Simuanalog

[susiwong]

Oh, btw, it's very important to use the Simulanalogs in a MONO channel, they don't work correctly with a stereo signal.
susiwong

[Lunch Money]

Or, in a sequencer that transparently adjusts itself to accomodate such plug-ins. Not mentioning any names.

Greg

[susiwong]

The gate can go anywhere, but before delay and reverb.
Chorus depending on personal taste, instead of a Stereo Simulator better doubletrack the rhythm guitar and use stereo delay on the lead.
susiwong

[susiwong]

Greg,
you're absolutely right, but there are lots of things (including beta-bugs ) in SX which you don' find anywhere else in that combination.

Cheers, susiwong

[stayne]

Thanks susiwong. I have the gate before the delay and reverb. I learned that the hard way .

Double tracking rhythym is good. I just use a stereo sim or chorus for prototyping. I've read about a technique where engineers will double a rhythym track and then toss in a small delay, bump one track up a tad or something similar to give it width. I play them separately panned hard left and right (sometimes 90L/90R). The subtle nuances sound better to me. Believe it or not sometimes I'll make little mistakes that turn out to be keepers.

[susiwong]

Believe it or not sometimes I'll make little mistakes that turn out to be keepers.

That's pretty much standard procedure among most pros, too !
The "doubling trick" you're refering to works like this :
duplicate your track one or two times, delay each of the copies by 10 to 30 ms, pan to taste. You could then pitch one track up (1 - 3 ct), the other copy down by the same amount.
Good enough to make the SPX 90 a bestseller back then, but still not quite like the real thing.
Cheers, susiwong

[Sascha Franck]

Fwiw, I usually prefer a compressor (if used at all) after the preamp/gain stages.
That way, the amp gain will still react fine to my playing (so, lowering the guitar volume will indeed decrease overdrive) whereas with a pre-compressor things are just getting all evened out, which I don't like.

And fwiw, to Hink: There's no need to discuss about sarcasm with a non-native speaker, so I won't get into the details of that here.
And fwiw #2: You always vehemently defend your use of active PUs (which is what our short excurse was about). And I completely fail to see why. I could be nasty now, telling you that your tone really needs some work, but I won't. It'd be a non-debatable debate anyways.
But stay calm, you're not alone. There's another KVR member (that I won't name) constantly telling some things about tone, yet his recordings are just plain awful.

[guitarzan]

I suppose I'll get by with the green gate for now. There's not that much of a loss in attack (that I can hear anyway). If I can run my hand down the strings and hear it, and NOT hear the noise that started this thread in the first place, then I'm elated.

Once you get the noise level down to a more manageable level using whatever suggestions apply you might want to reconsider Floorfish. I used Green Gate for a while but was always unhappy with the loss of attack and frequency content - Floorfish can be adjusted to leave the tone alone and I like it better than my Boss NS-50. Here is how it is adjusted for me in one setup:EDIT: To me it makes sense to have the Expander/Gate as the first VST in a guitar setup since you don't want the noise to be amplified or effected.

[Killvehicle]

Sascha

Ah, senseless discussion. But, one fact remains absolutely clear: In "professional guitar land" active PUs are tough to find.

\

FIrst off I am not defending active pups, they arent my cup of tea either. Secondl;y what do you describe as "professional" to me this sounds like such a stupid statement, Lets see when I was younger in my early 20's till about 3 years ago, (IM 28 now) I played around to all types of gigs, A musical whore was we called ourselves,, Mainly Blues, Jazz and Rock type shit, I was teamed up with a couple of guys one is a drummer, WHo did some Worldwide tours with Nugent(Opening for the NUG that is), and another bass player who was considered the Best bass player in college.. ANd we went and played anything and everywhere, It sucked but we all figured this is still better job than not playing, BUt we had our heavy shit on the side as well. ANyway I would say that should qualify as some sort of pro, and man I have seen many active pups out there, so im not sure where you are coming from, As I said IM not defending this choice, but you make it seem total amateurish, when it is up to the player to decide..

But i guess Bass is a different story and its OK to have actives?

BUt also, there are tons of Pro guys who maybe you dont like but metal and rock bands EAT up them damn EMG's. Zack Wylde, Metallica ,Slayer,etc. etc. etc.. There is a ton in that genre.

ANd by the way , what type of music and band are you in? I notice you always say you are on tour, yet I dont see links to your stuff, or what band you are in?

[Sascha Franck]

As I said IM not defending this choice, but you make it seem total amateurish, when it is up to the player to decide..

Well, of course my comment was blatantly over the top.
I've seen quite some people getting great sounds out of active PUs. No problems with that.
All I've been trying to say is that the vast majority of guitar players (including both amateurs and professionals) are using passive PUs - and it seems as if there's reasons for that. Perhaps conservatism being one of the reasons, but I'm sure there's others as well.

But i guess Bass is a different story and its OK to have actives?

Personally, I seem to prefer a passive bass sound, but in a bass, active PUs seem to make sense as they preserve the "full bang" a bit better - something that isn't necessarily needed on a guitar (as Kingston already pointed out, you may even want a certain lossy signal from a guitar PU to add to the overall character).

