Advice on how to make this sound better

[mahler007]

Hi Slutz,
I've spent the weekend trying to figure out how to get a good stereo recording of a mono guitar amplifier, and would appreciate any advice on how I can get a better sound from this setup, given my resources, etc...

The tune is a solo electric guitar piece with a couple looping machines. Please forgive the playing at this time- the mp3 is just a sketch/improv and I'm still figuring out what to do and how to play with both my hands and my feet. I know that in the end it's more about the music than anything else. I plan on having it finished with a couple other similar tunes by the end of the summer, when I hope to record it in earnest. Anyway, since I had some time, I decided to do some experimenting to see what kind of sounds I could get with my home setup. Please forgive the excessively detailed reporting, but if I'm serious about getting advice and help, I figured it would pay to be as specific as possible about what exactly I'm using, and how I'm using it... I even put links to pictures etc. below...

I play a Strat with EMG pickups through a '65 re-issue Twin Reverb. I don't have a lot of mics available to me, so i ended up using an AKG 414B-ULS, a Røde NT2A and a pair of Neumann KM184s. The 414 and the NT2-A were put 6 inches away from the amp's speakers at the dead center position. I set up the KM 184s about 5.5 feet back from the amp, at a height of about 5 feet. The 414 and NT2-A ran into a PreSonus BlueTube pre, and then out to an Apogee Rosetta 200, and then into Protools via SPDIF. I ran the Neumanns into channels 1 and 2 of my Digi 002.

I should say that this placement came after a great deal of experimenting. If I put the large diaphragm condensers any closer to the amp, the sound became too bassy due to proximity effect, and when I went back further to about 12", I lost a lot of the fat, bottom end that I was enjoying. 6" seemed to be about right. With the Neumanns, I put them higher than the amp because I didn't like the way they sounded when they were on axis with the speakers of the amp. They were way to bright.

The room is not great, and there are a number of little things i can do next time to improve things. There are a couple of little artifacts from running my pres too hot, and the wah-wah pedal proved to be difficult to tame as well. There's also the sound of me clicking pedals etc, but next time I'll figure out a way to fix these things (ie- put the amp in a different room)

When mixing, I originally used both the large diaphragm condensers and panned one hard left and the other hard right. I also panned the Neumann's hard left and right, and mixed them in to taste with Altiverb on an aux track. Originally, I like using both the 414 and NT2-A together, but later decided against it, as it's a little more aggressive this way and I feel like the imaging, while not unpleasant, isn't quite as realistic as when I used one mic up the center. In the end, I used the 414 up the middle with no EQ- the NT2-A was a little too bright for my tastes- and the Neumann's EQ'd with 3-4 db rolled out of the mids to tame my kind-of-lame room. I used an EQ on the master fader to warm up the mids a tad and then used a compressor for a gentle, 2:1 compression.

Anyway, what I'm really after is a nice, Bill Frisell kind of sound, only without the chorus sound that he seems so fond of using. If you've taken the time to read this post and have a listen, I would be really grateful for any observations or insight you could provide as to how to make this sound better. As it is, it doesn't sound terrible, but I think it could be a lot better, too. Below is a link to the mp3 as well as some photos of the setup I wa using... Thanks so much if you can help-I feel a little frustrated...

Peace,
Andrew M. Lee

http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...g/LoopTune.mp3
http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...g/ProTools.jpg
http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...ding/amp_1.jpg
http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...ding/amp_2.jpg
http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...ing/room_1.jpg
http://silvertone.princeton.edu/~aml...ing/room_2.jpg