Good distorted guitar sound in the mix?

jazzius II · 28th October 2003

Peeps......i need some advice on getting a good distorted guitar sound in the mix.......i'm mixing a track on thursday.....it's a rap track but its got quite a rock sound to it and is pretty heavy.....the distorted guitar sound is a bit crappy...i suspect something like a pod.......rock's not really my thing (i usually do urban), so i'm wondering what i'm gonna be able to do to make this guitar sound a bit better (distort it some more!?).......any suggestions would be well appreciated...i've got access to lot of gear so get weird if ya like!.......cheers..

jazzius II · 28th October 2003

just to add, i've got one idea at the moment.....the guitar's mono (i think).......i want it to sound super wide so i was planning to mult it and pan it hard left/right......then i was planning to insert 2 different bits of outboard on L/R and overload.......do you think this'll get the sound wide or not?......if not, any other strategems for getting this mono guitar sound to go w-i-d-e?

AgonizingpaiN · 28th October 2003

Ummmm.... I'm still kind of an amateur, but i find that slightly delaying either the left or the right track (if the guitars are in stereo) helps alot in makin everything sound bigger and better. Since its in mono, just copy/paste, add a little delay, and u shud be fine.

jazzius II · 28th October 2003

This guitar is mono and i'm a bit worried that using a delay won't translate too well when the mix collapses to mono on the radio......

e-cue · 28th October 2003

Reamping through a decent amp should help if it's long sustained whole notes. If it's "chunka chunkas", using distortion on distortion (via Sans Amp) with a gate should be helpful. Those POD tracks are always tricky for me to settle in a mix. Doubling tracks and experimenting with different distortion on distortion and reamping (multiband compression pre reamping works pretty good for me) would be the way I'd go. Since it's rap, you'll be able to get away with more- the guitar doesn't necessarily have to sound like distorted guitar. Some ayehole sent me one of the worst pod tracks ever on a Wu Tang style track, so I just LO FI'ed the mofo down to 6 bit with a smige of saturation and threw a keyed gate post Lo fi. It didn't sound anything like a guitar, but was hella cool. YRMV.

Are you going for realism (Onyx - Slam) , or synthetism (M.O.P. - Handle your Business)?

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius II
just to add, i've got one idea at the moment.....the guitar's mono (i think).......i want it to sound super wide so i was planning to mult it and pan it hard left/right......then i was planning to insert 2 different bits of outboard on L/R and overload.......do you think this'll get the sound wide or not?......if not, any other strategems for getting this mono guitar sound to go w-i-d-e?

No, it won't really do jack shit for your imagining. Try using Meta Flanger. Mike Shipley is a master of it, and I really dig his distorted guitar sounds. I'd try leaving the mono turd up the middle and multing it to Amplitube and sending that into Mega Flanger, and then maybe a desper spatializer post MF. I'm just taking stabs here, as there are so many variables to this equation.

jazzius II · 28th October 2003

erm, i'm not really sure......all i know is it (the guitar) sounds like shit on the demo mix i've been given......and the guitar pretty much drives the track along......it's chunka-chunka choppy guitar stylee......

......what about tricks for getting mono stuff to sound stereo (apart from the obvious - delay)?.......

.......if you had a mono sound but distorted the L/R in totally different ways, couldn't this sound very stereo?.......gonna try it on this mix!

jazzius II · 28th October 2003

Hey e-cue, have you heard R.Kelly's "Ignition - Remix".....damn, that's one of the best mixes/production i ever heard!.....the kick from heaven!......

jbuntz · 28th October 2003

Send it to the other room and pretend ambient mic the amp. You can do either stereo ambience or pan ambient and dry tracks.

e-cue · 28th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius II
Hey e-cue, have you heard R.Kelly's "Ignition - Remix".....damn, that's one of the best mixes/production i ever heard!.....the kick from heaven!......

