Self-Recording Guitar Players LOVE Making Things Complicated And It’s Not Good
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- Опубліковано 29 тра 2024
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If you're into recording guitars and want better-sounding mixes, do yourself a favor and stop obsessing over the following things:
1. Amp Sims
Endlessly trying and tweaking different amp sims is a colossal waste of time.
If your tone isn't great and easy to dial in within a few minutes, you're probably using the wrong IR.
Amazing guitar tones can be achieved with even the free amp sims available today as long as they're paired with a quality impulse response.
2. Quad Tracking
If you want "bigger" sounding guitar tracks, avoid recording unnecessary layers.
Recording more than one well-tracked rhythm guitar per side will often make your mixes sound cluttered and less clear.
3. Panning
Guitars are one of the easiest instruments to sit into a mix. The trick is to NOT overcomplicate things like the panning of your guitar tracks.
Pan your rhythms 100% L & R and call it a day. Panning them inwards will only make your mixes sound smaller.
4. Input Levels
Here's all you need to know about input levels: Don't clip on the way into your interface when recording.
There you go...that's all you need to know. Overcomplicating this process is 100% unnecessary.
Hear me talk more about these topics using real-world examples in this video.
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Thanks for the video man 🤘🤘
Did algorithm got fixed? 😂😂
The best thing I've done is making a template. Sure getting the template to where I wanted took some time, but now that I have it, I literally sit down and start recording and programming. No tweaking sounds, no nothing. All my time is coming up with and playing a song.
This is the way. 🙌
Yep it's tedious but putting in the time pays off
Slide that template babycakes 🥰
the point of having multi mic setup on cab is to have different flavors of your tone so trying to EQ them to sound similar to one another kinda defeats the purpose of doing it anyway.
Whenever I get a session from an engineer that throws a million mics on the same cab or multiple cabs I just select the one mic/cab combo to my ear and trash the rest of the tracks.
I always use 2 microphones on my recordings. Simply put: I don't like EQing the hell out of a signal. I have a ribbon mic for the lows and an aggressive dynamic mic for the top end, and blending these give me a good control of the sound even without any filter. So I only need an EQ later to eliminate problem frequencies. But I don't do metal, I'm an Indierocker and work with moderate overdriven guitar-tones.
Hey Bobby, you're a God sent. Ever since I stumbled on your channel, I love your keep it stupid, simple approach. No nonsense, very informative straight to the point, no bullshit you gotta do this. You gotta do that in order to get pro results. Over analyzing everything. Thanks for taking the blanket off all the myths out there. I'm subscribing. I'm recording the majority of time different genre other than metal and rock. Being a musician I don't discriminate against no genre i can actually play it. I'm recording mostly R&B, hip hop, jazz, gospel but I'm still able to apply what you teach to what I'm doing. Thanks keep up the great work
I like to keep it stupid, as well. :)
If anything gets panned in, it's usually quieter tonal texture layers, like if I blend in a chainsaw type tone, or a metal zone boosted with a tube screamer straight into a power amp, in with a different overall tone as like a "spice" layer; the way old school death metal bands like Crowbar, Cannibal Corpse, Dark Tranquility, Dismember, In Flames, Entombed, etc used to do, and the way newer extreme hardcore and Nu Deathcore/Nu Metalcore/Nu Djent bands do, such as Tallah, Knocked Loose, Spirit Box, et al. HM-2 or fuzz style chainsaw tones blend surprisingly well with modern downtuned, 7 string, and 8 string tones, and modern style tones gotten from classic metal amp circuits likewise lend well to blending well with both that and the boosted MT-2 into power.
A lot of similar advice as Jordan from Hardcore Music Studio. Really nice to have multiple dudes reaffirm the same advice. Love the no bs approach with mixes and recording engineering to back it up. Cheers
Dude, long time guitarist/musician here - getting back into recording for the first time since 08 and have been loving all of your videos/information.
How do you go about mixing heavy guitars when there is an acoustic guitar like starting verse of a song or that keep going through the entire song? 1 acoustic center and heavy stuff hard pan, or double acoustic hard panned same as the heavy?
