if there is the possibility to remix and make it right it should be IMO). Just my two cents.

To the original poster there are a lot of things you can try. Panning is a big part of the equation. I find the 'primary' distorted electrics work well at 9/3 o'clock or 10/2 o'clock on the panning. If you make the loudest double tracked guitars on the extreme left and right they will be wide but they feel like they are in outer space. For hard rock and metal, I like to use four mono tracks, or possible two takes with two mics per take. The 4 tracks will be panned 10/2 or 9/3 usually quite dry or just a little subtle delay, and the secondary tracks (which will hopefully be tracked with another amp or guitar, or these are the room mics) will be hard left and right with some possible tight ambience added. The hard panned guitars ban be automated up and down for effect, i.e. wider on chorus, tighter on verse, etc. There are a million things to try, just experiment.

[Mike Brown]

Originally Posted by NathanEldred

I think just fixing the mix in the first place is far more effective and safe than M/S mastering. If he's happy with his center, all it's going to do is weaken the center if the sides are brought up in mastering. There could be information on the sides too that shouldn't be brought up (cymbals, ride, hh, etc). IME it's only for extreme cases where the mix is done and mastering is the last step to 'fix it' (because as a mastering engineer, I highly recommend that if there is the possibility to remix and make it right it should be IMO). Just my two cents.

To the original poster there are a lot of things you can try. Panning is a big part of the equation. I find the 'primary' distorted electrics work well at 9/3 o'clock or 10/2 o'clock on the panning. If you make the loudest double tracked guitars on the extreme left and right they will be wide but they feel like they are in outer space. For hard rock and metal, I like to use four mono tracks, or possible two takes with two mics per take. The 4 tracks will be panned 10/2 or 9/3 usually quite dry or just a little subtle delay, and the secondary tracks (which will hopefully be tracked with another amp or guitar, or these are the room mics) will be hard left and right with some possible tight ambience added. The hard panned guitars ban be automated up and down for effect, i.e. wider on chorus, tighter on verse, etc. There are a million things to try, just experiment.

Good post! To sum it up : Use your ears!

[bgrotto]

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

[pete]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

so you do that on both sides or just on one side to get the stereo effect? sounds like a nice trick...

[Flying_Dutchman]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

Greaaaaaat!

I love this trick.

[johnnyjellybean]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

I'm going to try that one out.

Personally I find that the right mic and pre choices are important, then double track them panning at 9 and 3 o'clock. If you are lazy or pressed for time, then you can try copying the track and moving the copied track ahead or behind a bit. That works but not as well as a real double track.
I also use 4 tracks with 4 takes sometimes.

[pete]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

cool trick - thx for that one

[over-man]

Originally Posted by bgrotto

One good trick is one I gleamed from the Slipperman guitar recording thread. The trick is to boost a high shelf ABOVE where you've set a low pass filter.

For example, if you're using a 1084 (my guitar EQ of choice), low pass at 6k or 8k, and boost at 10k or 12k.

It creates a really unique top end that eliminates the fizzy crap that lives at the top of dirt guitars, without dulling them severely. Cool stuff.

Oooohhh thats nice, and just in time. I'm tweaking some iffy guitar sounds as we speak.