I LOVE the automated eq sweep on the "Got me rolling something something everyone wishin'" line in the hook. Tony Maserati and Peter Mokran have been doing a greatjob with R Kelly for years... Their strong points are they are always sound great on the radio (mixed with the radio in mind?), actually better on radio than in the studio.

jbuntz · 28th October 2003

I guess you could start mixing through an optimod with car stereo speakers as a reference!

Doesn't Indian Trails have a transmitter at the studio so you can hear the songs on the radio?

Beezoboy · 29th October 2003

Hey Jazzius, I like to mix two slightly different distortions and pan them hard left and hard right. Then if I need more I'll do a scooped mid "Metallica" sounding distortion in the middle for a pretty chunky sound.

I am really not understanding whether you are trying to get width or chunk.

I always have them play the distortion track twice though. The little inconsistancies are what really creates width to me. How good are you at guitar? :P

Beez

Marshall Simmons · 29th October 2003

I think the problem is that he is re-mixing something that has already been tracked.

The only mono-compatable solutions i can really think of is to do one or all of the following:

-Reamp through different combinations of cabs and heads
-Pitch shift the tracks
-Stereo Mic the Reamping with different microphones.

-Do a delayed Track and pan hard left and right--- reamp with a stereo amp combo- and stereo mic it with a bit of distance (NOS or XY miking)-- The distance with the room contributions should null the horrible comb filteing a bit.... you'll have to play around with the delay time however to get the least significant comb filtereing problems

Marsh

Absolute · 29th October 2003

I dont think reamping a distorted guitar is something anyone would do.

If you have any speaker simulations --I would use them. A different one L and R. But if this part drives the song--it would a shame to use it

Jay Kahrs · 29th October 2003

Yeah, reamping distorted guitar just doesn't work. Maybe run it out to a PA and mic that. Still, I'd look into other things like putting a short delay on it, maybe 40-60ms and run that to one side. I get the levels equal, sum to mono and then flip the phase and nudge the delay time back and forth until I'm doing the least amount of evil phase smear I can. Maybe just pan it to one speaker and use a mono 'verb to fill it out and get it on the other side. If it really sucks tell them it would sound a lot better if it was retracked. It wouldn't be the first time guitar gets added during a mix session.

Robotnik · 29th October 2003

If the guitar part in question is a rhythmic guitar part, you can simply create another track from the original by comp'ing different parts. Example: copy verse2 of track 1 to verse1 of track 2. Go through the whole track. If it's the same rhythm being played, then it'll be doubled. Use some VocAlign to tighten up the tracks if it's needed. Pan them hard left and right. I do this all the time...sometimes creating 4 tracks from a single track with opposing delays. A lot of people seem to like my huge guitar tracks. There are other techniques I use not mentioned here...I can't give you guys all of my secrets.

jazzius · 29th October 2003

Thanks.....some good suggestions there......and some unrealistic ones - mic'ing up a P.A.!?

......i'm not sure the re-amping thing is a good idea in this case......the guitar already sounds a bit phasey.....

......i think the best suggestion was Robotniks......comping a new track.....dunno if there's enough geetar to do it with though.....

.....the guitar drives the track, but i want to have it very stereo in the chorus, and less so in the verse.................this is rap so i wanna leave a lot of space up the middle for other stuff............

Tim L · 29th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by Absolute
I dont think reamping a distorted guitar is something anyone would do.

That depends on what you're looking to achieve. I've done it several times and it worked out great... mileage I guess.

Tim L · 29th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius
...the guitar drives the track, but i want to have it very stereo in the chorus, and less so in the verse.................this is rap so i wanna leave a lot of space up the middle for other stuff............

I would try to copy, edit, and comp up another track. Then I'd use different delays and panning during the V's and C's...

Screws · 29th October 2003

Micing up a PA is something we did years ago. If you have a full range speaker that will let you get a loud and decently truthful approximation of a guitar stack playing back the track, put it in a nice sounding room and mic it 20 feet back with a pair of LDC's.