Good advice on the single sm57 . I'm pretty sure Testament - The Gathering was done with a single sm57 and the tones on that album are crushing
That's a perfect example! That album still sounds amazing and it was recorded with budget gear in 1999.
One of the best metal albums ever and still sounds amazing 25 years later!
You have great perspective.
I always pan hard left and right but Dimebag always wanted his panned 9 o’clock and 3 o’clock. Hetfield also often goes left, right and one in the center pulled way down.
That’s why their mix sucks?
Hetfield’s guitar tone eats up all of the bass guitar and you can’t hear them
Uh brother... Idk when the last time you looked at a clock was, but 9 o'clock and 3 o'clock IS hard panned left and right.........
@@gdawgs101 Yeah, no it’s not. Try again.
@@ky9999 Ever listen to the Black Album? Plenty of bass on that one.
Well the producers who call me to the studio to recommend complicated things are often happy with my suggestions as it makes the each sound proganize and not lose dynamics. The thing all guitar player love, protagonization.
For solo balance...you can side chain a compressor on the rhythm guitars from the solo bus. I don't do this on every track, but I typically sidechain a compressor on the rhythm guitars from the snare, bass to kick, and maybe solo to rhythm guitars, depending on track and instrumentation. EDIT: I hard pan too. I've never found an exception as a general technique, although I have produced tracks where I have a deliberate lower energy section (bridge start, or a verse) with one guitar track panned center. But to me, that should always be a deliberate aesthetic choice.
Some interesting ideas here. I’ve never tried sidechaining rhythm guitars to the snare, usually just use it to make sure the kick doesnt get buried
One thing I would add to getting virtual bass to gel in a mix with guitars, is the less busy the part, the better it tends to sound. Too busy and you can generally tell the bass is fake at least speaking for Odeholm nuclear bass.
Man, I swear...this is totally true. And it's not even just guitar players - it seems to be audio production people in general.
Yesterday, I had a full-blown meltdown as I was about to start mixing a track that had Superior Drummer on it. For some drum kits on there, it is a GIANT pain to bounce out the tracks because they not only have individual track processing and bus processing going on, but even parallel processing. So in order to bounce out each drum sounding the way you're actually hearing it, you need to re-route everything just right within Superior Drummer. There's no simple, straightforward way to just get the drums out of Superior Drummer exactly as you hear them.
Again, that's only for some kits. But WHY?! haha! I got so annoyed I actually just stopped myself from mixing for the day. I was in the perfectly wrong mindset to be creative at that point.
Why do audio people LOVE complicating everything so much?!
Been there many many times!
@@FrightboxRecording Haha! So maddening. Why do audio people love self-owns so much?!🤣
"Less is more" - Yngwie J Malmsteen left the conversation.
great video , may I ask what plugin did you use for guitar ?
I think that alot of guitar players struggle with tone bc when we play live or at practice or just around the house there usually isn't any low/high pass going on so they are used to hearing more lows and highs from the guitar that are generally cut down in a mix
I think you're spot on!
One GOOD mic positioned well, a little low cut and then if the tone isn't working with the mix, subtly cut everything but the presence peak. In general, any reason to add more mics or overdubs (of same part) can be solved in a different way.
The key to using 2 mics is to blend them going into the interface. If someone has already said that, sorry for the repeat. But I learned this from Ulrich Wild and it saves a LOT of time and headache. It completely removes the issue of altering and second guessing the tone throughout the mix.
I do quad track to thicken the last chorus😁
That bit at 4:55 made me mad lol
great video dude!
Good info. Thanks! +1 REAPER
When I track a song, I start With the Drum Track first then bring up the vocals and add Bass then Guitars of course I mostly do Pop.
Could you do this for bass?
Agree 100%. I spend a month learning my HX Stomp, and then made 30 patches. Of those, there are 6 that I use all the time now. It's very easy to just dial up one of those patches and record.
When automating guitar levels (for example), do you do it only on the individual tracks or group bus, or sometimes on both on different places?
Or do you sometimes use VCA faders?
