Reamps

[RodC]

So are DIs and reamping the secret to getting a good recording of a band playing togther in one room?

I ask because this is what I hope to do with my own band, and this thread has given me some things to think about. The last time we recorded a few songs, we played together in our practice space -- I isolated the guitar and ran the bass DI (we're a 3-piece). Still got a lot of bleed from the guitar, since the practice space is only a 10x20 room.

I'd love to be able to concentrate on getting a nice recording of the drums (since, after all, I'm the drummer) but still have the tight vibe of us all playing together. Then later I could reamp the bass and guitar tracks and get my nice sounds there.

One question I have is how the bass and guitar will sound in our headphones as we play live. I can't imagine getting the feeling we're hoping for if our instruments don't sound good in the headphones. Like, I can't imagine really rocking when we're hearing a sterile DI guitar track instead of a loud Fender amp, you know?

Any suggestions on how to go about this kind of home recording approach? I'm pretty new to recording and still in the early stages of gear acquisition.

thanks!
-scott

___
www.rumandrebellion.com

Yes this is one secret to all playing in the same room with no bleed. Bass guitar sounds really good if you have good headphones, we have a set of DJ headphones that the Bass guitar really blasts in so we give those to whoever wants to hear that.

The guitar players are the ones that have the most trouble.

In a guitar amp/speaker setup there are a lot of crappy sounds out of the preamp. A lot of those highs are the sounds of the distortion and are rounded off/changed by the power amp and many are changed in the speaker cab. Guitar players get real nervous and are tempted to change their settings.

There is also the issue of less feedback and the resulting feedback. This can be a good and a bad thing.

But keep in mind you can always go back and add the guitars after you have captured the rest of the band.

A lot of times we go back and double guitar tracks/add solos with just the guitar player and his amp cranked and miced. In this situation we still capture the DI BECAUSE we may want to mess with mic position and reamp again. GUESS WHAT the feedback/Sustain will be in there in this case!

Sometimes its pretty cool hearing feed back created on a cranked halfstack playing through a small pratice tube amp LOL

We just bought a Mackie matrix mixer, this thing is awsome for monitoring while you record like this. One of the best investments we have made.

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[scott macdonald]

Awesome, thanks for the tips. So I'm thinking I need two DIs for guitar -- one takes the guitar signal straight to the DAW, another takes the signal through a distortion pedal or two and into the mixer for monitoring, so that the guitar will sound in our headphones something like how it really sounds.

Is there a better way to do this, without using all these DIs?

-scott

[RodC]

Awesome, thanks for the tips. So I'm thinking I need two DIs for guitar -- one takes the guitar signal straight to the DAW, another takes the signal through a distortion pedal or two and into the mixer for monitoring, so that the guitar will sound in our headphones something like how it really sounds.

Is there a better way to do this, without using all these DIs?

-scott

Read all the options I gave above. If you are only reamping so you can cut the bleed I would

1 have the guitar player dial in his fav sound
2 make sure I can live with recording it
3 run a cable from his effects loop out into my DAW for monitoring and recording
4 record a sample, play it back from the DAW into his effects loop return, MAKE SURE IT SOUNDS right, adjust daw output level, effects loop return level ect to make sure you can get the sound.

After you do this you can record your tracks like step 3 and not worry about the clean DI. The clean DI is great to have around if you screw up the whole chain. Thus you only need 1 DI.

You will also degrade your sound when you use a Y cable to go into 2 DI boxes, the Guitar sees double the load (Half the impedance)

[I'm Painting Again]

So are DIs and reamping the secret to getting a good recording of a band playing togther in one room?

no the secret is recording it properly to begin with..but only if the sound in the room of the band playing is good to begin with..etc. etc.

though a "reamp" can be a good bandaid or fix for a poor live recording..

[RodC]

So are DIs and reamping the secret to getting a good recording of a band playing togther in one room?

no the secret is recording it properly to begin with..but only if the sound in the room of the band playing is good to begin with..etc. etc.

though a "reamp" can be a good bandaid or fix for a poor live recording..

I agree 100% the first stage is a good performance!

[joel hamilton]

Though I agree that a good performace is paramount...

I use the reamp more for creative choices than I do for "fixes" or as a "band-aid."

Being able to do "overdubs" of the same great performance through 4 different amps is surreal, and amazing. Even if the first one could have simply been the only one...

The kids all love that "stereo" thing these days, and there is simply nothing like having a couple of amps "interpret" the same basic guitar take... That along with a nice tight double can be amazing IMO.....

[I'm Painting Again]

yes..the creative or tone shaping aspects of the "reamp" devices are definitely the most fun and interesting..

[the finger genius]

I'm thinking about buying a Reamp box (not necessarily the "Reamp" box, although I haven't ruled it out) and I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations. In particular, I'm wondering what are the practical differences between the active and passive choices that are out there?

[mcRack]

I use the radial prormp,great simple passive box....and,it only costs 100$!!!
It always amazes me when the amp starts singing,great fun

[the finger genius]

That definitely helps. I guess what I'm asking is, what does the active box do differently that folks are willing to shell out another 100 bucks for?

[the finger genius]

That definitely helps. I guess what I'm asking is, what does the active box do differently that folks are willing to shell out another 100 bucks for?

Anybody?

[djimbe]

Typically you won't see loss of signal level with an active box. Lotta these impedence matching devices rely on a transformer as part of the circuit. Pump signal through a transformer and you'll get some modest signal loss. With a passive device, you could need some make up gain on the output side of the box. Probably not an issue when pumping that signal into an amp, but you never know. Also, transformers can have a tendency to color the sound. Sometimes cool, sometimes not. The active devices are often sold as "cleaner" sounding than passive ones because of the supposedly more "neutral" sound of an op-amp circuit...

[the finger genius]

Thanks for your responses guys. I did a little sleuthing on John Cuniberti's site and came with the following, which I think sums up pretty well why an active reamp device is not necessarily better:

Question - Why doesn't the Reamp require a power supply or battery?
Answer - The Reamp is designed around the philosophy of minimal signal path (less is more). A high quality transformer designed for reamping, a trim control, the proper connectors and RF filtering is all that is needed to do the job reliably with full bandwidth and no added distortion. Because the Reamp is transforming high-level audio into low-level audio there is no need for added power. Therefore, adding power would only provide silly lights and useless features that would compromise the audio signal and increases the failure factor tenfold. In addition, you might trip over the power cord and bump your head.

From: http://reamp.com/faq/#4735

So thanks, Mr. Cuniberti!

[0dbfs]

I recently acquired an X-Amp box so that I could use the instrument in on one of my LA610's or API pre's which drive the X-Amp in the live room which drives a couple amps mic'd individually.

i'll us it in a reamp sitch as well after the fact.. but that's just a plus. I guess I can mult the mic-pre out to both the X-Amp and to a record channel for the "reamp-track"

The main reason for this at this point in time was to be able to drive a couple 5W practice amps in the live room with the guitarist in the control room without having to run 50 or 60 ft of instrument level signal.

the x-amp has two instrument level outputs. what are your thoughts of paralleling each of those two outputs to three amps? In other words, mic up six or seven amps and record any combo of amps for the particular part?...

Cheers,
j

[RodC]

If the 2 outputs are active and designed to be used together, I would say you are OK with 2, but if you plug 2 amps into one, some amps may not like this. They are designed for high impedance inputs and many dont like to be pulled down with too low of an impedance.