The Tone Thread

[JD01]

But at least it's arranged such that the straight edges are all towards the inside of the square-ish shape.

Yes & No:
Straight edges were noted & scored a tick.
Squarish was noted and scored a cross.
The piece over to the lefthad my attention for some time - pondering it's purpose and it's lack of clarification thereof.

The bit on the left is marks the edge of the wood where the speaker cone starts. The mic is about 1/3 of the way out from the cap to the tone.

[rayc]

Yes & No:
Straight edges were noted & scored a tick.
Squarish was noted and scored a cross.
The piece over to the lefthad my attention for some time - pondering it's purpose and it's lack of clarification thereof.

The bit on the left is marks the edge of the wood where the speaker cone starts. The mic is about 1/3 of the way out from the cap to the tone.

That helps - Now, knowing that some tape marks that relationship, I'd like a dot for the centre of the dust cap and a verticle bar for the inside edge of the cone.

[JD01]

My OCD would get itchy about the unevenly torn tape.

But at least it's arranged such that the straight edges are all towards the inside of the square-ish shape.

---

Now for something more serious: a tone experiment in which I both use and do not use a boost pedal. I think I know which is a "better" tone, but I'm seeking additional viewpoints and suggestions. The pedal in question is the "Ember Drive" I built a while back (check the DIY threads...maybe I'll come back and edit this with the link linked here: viewtopic.php?f=27&t=1690) which through experimentation on my part turned out more like a clean-ish boost with a tone control (high-pass filter) and less like an overdrive.

The setup:

- Tele-clone, bridge pickup, tone 100%, vol starts rolled off maybe 40%, then ends at 100% (full on)
- boost pedal, level at 12 o'clock, tone somewhere between 7-8 o'clock (I accidentally wired it backwards, so a setting like that actually cuts most of the bass)
- Vox early-gen modeling amp (AD30VT) in "UK 70's" mode, "gain" set so it breaks up a bit when the guitar is 100% vol, treble above 50%, mid/bass below 50%
-> SM57, off-axis about 45 deg., capsule in front of the center of the cone, and backed off the grille about 1.5"

The sound clips -- #1 and #2 -- raw recording / no processing other than rough level matching between the clips and between the softer/louder parts within each, and I'm not saying in which the boost pedal is on and in which it's off:

boostExperiment_1.mp3
boostExperiment_2.mp3


EDIT: added the link to the pedal build thread

Hmmm, both of these sound pretty boxy/nasal but also pretty harsh.. I think the boost seems to be the first one as it appears to have a little more gain and some of the lows sound shelved off. Although in this case I don't think they were doing you any harm and I normally like boosting amps.

If I were you I start with putting your mic on axis and moving it outside the dustcap - I don't think your placement is helping you at all here... unless you going for a late 50s "small amp on deaths door" tone. Is this a 12" speaker? It sounds small.

[SweetDan]

Hmmm, both of these sound pretty boxy/nasal but also pretty harsh.. I think the boost seems to be the first one as it appears to have a little more gain and some of the lows sound shelved off. Although in this case I don't think they were doing you any harm and I normally like boosting amps.

If I were you I start with putting your mic on axis and moving it outside the dustcap - I don't think your placement is helping you at all here... unless you going for a late 50s "small amp on deaths door" tone. Is this a 12" speaker? It sounds small.

Thanks for the feedback. Single 10" speaker, so yes, small-ish.

Re: mic placement and angle, I ran through several placement/angle experiments while doing this, and this was the clearest sound of the bunch (I'll upload those, maybe, when I get back to my personal computer).

[JD01]

Hmmm, both of these sound pretty boxy/nasal but also pretty harsh.. I think the boost seems to be the first one as it appears to have a little more gain and some of the lows sound shelved off. Although in this case I don't think they were doing you any harm and I normally like boosting amps.

If I were you I start with putting your mic on axis and moving it outside the dustcap - I don't think your placement is helping you at all here... unless you going for a late 50s "small amp on deaths door" tone. Is this a 12" speaker? It sounds small.

Thanks for the feedback. Single 10" speaker, so yes, small-ish.

Re: mic placement and angle, I ran through several placement/angle experiments while doing this, and this was the clearest sound of the bunch (I'll upload those, maybe, when I get back to my personal computer).

Yeah, hopefully you kept a decent record of what tone was recorded with what settings but we'll take a listen. Greg will have better ears for what to do about this than me.

