My recorded guitar tone sucks for the most part

[Ostinato Rubato]

I'll put clips up of what I mean soon. I don't know enough about recording to get a good recorded sound.

I have a fairly newer model 4 (or maybe 6) track Mackie. I have the M-Audio Audiophile USB which is the external version of their 2419 or whatever that soundcard was. I use an SM57, and I record everything in Reaper. I do virtually nothing in the way of production at the moment. Just straight ahead and dry. Still despite the dryness I would anticipate being able to capture something more lively. I have flat, thin, and sometimes harsh in the high end, recorded tone.. particularly on rhythm riffs. For whatever reason my leads with a little delay coming by way of my DL4 sound pretty good.

Bothers me though. Oh, and cleans sound good. It's my heavy rhythm tone that just plain sucks.

[GuitarBilly]

It's all about mic positioning and dialing the amp for recording. One of the most common issues is too much gain , most of the heaviness on recordings is achieved by layering several guitar tracks not by cranking up the gain. I record my heavy rhythms with the gain just a notch or 2 above AC/DC level of gain and quad track the fucking part.

I think we went over some of this stuff last time you were at my home studio, but if you want to, stop by again one of these weekends and bring your gear and I will show you some tricks... these things are a lot easier to show than to write about

[Davidian]

I would like to add that my recorded guitar tone sucks too...




That's all I have to say about that.

[Ostinato Rubato]

Here's a sample of some decent melodic recorded tones and some relatively weak recorded heavy rhythm tones.

http://www.tonefinder.com/index.php?section=user&value=yam%20doodle

And Billy, I'm probably going to need to stop by and get some tips in semi-near future. Recording is on the horizon.

[Ostinato Rubato]

I just tried that quad tracking with the dialed back gain, and things are sounding a lot better now. I was already doing that lowest frequency band cut and highest frequency band cut even though it's not part of a mix. It still helps. On to mic placement. For whatever reason I've had easier time finding spots on other speakers than with this BL80. Interesting cause I love the way it sounds in the room.

[Ostinato Rubato]

bump, to see if anyone listens and has additional advice. I'll put up another clip after recording per Billy's advice, which after a quick test sounded heads and shoulders above what I was doing.

[Devin]

IMO one of the most important parts of great recorded guitar tone is having great recorded bass tone.

[GuitarBilly]

The recorded tone is not too bad, I was expecting worse based on your description of it, but yeah lowering the gain and using layers is the way to go. You don't need to quad track if you don't want to, sometimes double tracking is enough. Looking forward to hearing the new clips.

[Ostinato Rubato]

thanks Billy.

[Devin]

The "491369696879-guitarequeing.mp3" sounds pretty good to me


As good as just about any other solo'd guitar track I've heard. It's once you start putting that in to the context of a full mix that things start getting difficult.

That tone sounds right, though.

[Ostinato Rubato]

thanks Devin. I just expect being able to capture the sound of the amp more as it translates in the room, and it's not happening yet.