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Guitar FX Pedals

Possessed said:
The only pedal I use is a pevey wah pedal because I'm one of those awful kids who uses a digital Amp and I use the built in distortion, compression, reverb, chorus and delay (as well as a multitude of other options I don't touch) so all I needed was a wah pedal. I know that's not the ideal way to go but it does sound pretty good ( I have the biggest peavey vypyr you can get and it actually does sound good even if it's not authentic to anything) but don't let that give you the wrong idea I really am quite good, but my money from my day job goes to rent, living my life etc and I live in a small town where paying gigs are sparse. But it's good enough to make good recordings.
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Honestly, while I still like my tube amp (it just feels different to me and I play differently), I might consider a digital modeler for recording. It’s hard to get really good recordings in my music room. My recordings are mostly just for my own pleasure. Though I never really listen to them much after they’re done. Ha!

I’m actually in the market for a small bass amp for my music room. That Vypyr might fit the bill as it doubles as a bass amp.
 
I really recommend the vypyr with the sanpera foot board for recording. It's specially made for that amp and runs off it's power,  no batteries. It's got loads of built in effects if that's your thing but besides delay and reverb I only really use the compressor. 

It has usb out for recording but I honestly recommend still micing it anyway as I find the usb out to sound really dry and bland. Plus you can't have the speaker on the amp on and use usb simultaneously... It's really just better to mic it. But I do recommend the amp. And it's surprisingly powerful too I have the biggest model there is,  which is still nowhere near a "stack", but if I crank the volume up high it can still be heard just fine playing along with other people using big amps.
 
Ah okay. TBH I’ve never looked into modeling amps that much as the last time I purchased an amp they practically didn’t exist. But I figured by now there was a way to get similar tech to an AxeFX on the cheap. I’ve recordings direct out of that modeler that kill. But it’s $2k+. 

I probably should just invest in a good condenser mic and learn a DAW better than GarageBand. Here’s a tune I wrote and recorded in my small music room. The first solo I re-amped to get that skronky Scofield sound. The second solo sounds more like my normal tone. Just a TS-808 Tubescreamer (modded) into a Keeley Compressor out to Deluxe Reverb. But neither sounds very good or very accurate according to me and others I play with or hear me live. This was just a demo I did to show to the band. 

(Solos start around 1:53)

Dwindle
 
A decent dynamic mic isn't too expensive. You can get a shure, which is pretty much the industry standard for recording guitar,  for less than 100 USD if you know where to look. But even a cheaper one will still sings. 

Condenser mics are better for vocals than guitar in my opinion but it's still extremely possible to get good guitar recordings out of them although a good condenser seems to be more expensive than a good dynamic,  but that's just my memory and omitted limited experience talking. The snoball yeti is a really good condenser mic made for pc recording... usb output so no need for an interface or a jack converter.
 
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Possessed said:
A decent dynamic mic isn't too expensive. You can get a shure, which is pretty much the industry standard for recording guitar,  for less than 100 USD if you know where to look. But even a cheaper one will still sings. 

Condenser mics are better for vocals than guitar in my opinion but it's still extremely possible to get good guitar recordings out of them although a good condenser seems to be more expensive than a good dynamic,  but that's just my memory and omitted limited experience talking. The snoball yeti is a really good condenser mic made for pc recording... usb output so no need for an interface or a jack converter.
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I’ve got dynamic mics and, especially for acoustics and (as you say) vocals, they just don’t sound very good. I think a big part of it is my DAW is just straight into a Mac with GarageBand. I think the track I posted above was even done with an iMic into an iPad. I’ve just got to get more serious about my recording setup. I just haven’t been motivated enough to learn ProTools or the like. I have Audacity too, but I’m not sure that’s  much of a step up from GarageBand.
 
I recommend reaper for something nice in between. It's a legitimate daw, so a step up from like audacity (which is great for just recording tracks and possibly even mastering but I wouldn't mix with it due to the fact that any effects or processing you apply is rendered on the spot,  making fine tuning while listening impossible) but not nearly as complicated as protools.
 
One of my six year olds had his guitar lesson today so I asked his teacher what he thinks. My son’s teacher is a very accomplished jazz musician from Hungary. He recommended getting a really good soundcard. He thinks, given my current setup and objectives, that would be the best bang for the buck.
 