[Bill L]

The left rhythm guitar tone is quite fizzy Bill...Does the Digitech have cab simulation??? Sounds like you have it turned off in the left rhythm guitar (to me anyway)...

The right rhythm guitar & lead guitar sound pretty damn good dude...

Thanks for listening Miner. Since we were recording in a very small room I didn't want to mic an amp. I knew I would be replacing whatever I played anyway so I just went straight out of the Twin Tube right into the recorder. Y'all are absolutely correct that it is very fizzy. I'll redo the track one day next week just because I can.

Yeah that left guitar is straight fizz. Like miner said, it does sound like it has no cab emulation. The right guitar sounds pretty normal and much better than the left.

Thanks Gerg. You guys here in this thread (and the other one from that quaint other board) have really helped make me good at what I do, which is mostly live sound. I know I'm one of the few sound guys around here that actually has people from the crowd coming up to them during a gig and thanking them for making it sound so good. That's cool and all but the best part is after a gig when every member of the band comes up to me and shakes my hand and "thanks man! I never have to worry about hearing things on stage when you do sound". That's the best compliment I could get.

Yeah, I was flipping off my left and right can while listening to that. You need to sort that left guitar out!

Thanks JD. I pretty much left it their because I wanted to hear what you guys would say about it. I knew it wasn't great but hearing what you guys think about it was kind of important to me. And of course, after hearing real amps on the other tracks just pointed all of that out to me. But hey, sometimes you just gotta do things to make sure.

[muttley]

So, for the longest time I've been meaning to upload a recording with the Mutt90's I got from Muttley a while back but life and shit got in the way. So today I finally got motivated enough (and had enough time to burn) that I was able to finally get a track done. A while back, I got a couple of my friends together to start work on some originals. This is still in the planning stages but I thought it would be a cool tune for the Mutt90's. Drums and bass were recorded in the same room. My guitar (the left channel) is a Les Paul plugged into a Digitech GFX1 Twin Tube and recorded direct. All recorded live back in April. The guitar on the right and during the solo is my cheap ass Les Paul Gold Top copy that I bought around 1986 or so for like $40 and hadn't been used (or even touched) since around 1988. I plugged straight into my Vox AC 30 (with 2 Greenbacks) using the high input on the Top Boost Channel. I used a Sennheiser e609 about an inch off the grill and about 1" off the dust cap.

Mutt, let me know if you want me to send you the file or upload it somewhere.

Pork Belly Blues Rebels Mix 2018-09-06.mp3

Hey man, just catching up with stuff as I've been out for a while. I agree with what the others have said. It seems pretty "live" to me but you have the chops to pull it off... Am I right in assuming the right channel is the MuttPup stuff? ..and yeh I would love to have the tracks once you are happy with them. I have some time on Sunday when I hope to catch up with this and the JD stuff he posted. I'm about three weeks behind...

[SweetDan]

...I'll upload those, maybe, when I get back to my personal computer...

Yeah, hopefully you kept a decent record of what tone was recorded with what settings but we'll take a listen. Greg will have better ears for what to do about this than me.

Records bordering on obsessive, maybe. lol. Gotta' get this tone/recording thing down somehow, right?

Here's the general setup:

- Tele clone, bridge p/u, tone/vol ~100%
- Boost pedal, level at 12 o'clock-ish, tone at 7:30 o'clock-ish
- Vox AD30VT (early gen. modeling amp), "UK 70's" model, gain maxed, treble @ 1 o'clock, mid @ 11 o'clock, bass @ 10 o'clock; 10" speaker (Eminence "Ragin' Cajun", not stock)
- SM57 at positions as noted in file names/notes below

Ready? I think the forum has an attachment limit per post, so I'm posting these in groups of 3:

Group 1: mic on-axis, on grille, positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

EDIT: Where's my attachments?

[SweetDan]

(Whew! After editing that post, and re-attaching the attachments, they're there.)

Group 2: mic on-axis, pulled back from grille about 1.5", positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

[SweetDan]

Group 3: mic off-axis about 45 degrees, on grille, positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

[SweetDan]

Group 4: mic off-axis, again pulled back about 1.5" from grille, positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

[SweetDan]

Now commentary: of the bunch of positions, I think the "center_out_offAxis" was the clearest sound. Mic at center of cone, positioned 45-ish degress off-axis, and about 1.5" away from the grille. To my (still becoming fine-tuned to this stuff) ears, it had the brightness of the center position, but avoided too much proximity-effect mud by being away from the grille a bit, and also avoided the extreme harshness of the center/on-grille/on-axis position because it was positioned off-axis. The edge positions were all too muddy/unclear, and the positions at the seam had a kind of phasiness to the sound.