Jay Kahrs · 30th October 2003

Totally. And if it is just the DI from a POS (my new name for the POD) then it'll let you capture actual moving air molecules which should make it much more "real" sounding. That'll also let you get a whole different kind of stereo thing going for the songs chorus.

jazzius · 30th October 2003

Tried leaving the turd up the middle with a chorused stereo mult....sent the whole shabang into the edison, tweaked, then eq'd.....that works pretty good.....need some more edison's!

cebolao · 30th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius
......i think the best suggestion was Robotniks......comping a new track.....

...untill you find out that the whole track is the same bar looped over and over again...

jazzius II · 30th October 2003

It is!

e-cue · 30th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius II
It is!

Guess that saves you the time of pressing the "track search" button back once to get to the top of the song.

dave-G · 30th October 2003

Here's a couple that have worked for me before.

1. Put your studio monitors in a room that has an interesting set of early reflections, run the mono signal through both speakers, and mic the results in stereo (I like spaced omnis or ORTF, but an XY cardioid or Blumlein pair can also be effective). You'll get localization cues from the differences in the early reflections from each speaker's relationship to the room.

or if you're not into the early-reflections thing...

2. Mult and process the signal differently for left and right channels, then use the time-honored mastering method of M-S processing to bring out the differences you just created, thus "widening" the signal...

-dave

Robotnik · 30th October 2003

Quote:

Originally posted by jazzius
Tried leaving the turd up the middle with a chorused stereo mult....sent the whole shabang into the edison, tweaked, then eq'd.....that works pretty good.....need some more edison's!

There are creative ways around that too.

Anyway, we're talking about a hip-hop track. You never heard a loop on a hip-hop track?

Faderjockey · 30th October 2003

e-cue is right. Metaflange can make it sound very stereo and smooth the pod tone out. I hate getting tracks to mix that have been done with a pod.

I have fixed bad tracks using outboard comp and metaflange. I'm working on a mix now that was all pod, midi parts, real drums and bass. It's tough getting the pod to sit right. But it can be done, People do it all the time. I use Metaflange more then any other Waves plugin. I use it to the point you don't know it's there until you pull it off. Just like I said to smooth out and spread the pod tracks. When the pod is right up the middle it is hard to tuck in.

Goodluck

28th October 2003	#1
jazzius II Lives for gear Joined: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,002 Thread Starter	Good distorted guitar sound in the mix? Peeps......i need some advice on getting a good distorted guitar sound in the mix.......i'm mixing a track on thursday.....it's a rap track but its got quite a rock sound to it and is pretty heavy.....the distorted guitar sound is a bit crappy...i suspect something like a pod.......rock's not really my thing (i usually do urban), so i'm wondering what i'm gonna be able to do to make this guitar sound a bit better (distort it some more!?).......any suggestions would be well appreciated...i've got access to lot of gear so get weird if ya like!.......cheers..

29th October 2003	#12
Marshall Simmons Gear addict Joined: Nov 2002 Location: Kansas City, Missouri Posts: 391	I think the problem is that he is re-mixing something that has already been tracked. The only mono-compatable solutions i can really think of is to do one or all of the following: -Reamp through different combinations of cabs and heads -Pitch shift the tracks -Stereo Mic the Reamping with different microphones. -Do a delayed Track and pan hard left and right--- reamp with a stereo amp combo- and stereo mic it with a bit of distance (NOS or XY miking)-- The distance with the room contributions should null the horrible comb filteing a bit.... you'll have to play around with the delay time however to get the least significant comb filtereing problems Marsh __________________ Marsh Simmons

29th October 2003	#16
jazzius Lives for gear Joined: Nov 2002 Location: Amsterdam.....The Netherlands Posts: 593	Thanks.....some good suggestions there......and some unrealistic ones - mic'ing up a P.A.!? ......i'm not sure the re-amping thing is a good idea in this case......the guitar already sounds a bit phasey..... ......i think the best suggestion was Robotniks......comping a new track.....dunno if there's enough geetar to do it with though..... .....the guitar drives the track, but i want to have it very stereo in the chorus, and less so in the verse.................this is rap so i wanna leave a lot of space up the middle for other stuff............ __________________ Wisseloord Mastering

