Re: Best effect to ballsify thin synth sounds?

On 2008-07-10 [email protected] said:
>> don't think he has good room or
>> good preamp.
>> LEast it sounds that way.
>Well, the rooms have fine reverb characteristics per se.
>Unfortunately we also have a bunch of neighbors with lots of kids
>and zero civilizing ability. Tour buses that sound louder from 60
>ft than the average TV set in the room. Harley monkeys whizzing by
>every 3 hours on average presuming someone may *want* to hear how
>their bikes sound. (Hint: no). The back side of an upscale
>restaurant next door where drunk employees compete in out-shouting
>each other and tinpot football on concrete. So yeah, I'm pretty
>much resigned to working with line- level sources.

AW bummer. FIgured it might be something like that. THe
perils of trying to do this in an urban environment <g>.




Richard webb,
replace anything before at with elspider

On 2008-07-10 [email protected] said:
>> LEslies are cool too as another poster suggests, and if
>> doing organ tracks a must. ˙NO I don't like the simulators,
>> I like the real deal.
>Using a Leslie might end up being more of a distraction.
>You can get lost for hours in that sound.
>Especially if you sit up close. It tends to suck you in.
>Heck, you could spend all day just trying to mic the thing in
>stereo.
OH yah!!! Love it with a Hammond, even the new combo
hammonds.
USed to put an re20 or SEnn 421 on the bottom, did various
condensers on the top and got a great LEslie sound. Love
'em.
YOu're right, it sucks you in. Live couldn't be better!!!
BIg ballsy b3 and a 147. I'm only 5 3 and about 130 lbs but
man I like rockin' one o' them big boys. MIss mine.




Richard webb,
replace anything before at with elspider

> Using a Leslie might end up being more of a distraction.
> You can get lost for hours in that sound.

Yeah... nice eh? ;)

> Especially if you sit up close. It tends to suck you in.

It keeps amazing me. Even after years.

> Heck, you could spend all day just trying to mic the thing in stereo.

I recently did a lot of leslie recording, experimenting with lots of
different mics. Took me a long day indeed but i've now fully refined my
Leslie micing technique.

For all the Leslie fans: try a Shinybox ribbon mic on the low rotor. Smooth
sweetness.
Or try a couple of dirt cheap sennheiser 635 vocal mics (!) on the top.
Outperforms a set of 421's to my ears. I just tried it because they were
available.

Bm

On Jul 10, 3:48 pm, "Paul Stamler" <[email protected]> wrote:

> Run it through a Fender Champ in a good-sounding room. Mike the room with a
> good microphone run through a good preamp. Enjoy.
>
> For a different effect, substitute a Fender Twin.

Or for that matter, a PigNose.

rd

> BM, this is an awesome idea. Will definitely try.
> Do you do it with a real Leslie, or do you use a Leslie emulator of
> some kind?

I have the privilege of owning a real Leslie, but i've you're stuck using
line-level and in-the-box effects a sim might also work.
You might try the sim that comes with the VB3 vsti.

Bm

I found a plugin that approximates the quadrupling+detuning effect I
mentioned, it's Antares's Avox Choir. I tested their free trial
download. Its "Vibrato" parameter muddies synth timbres a bit, but
hey, it's a vocal plugin, isn't it. The main thing is that it showed
me that the pitch-shifting approach works. The search continues for a
similar effect that doesn't muddy synth sounds with an added vibrato
and doesn't require a hardware key.

On the preamp side, I stumbled onto Focusrite's Trakmaster Pro; for
$150 used, this strip can reportedly lend a fat "classic console"
sound to recordings. If anyone cares to comment from experience how
much difference it really makes on synth sounds, it will be
appreciated.

On the Leslie side (because, when you have 3 solutions, why not to use
all 3) I found a freeware Leslie simulator from MDA at
http://www.kvraudio.com/get/787.html

On Jul 15, 5:08 pm, Keoki <[email protected]> wrote:

> On the preamp side, I stumbled onto Focusrite's Trakmaster Pro; for
> $150 used, this strip can reportedly lend a fat "classic console"
> sound to recordings. If anyone cares to comment from experience how
> much difference it really makes on synth sounds, it will be
> appreciated.


No, it will make them sound worse. I have no idea why Focusrite
continues to make low end gear that everyone returns to the store and
gets something else. You'd think they'd catch on.

On the pitch shifting front, I pulled out an old TC Electronic
(Helicon) Quintet that I had around the studio for ages immemorial, to
see if it maybe can fit the task.

I never used this box for anything since the 6 years I had it because
I could never make sense of it how it's supposed to work. On any
normal effect I ever saw, you pump in a signal, you dial through the
presets and hear what they do. Not on this one. You dial through the
presets, you hear no change, only the numbers blink. You open the
manual PDF to see what the @#$%! one is supposed to push to hear & see
something happen on this stoopid box, you find no explanation. So you
throw both the manual and the box in the corner where they were
gathering dust in the first place. Whoever designed the used
interface / manual for this should really pursue a different job.

I'm getting better, though, this time I got through this recurring
routine in under 2 minutes. Well, okay, this unit won't help either.
The search continues :-)

On Sat, 19 Jul 2008 22:27:24 -0700 (PDT), Keoki <[email protected]>
wrote:

>On the pitch shifting front, I pulled out an old TC Electronic
>(Helicon) Quintet that I had around the studio for ages immemorial, to
>see if it maybe can fit the task.
>
>I never used this box for anything since the 6 years I had it because
>I could never make sense of it how it's supposed to work. On any
>normal effect I ever saw, you pump in a signal, you dial through the
>presets and hear what they do. Not on this one. You dial through the
>presets, you hear no change, only the numbers blink. You open the
>manual PDF to see what the @#$%! one is supposed to push to hear & see
>something happen on this stoopid box, you find no explanation.

It's on p.7 of the manual

DATA WHEEL
Edits the value of the current
parameter from any menu or
mode.
In recall mode, turning the
wheel previews presets (top
level preset information is
flashed on the display but
preset data is not loaded until
RECALL is pressed again).

On Jul 19, 10:55 pm, Laurence Payne <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Sat, 19 Jul 2008 22:27:24 -0700 (PDT), Keoki <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
> >You dial through the
> >presets, you hear no change, only the numbers blink. You open the
> >manual PDF to see what the @#$%! one is supposed to push to hear & see
> >something happen on this stoopid box, you find no explanation.
>
> It's on p.7 of the manual
>
> DATA WHEEL
> Edits the value of the current
> parameter from any menu or
> mode.
> In recall mode, turning the
> wheel previews presets (top
> level preset information is
> flashed on the display but
> preset data is not loaded until
> RECALL is pressed again).

I saw this information, but I don't see the juncture where it relates
to the problem. One can turn the TC Quintet's data wheel till the cows
come home, and no sonic change happens, whatever mode the unit might
be in (I don't know). When I pressed RECALL, I only got stuck at a
different screen, with no sonic change when I wanted, and lots when I
didn't. I'm typing this from memory, the Quintet is already unplugged
& out of rack, readied for eBay. (Finally I'll get something good out
of it. My money :-)

On the other hand, I found a plugin that blows Avox Choir (and most
likely, this TC) right out of water, when it comes to thickening
timbral change. It's IK Multimedia's Amplitube. On its "Stomp" page, I
put a Chorus-1 box, added four slightly detuned pitch shifter modules
after it, and - wahoo! The hugest sound change ever, especially with
tube distortion added from an other page. (Vintage warmth? Check.) My
original Yamaha FM programming trick would only get me half this far;
this plugin could turn an anemic clavichord into full-blown Motörhead
even, which is well beyond my target. :-)