That phasiness-thing is interesting, I think. I drew out a diagram of a speaker and the mic at the different positions, then drew lines of what I imagined the sound-waves might look like emanating out of the center of the cone. I'm no acoustic engineer, and I'm guessing that sound doesn't travel from exactly the center point, but in thinking about it as a model, it makes sense that you hear something like phasing at some positions and angles, given that the sound waves may hit one side of the mic capsule and travel "across" the capsule surface to varying degrees.

Anyway, now the recordings are posted, and everyone can listen and make their own determination and recommendations based on what they hear.

[JD01]

Edge Grill on Axis: Bit dark, not too bad, doesn't have that harshness that the earlier ones had. Think you've got too much gain though
Centre Grill on Axis: Brighter, but very harsh, sounds really thin too. Maybe the darkness in the earlier one was balancing out your little speaker.
Seam Grill on Axis: This sounds like a good balance between the other two, this isn't too bad - its still a little on the dark side and a bit small and boxy, but better than the other two - are you sure that you labelled them the right way around?
Or by centre, do you mean you placed the mic right on the centre of the speaker cone? Not midway between the seam and the edge?

Edge out on Axis: Dark and boxy like the first clip but has a touch more clarity.
Seam out on Axis: This is slightly less boxy than your seam grill clip and still has the extra brightness, but there's a slight harshness creeping in.
Centre out on Axis: Harsh as fuck! By centre you mean right on the dust cap don't you? Avoid this!

Centre Grill off Axis: Bright and a little harsh, better than the other centre clips though, the off axis seams to have taken the harshness out of it a bit 'cos your mic isn't pointing right at the dust cap!
seam Grill off axis: Dark and boxy - avoid this.
Edge grill off axis: Really dark and wooly.

Centre out off Axis: Like you say, quite clear, but its also a touch harsh and a little thin.
Seam out off Axis: Not too bad - doesn't have that harshness that the previous one has but is a little thin and lacking balls
Edge out off Axis: Dark and dull but also a little on the harsh side - avoid!

On balance I think Seam out, on Axis is my favourite, it has a bit of bottom end to it but isn't too dark and boxy. Centre out, off Axis is OK too but its a touch thin. You think you could move Seam out, on axis out a tiny bit from the seam to try and take out some of that harshness but then dial a bit more treble back in from the amp? I think you've got a bit too much gain on all of the clips too.

'cos you've got a small speaker cone you're probably gonna get quite drastic changes with very small mic movements.

[SweetDan]

Or by centre, do you mean you placed the mic right on the centre of the speaker cone? Not midway between the seam and the edge?
...
'cos you've got a small speaker cone you're probably gonna get quite drastic changes with very small mic movements.

The former: center of the dust cap, center of the entire unit. And you're right; with the construction and dimensions of the speaker, small movements have a huge effect...the dust cap/cone seam is nearly halfway along the radius of the speaker.

[JD01]

Or by centre, do you mean you placed the mic right on the centre of the speaker cone? Not midway between the seam and the edge?
...
'cos you've got a small speaker cone you're probably gonna get quite drastic changes with very small mic movements.

The former: center of the dust cap, center of the entire unit. And you're right; with the construction and dimensions of the speaker, small movements have a huge effect...the dust cap/cone seam is nearly halfway along the radius of the speaker.

Ah, the Rocket50 in my Blackstar combo was like that. Made mic placement quite tricky - particularly coupled with how dense/dark the grill was so you couldn't see the speaker without a really bright light shining at the grill.

[Minerman]

Group 4: mic off-axis, again pulled back about 1.5" from grille, positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

I think the first clip in this group sounds the best Dan, but all of 'em could stand some high-end...I've never used a 10" speaker, but I've read about 'em being really finicky compared to a 12"...Most of these clips are a little dark, so I think you need to keep tweaking your mic position...It's a lot of trial/error, but once you have it nailed down, it'll be easier to get there on the next go-round...

Gotta give you an "A" for effort though dude, & don't take this the wrong way, they don't sound bad, they're just a little dark IMO...