29th October 2003	#19
Screws Lives for gear Joined: Nov 2002 Location: Florida Posts: 733	Micing up a PA is something we did years ago. If you have a full range speaker that will let you get a loud and decently truthful approximation of a guitar stack playing back the track, put it in a nice sounding room and mic it 20 feet back with a pair of LDC's. __________________ Steve Cruz Cruzified Music Florida

30th October 2003	#27
Faderjockey Lives for gear Joined: Aug 2002 Location: Baltimore Posts: 1,970	Metaflange e-cue is right. Metaflange can make it sound very stereo and smooth the pod tone out. I hate getting tracks to mix that have been done with a pod. I have fixed bad tracks using outboard comp and metaflange. I'm working on a mix now that was all pod, midi parts, real drums and bass. It's tough getting the pod to sit right. But it can be done, People do it all the time. I use Metaflange more then any other Waves plugin. I use it to the point you don't know it's there until you pull it off. Just like I said to smooth out and spread the pod tracks. When the pod is right up the middle it is hard to tuck in. Goodluck

28th October 2003	#3
AgonizingpaiN Gear nut Joined: Oct 2002 Location: Los Angeles, CA Posts: 76	Ummmm.... I'm still kind of an amateur, but i find that slightly delaying either the left or the right track (if the guitars are in stereo) helps alot in makin everything sound bigger and better. Since its in mono, just copy/paste, add a little delay, and u shud be fine.

28th October 2003	#8
jbuntz Lives for gear Joined: Jul 2003 Posts: 1,716	Send it to the other room and pretend ambient mic the amp. You can do either stereo ambience or pan ambient and dry tracks.

29th October 2003	#11
Beezoboy Gear addict Joined: Mar 2003 Posts: 495	Hey Jazzius, I like to mix two slightly different distortions and pan them hard left and hard right. Then if I need more I'll do a scooped mid "Metallica" sounding distortion in the middle for a pretty chunky sound. I am really not understanding whether you are trying to get width or chunk. I always have them play the distortion track twice though. The little inconsistancies are what really creates width to me. How good are you at guitar? :P Beez

29th October 2003	#13
Absolute Lives for gear Joined: May 2003 Location: NY Posts: 1,142	I dont think reamping a distorted guitar is something anyone would do. If you have any speaker simulations --I would use them. A different one L and R. But if this part drives the song--it would a shame to use it

29th October 2003	#15
Robotnik Gear addict Joined: May 2003 Location: all over this great world Posts: 385	If the guitar part in question is a rhythmic guitar part, you can simply create another track from the original by comp'ing different parts. Example: copy verse2 of track 1 to verse1 of track 2. Go through the whole track. If it's the same rhythm being played, then it'll be doubled. Use some VocAlign to tighten up the tracks if it's needed. Pan them hard left and right. I do this all the time...sometimes creating 4 tracks from a single track with opposing delays. A lot of people seem to like my huge guitar tracks. There are other techniques I use not mentioned here...I can't give you guys all of my secrets.

30th October 2003	#20
Jay Kahrs One with big hooves Joined: May 2002 Location: Earth, NYC metro Posts: 5,899	Totally. And if it is just the DI from a POS (my new name for the POD) then it'll let you capture actual moving air molecules which should make it much more "real" sounding. That'll also let you get a whole different kind of stereo thing going for the songs chorus.

30th October 2003	#25
dave-G Lives for gear Joined: Jun 2002 Location: Florida Posts: 2,486	Here's a couple that have worked for me before. 1. Put your studio monitors in a room that has an interesting set of early reflections, run the mono signal through both speakers, and mic the results in stereo (I like spaced omnis or ORTF, but an XY cardioid or Blumlein pair can also be effective). You'll get localization cues from the differences in the early reflections from each speaker's relationship to the room. or if you're not into the early-reflections thing... 2. Mult and process the signal differently for left and right channels, then use the time-honored mastering method of M-S processing to bring out the differences you just created, thus "widening" the signal... -dave

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