BUt also, there are tons of Pro guys who maybe you dont like but metal and rock bands EAT up them damn EMG's. Zack Wylde, Metallica ,Slayer,etc. etc. etc.. There is a ton in that genre.

I know, they're still quite a minoríty though.

ANd by the way , what type of music and band are you in? I notice you always say you are on tour, yet I dont see links to your stuff, or what band you are in?

I'm a musical whore. That's why you don't see me linking any of the stuff I'm doing. Right now it's some ABBA cover show, apparently the largest in Europe (called "Abbamania"). Nothing to be too proud of, but it pays well and touring is something I like quite a lot as well.
I'm also playing musicals occasionally (the next one starting next month).
A few years ago I had a rather great (own) band and we've been trying to become rockstars. Major deal, big video, blah blah blah... as every so often it miserably failed for whatever reasons.

[guitarzan]

I've been trying to avoid tone debates since I realized that we are all looking for totally different things in guitar tone...but I guess I can still afford to chip in my two cents worth...

Active pickups: they are probably great if you are looking for a solid aggressive tone, but I like the inefficient, sometimes sputtery classic tone and response of passive pickups (single coils, for me) even if it means dealing with noise. It is the inefficiency that produced the classic tone and feel I like. De Armonds, Danelectro lipstick tubes, Strat/Tele pickups, P-90's; those sounds can not be "improved" in my oppinion. You can get a different tone that you may like better personally, but it still is not an improvement - just different, and I would probably still like the classic tone and response better.

Scientific studies have shown that passive single coil pickups are 87% more funkadelic than other pickups ya know

[susiwong]

Guitarzan,
I'm with you almost all the way about the classic, unique tones those old and sometimes even strange guitars and amps often offer, with one exception :
the stages you have to play and a lot of the technical stuff going with current gigs have radically changed, lights, PA systems, stages and so on, and if you're not really in The Heartbreakers or similar bands you have to adjust a bit in terms of equipment to get a gig done. If you can control the situation (recording, gigs where you know what to expect and so on) the old stuff is really hard to beat imho.
Cheers, susiwong

[Sascha Franck]

the stages you have to play and a lot of the technical stuff going with current gigs have radically changed, lights, PA systems, stages and so on, and if you're not really in The Heartbreakers or similar bands you have to adjust a bit in terms of equipment to get a gig done.

I totally agree with that. And yes, for live situations a whole shitload of things are making sense that you'd never touch in the studio. Such as my very old GT-5 which is still doing a superb job on *some* occasions, due to its utility mode that none of the others (Pods and the likes) offer.
Or such as the PUs in my Anderson, which defenitely aren't all that hot for a kickass studio guitar sound (well, they do a great job for fusion stuff, but it's not exactly what you're usually asked for...). For live stuff they're giving me exactly the sort of flexibility I need.
And of course active PUs are making quite some sense for live useage as well, due to their more "constant" and "even" output characteristics.

[susiwong]

Those Andersons sure are great allrounders, I'd rather have a strat style like that as the only guitar for a variety job than something like a PRS. For me it's easier to get a useable humbucker style sound out of one of these guitars than the other way round.
Just to get back on offtopic ...
Cheers, susiwong

[Kiwburger]

Ooops - didn't realise that mentioning EMGs would cause so much pain. I agree that EMGs may not be always the ultimate for tone (although don't blame them for neck-through piano-like sustain ...). Pickups simply pickup whatever string sound is there in the first place, so wood quality and design/construction quality override most tone concerns. Level and eq curve can always be compensated for, to a certain extent, so EMGs can be made to work if you know what you're doing.

I mentioned them because of noise issues. Most guitars are noisy, because they are poorly made ripoffs of 1940's technology. The only reason so many noisy, passive guitars are sold is because guitar players buy the shit and don't mind eating it. Just like McDonalds hamburgers - they aren't good food, but we buy the shit anyway.

I would like to see somebody build a new technology guitar based on good EMI shielding. I think the whole pickup and electronics assembly should be in a shielded aluminium or steel 'box' unit, and then the problem would be solved.

SO - given that most guitars are poorly shielded (if at all), and given that most home studios are very hostile EMI environments, what can you do (apart from gates that don't work?).

There is a huge difference between EMG pups and Active circuits. An active circuit is simply a preamp in the guitar. It amplifies a passive pup, and therefore if your guitar is poorly shielded, it amplifies the noise. And usually the preamp is very cheap and noisy itself.

An EMG pup has the preamp built into the pickup - a very important difference. This means that the whole pickup and preamp are shielded. It no longer matters if the guitar isn't shielded - because by the time the wire leaves the pup, it's at a higher level and buffered lo-z and fairly immune from hum. There is still a little self noise from the preamp, but if you buy the top shelf ones they have extremely low noise. It's a shame they don't fit the good EMGs to stock guitars, so don't judge EMGs by the ones you see in shops. Read the spec sheets and look at noise specs to see what I mean.

I strongly believe that if guitar makers could forget the 1940's and make a good new design with a fully shielded unit, you could use the classic passive pups and achieve the same low noisefloor - it's not rocket science, but nobody is doing the obvious.