Not too sure what Bobby does, but I almost always automate both on individual tracks and then to a much lesser degree, the entire guitar bus. If I nail it in the individual tracks (which is often done to get perfect left/right balance) then I don't need to do much on the bus at all. One example Bobby gives here is automating the rhythm tracks down -1 to 2 db on individual tracks but not the bus, so as to leave the relationship between lead and rhythms. Another example is automating the bus up or down when there's a dynamic change from say, a verse to a chorus or big vocal part that needs all guitars moved down to make room. Hope that helps
@@oldguysplaymetal5517 Ah but I usually have my rhtyhm lead and solos on three different buses. xD
Because I usually export stems wherer I want them separate
Bobby has reviewed this when he has talked about automation. He will usually just use buss automation. There is a reason to automate just the buss or just a sample too, lets say on a verse your drums are just smashing the whole piece, their too present, then you could automate them down just a DB or 2 in that section. Then lets say in the next piece you have a chorus, and everything is hitting great, but,noe for some reason the snare is just smashing loud over everything else. Okay. Instead of automating the entire buss track, just automate the snare down a db or 2 on its own insert/send. Bam, there you go, 2 great examples of when to use buss automation and when to use individual sample automation.
I do both.
One thing that has always been a challenge is when I am tracking guitar using the "low latency mode" in Logic. I'm really liking the Bogren digital one knob series of amps and they do use up some processing. The sound we monitor is much thinner than when low latency is turned off, but I then get so much latency its about 20-40 millisec behind. Do you have this issue with Reaper and how do you track if so? Any other suggestions for getting the exact sound we hear in the full amp sim without it changing after its recorded?
Make sure to remove any heavy plugins you don't need. I remove my entire master chain and I remove my virtual tape machine instances (they are heavy af) and I have no problems recording with a large buffer size and tons of other plugins. I use logic also. I think I have 12ms or so latency? Not enough to notice.
Thanks, man. I probably don't pay enough attention to turning off plug ins while tracking. Its good advice. @@benstanfill363
For rythmns i do 1 hard left + right and leads in the middle
I am not a super prolific recording guitarist, but I get tracks done whereas I see most of my peers failing. I hear a lot of over complicating from them, and the questions I get from them about my recordings are generally things I don’t care about, like:
‘what channel strip settings and mics did you use on the guitars”
My answers are always underwhelming, “it’s just a 57 direct into the interface”
Q: did you use that guitar and amp setup
A: I try to use guitars and amps I haven’t used in a while, I just randomly picked a guitar and plugged it through amps until I was happy
My advice if someone wants to complete tracks, simplify your approach
Thanks a ton Bobby! The pdf file is titled "CRIPS & Clear" btw lmao
It's a good idea to set levels too high, then too low, then less too high, less too low to hone in on what sounds right. The brain handles reference points better than gradual adjustments. Studio engineers do it.
any time i have tried to quad track, i get phasing issues, even with different guitars and amps. panning one set in helps a little. i don't know how pros are layering guitar tracks (like green day for example, brings in more guitars in the chorus). how do they do that without phasing issues?
if you plan to quad track, make sure that you play as consistent as possible, a little bit of editing also helps. for layering guitar tracks they usually play double stops rather than the same part again.
Exactly.
And here's me plugging in my cheapo ME-25 multi effects to my interface and right into Waveform with no plugins 😂
Cool!
I try not look at levels in my tracks when mixing volume. Ears are the key. Don't go in the red while tracking and go. For the guitar mic question a e609 is great can mic. Behringer makes a clone for 1/3 price that is killer. Automate for sections people. So much easier then trying to make levels hotter etc. during certain sections. Automation is not talked about enough for some reason!!!
What song at 7:55??????????????????????????????????/
It's a song called "Valentina" by a new band called Raising Arizona. The single will be released later this month. You can check out their YT channel here: www.youtube.com/@raisingarizonaband
Thanks!@@FrightboxRecording
If you have a good base tone, not even the mistakes Bobby mentions in this video can screw it up. But therein lies the problem. Good heavy guitar tone is very difficult to achieve in the first place, let alone capture. I've tried the standard thing with a guitar going into a Marshall, ranging from the DSL to the 6100, into a cabinet, ranging from an MX112 to a 1960A, picked up by an SM57 at dust cap edge, and also every other conceivable placement known to man, and none of it ever got me close to the sounds I hear on isolated tracks from professional recordings. Too muddy, too spiky in the highs, too thin, to sharp, too fizzy, too wooly, too boomy, and the list goes on. Although I value Bobby's advice-after all, I follow his channel and take to his advice very seriously-he, like many other authority figures on UA-cam, tends to underestimate the challenge of getting a good guitar tone. The day that someone can recreate a convincing recreation of Maiden's guitar tone on Piece of Mind, my gold standard for good basic metal tone, with a simple set up (guitar, amp, maybe a few pedals, a decent cab, and an SM57), is the day I will eat my words. Until then, I am sticking to my position that pro producers trivialize the challenge of getting good heavy guitar tones.