Well... Yeah you should have a good sound card but that has nothing to do with what mics/methods of recording will sound best. It will make whatever you do sound better for sure, but it won't change which mics sound better for what purpose/what amps are better for which purpose etc. 

(Btw I  would say you are right that condenser mics are better overall. Dynamics are really good for an electric guitar amp though.... But not a ton else and condensers are fine for that too. I might get a snoball yeti for my next album)
 
Well I think his point was that if my electric isn’t sounding accurate mic’d with an SM58, the best place to start looking for the culprit is the soundcard.  For acoustic and vocals I definitely need a condenser.
 
You may have a problem with input/output levels. The input volume on your interface should be adjustable and can be turned down. Should be high output on amp, lower input in interface. As close to 0db as possible without clipping on your loudest strums or sounds.
(Edit: but also with the room/mic noise level as low as possible, at least -27db, it's a bit of a balancing act. This is so later when you're in post and have to do effects like eq, compression, and reverb, it will inevitably lower the overall volume and you'll need to "normalize" which raises the max volume back up to 0db or whatever level you set. When you raise the volume of the whole track by normalizing, it raises the noise level along with the wanted sounds. Noise reduction is possible in post as a last resort but with music this is a no no, you'll lose a lot of tone and depth and damage some frequencies of the recording and you will not get it back no matter how good the plug-in is. Best to nip the issue in the bud by getting it right on the intake. 

So tldr, really it's more, mid-high amp volume output, mid-low interface input, balancing high level desirable sound, low level noise.)

You may have a mic placement problem. If your amp has two or four speakers, try placing the mic on a different speaker than you normally do. You could try unorthodox mic placements to capture more room sound and reverb if that's what you're going for, turn the mic to point slightly or extremely away from the speaker, but keep it physically close by. Also worth trying putting a mic in the corner of the room, facing the corner, for a thicker natural reverb that almost borders into echo territory. Good for spooky acoustic blues folk type stuff, or that echoey old-school-ish rockabilly sound.

You may have a frequency problem. Try a cheaper mic (not a joke) like 5 or 10 dollars in an unknown or generic brand. The frequency range it picks up may be completely different from a more expensive mic, you might be surprised. Bonus points, record with both a cheap and expensive mic at the same time, and balance volume between them to mix tones. Or add effects to only one or different effects to each or pan them to different speakers in lieu of recording two separate tracks. 

Alternatively, try some more attentive application of the Equalizer in post. You can clean a muddy sound quite a lot this way.

Lots of fun things to do and try in the realm of audio repair. Audacity is free and has the capability of whatever your audio interface allows, as far as how many tracks you can record at once, etc. It also has several built in high quality effects like the aformentioned Eq.
 
Just wanted to take the time to say that I pre-ordered the Steel Panther distortion pedal, the "Pussy Melter" (yes, seriously), and it sounds incredible. Noisy as hell, but I can manage that with a gate. Definitely worth the price of admission, although if you didn't preorder one, they're probably going to cost you a pretty penny as it was a limited release.

addiesin said:
excellent advice here
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I've had pretty good results with a vocal mic shield. It tends to help eliminate pesky room noise, and a good one is only about $15. It works really well with high gain stuff, as pedal distortion tends to get a little noisy even with a gate.

I'd also recommend getting SPAN, it's a free VST plugin spectrum analyzer that lets you visualize your waveforms and see where your problem frequencies are. I use it most often to get a sense of what frequencies need to be cut/boosted to fit the final mix together, but it can be helpful in eliminating room noise, too. If you have a DAW that supports effects on the audio input (PSA: Cakewalk is 100% free now), put it on whatever mixer channel your mic is attached to, then put an EQ after it, then a second SPAN after the EQ. You get before/after results that way. Turn your amp on, but mute your strings and don't play anything, let the room noise get picked up. You'll see the frequencies on the "before" SPAN, and you can use the EQ to try and carve them out. You'll see the difference on the "after" SPAN, and once you're done you can start playing to check your tone.

My first album was all digital/direct input, and I had decent results with that, but I love my tube amp, and since my new Steel Panther distortion pedal arrived, I've gotten some incredible tones with my amp that I just can't go without. I've had good results combining SPAN and the mic shield.

And like Addie said, get a second cheap mic and use that, too. Mixing a bit of room sound in at a different frequency response level can lead to some interesting results in your tone.
 
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