[SweetDan]

...don't take this the wrong way, they don't sound bad, they're just a little dark IMO...

No, no problem. I appreciate the feedback from all you guys.

Group 4: mic off-axis, again pulled back about 1.5" from grille, positioned at edge, then cone/cap seam, then center

I think the first clip in this group sounds the best Dan, but all of 'em could stand some high-end...I've never used a 10" speaker, but I've read about 'em being really finicky compared to a 12"...Most of these clips are a little dark, so I think you need to keep tweaking your mic position...

So that was the "center (of speaker cone), out (~1.5" from grille), off-axis" clip, which was the one I chose as the best sounding too. For me it had the clearest tone / least amount of wolliness, but still had some beef to it.

It's interesting to note that this exercise got me at least to the point where individual subjectiveness comes into play. While if I'm hearing what you're saying (it needs a bit more high end), JD says:

...On balance I think Seam out, on Axis is my favourite, it has a bit of bottom end to it but isn't too dark and boxy. Centre out, off Axis is OK too but its a touch thin. You think you could move Seam out, on axis out a tiny bit from the seam to try and take out some of that harshness but then dial a bit more treble back in from the amp? I think you've got a bit too much gain on all of the clips too...

IOW, it's a bit too harsh (and by implication already has more than enough highs).

(Of course, I could be misinterpreting what you're both saying - lol. Though you did both say I should still tweak the mic position...)

I'd venture to guess that if I were trying to fit this riff into a mix, it would probably come down to picking the sound from the available positions based on what fits best into the mix, and make any super-fine mic position adjustments based on that. However, I'm lazy and probably wouldn't take the time initially to record the 12 different mic positions for the mix, especially if I'm in the middle of trying to work out the rest of the tune. Are there any shortcuts, at least in weeding out the worst-of-the-worst tones that you know won't fit the mix? Or would you all go through and record a bit of all the positions for the scratch mix?

[JD01]

I'd venture to guess that if I were trying to fit this riff into a mix, it would probably come down to picking the sound from the available positions based on what fits best into the mix, and make any super-fine mic position adjustments based on that. However, I'm lazy and probably wouldn't take the time initially to record the 12 different mic positions for the mix, especially if I'm in the middle of trying to work out the rest of the tune. Are there any shortcuts, at least in weeding out the worst-of-the-worst tones that you know won't fit the mix? Or would you all go through and record a bit of all the positions for the scratch mix?

By harsh, I don't necessarily mean just the highs, although that could be part of it. I mean that there's a certain angry scratchiness there which can be a symptom of being too close to, or on the dust cap.

Obviously you wouldn't record everything in all positions and choose one to get things to sit in a mix. I find getting something to sit in a mix is more subtle than big changes in mic placement which can be a bit of a blunt instrument. I think your best bet is to dial in the best tone you can which has the right blend of a bit of decent bottom end without being too dark and clear highs without being too searing, record it and stick with it. Then get it to fit in the mix with some EQ later - you'll probably find this far easier and more satisfying. Just dial your amp and mic placement in so you're capturing the sound that you really like, albeit with an eye on getting it to sit in the mix later.

Also, was just thinking on the brightness/harshness thing. See if you can find isolated tracks of Brian May and Joe Strummer, they both have a really bright tone, but its not harsh, scratchy and fatiguing to listen to.

[rayc]

I'm probably very late to the party on this but it seems a simple solution to a problem but can it lead to more problems?
[BBvideo=560,315]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T35B7yGSsK0[/BBvideo]

[SweetDan]

I've got more tone clips; yay!

...You think you could move Seam out, on axis out a tiny bit from the seam to try and take out some of that harshness but then dial a bit more treble back in from the amp? I think you've got a bit too much gain on all of the clips too...

For the following clips I tried, with a somewhat scientific bent, to leave at least one controlled parameter, which in this case, ended up being the mic positions. (I completely avoided all the "edge" positions, however, since they were all way too woolly.) So the "center" and "seam" positions, both on the grille and back about 1.5", with the mic either on- and off-axis.

I did try to dial in a less harsh tone to begin with, which I did by: 1) rolling off some of the high end on the guitar, 2) using a less-drastic low-cut on the pedal (left the boost level the same as before, however), and 3) using less gain on the amp. I also varied the EQ on the amp controls, with treble/mid/bass hovering near the middle and arranged less like a low-cut.

The files (in several posts):