I think the Mondragon guy is really asking: how do i make one guitar player sound like two different guitar players with unique tones (and make those blend). Just a guess 😁
Deal with rumble and resonances (unnatural "room" tones) before even starting with mixing the tracks together. It changes everything imo! Its the only way to get that nice, polished mix. No strange tones poking through destroying the natural sound of the instrument and vocal. Its before mixing (EQ boosting/cutting, compression, saturation, modulation, etc). Reaveal the true sounds of your instruments/vocals before mixing them together! It will sound so much clearer, punchier, balanced, etc without even having started to mix! Mixing will become so much more joyful and just involve taste, vibe, etc. Rumble and resonances are the true demons. When thats done you wont need all that much EQ boosting/ cutting, compression, modulation, saturation, reverb, etc. It will always sound good no matter what!
I'm gonna be honest, I've recorded in some of the worst spaces imaginable and I've never had this issue. Maybe I just got lucky 1,437 times in a row. I think you'll find these videos interesting: ua-cam.com/play/PLTrEDmZWWNjvhpSRmhdI23_8b4D5Y-Etv.html
Quad tracking guitars is just nuts. I don't know how anyone has the patience to do that.
Unfortunately, my band does that even though I genuinely feel like it's not needed. We do a mixture of rock and punk rock. Their idea of it is that it makes the guitars sound bigger and "Green Day does it." One guitar player does their double track and another guitar player does another two. I told them that if you want it to stick out, don't do the same thing. One person is mainly doing power chords while the lead guitar player does something else to help compliment the rhythm. So it kinda works, but felt like unnecessary work.
5:11 imo, it's a phase issue, when the timing of the bass is tight enough to be in phase you can basically raise the volume of the bass up as much as you want without throwing your mix out of balance
The performance is 90%. Mixing, effects etc are almost trivial in comparison.
Biggest problem with home studio recordings is weak vocals and shitty songs
Amen. They stomp the ants while the elephants are running around wild.
"download multitracks from your favorite bands and listen to what their source tones sound like in isolation"... where would you find multitracks like that?
Nolly released It's only smiles and wildfire stems from Periphery a while back, the catch is that there's no drums.
YOU SURE DO COMPLAIN A LOT! What if We have no tone problem with our guitar recording???? HAHAHA
It's about the SOUND...it's Music. It's not about Twisting Knobs, it's about LISTENING... The truth is that if you need multiple Mics to get your sound you really just need a better Mic or Pre or better positioning. KEEP IT SIMPLE, STUPID.....👍😁
Please stop? Hum, no. I record 4 guitars left, 4 guitars right, and sometimes 2 to 4 guitars in the center, and same with the voices, and since 30 years. So no, I won’t.
I fear asking how much cowbell you would normally apply
@@MikePiligrim Never enough brother
I use the 636 rule. For a single guitar part I will track six takes right and left but only two in the center. I like to keep it minimal.
Good Lord. Lol.
I record one take, duplicated it 20 times and pan it to the left, then duplicate it 20 more times then pan it to the right
Paying attention to things that make our tone better doesn't "hold us back". Once again, an ill-informed and over-stupified video because you can't come up with anything useful or valuable. This is where I unsub.
If you want to produce better records, being picky with stuff that are hardly going to make any difference in the context of a mix, yeah, I'd say it is in fact holding you back. And that's the exact point of the video. Make the tone "good enough" and then make the whole mix shine. It will feel like it's an amazing tone if it fits just fine.
@@peptoattackjust like Glenn fricker points out all the time. Why waste money and time on things you won't notice, or will barely notice when there's other, more noticeable changes to be made.