Recording Recipes: Electric Guitars

[dolivas]

sorry to rip off Jared's post but it's a good idea.

How about instant Whale Guitar sound:

1. Take a guitar preferably a trebly-sounding humbuck type.
2. Plug it in to a fuzz box.
3. Plug said fuzz box into a mini amp like a Pignose or a Marshall MS2.
4. Set up some mini condensers in an acoustic mic fashion.
a) one pointing to the mini amp
b) one above your back pointing down to the vicinity of the guitar/amp.
5. Play some chords or notes on the guitar and quickly with your picking hand hover the mini amp near the pickups.
6. Watch those strings vibrate like an e-bow and you get controlled feedback by hovering your mini amp back and forth...
7. Having your mini amp at full blast helps the effect. You can control the swell with your guitar's volume knob or moving the distance from the mini amp and the pickups.

[Jared Kubokawa]

Hey no problem dolivas. The more the merrier. Does anyone remember the urban legend of how they discovered the first distorted guitar sound? Feel free to add to this story but apparently it goes something like this:

A group of poor traveling musicians were loading gear into a show (no way! poor musicians?) and the guitar player happened to drop his amp out of the vehicle snagging the speaker along the way. The paper in the speaker ripped wide open. The musicians were too pressed for money and time to get it replaced before the show so they just went with it. And suddenly out of the clumsiness of a guitar player who can't load his own gear (also unheard of) a revolution occurred and resonant distortion was born. All the best things are accidents, your mother can attest to that.

So why not go back to the original?

Torn Speakers ala mode:

I've used a cabinet with a torn 12” speaker when I needed an especially trashy sound (most of the time) - the tone of a torn speaker isn’t easily emulated with electronics, nor is it desirable to try when you’ve got the real thing. If you're having that not-so-fresh feeling, you can always re-amp the torn speaker by running the original guitar track out of the board, into the torn cab/amp and putting a mic on it. Then you can keep the original signal to tape and have the torn speaker to blend with, like ice cream on hot apple pie. MMmmm...

[Jared Kubokawa]

Tired of listening to your roommate and his girlfriend late into the night? Well there's no fix for that, other than pounding on the wall--and that's a big maybe, but you can use the idea and the furnace vents for your recordings. Of course, don't record them...

I’ve never been satisfied with electronic reverbs, particularly the ones I can afford. I've used this technique once so I'm sure there's lots of variations to be had, but I found that micing a furnace register upstairs with performers downstairs gives a nice "canned" reverb. Or if you don't have an upstairs/downstairs, use one end of the house and the other, or mic the bathroom vent. You might need to hang a sign on the door though, "Stay out unless you want your movements recorded. Love, Me Ps. I'll get you money for the gas bill soon. Promise."

[GearJunkie]

oh man, don't get me started on weird guitar noises.

guitar--> crybaby---> mxr blue box--> light distortion: Instant TB-303 for guitar (complete with filter cutoff)

guitar---> light OD with mids boosted---> big muff (or any other over the top distortion---> light delay: instant sustainable feedback.

guitar---> phaser of choice---> octavia fuzz: obsenely bizarre "solo" fuzz.

guitar---> whammy pedal (set to two octaves down): done fast enough can sound like a tape machine being turned off.


why am I giving away all my fun noises on my board? meh.

[Nubus]

I liked doing overdub tracks with the amp in the live room and the guitarist playing to the monitors. It's a cool way to get feedback, probably because of the high res monitor. Seems to be super-contrallable and can get squealie

[smopo24]

If you have a double-necked guitar, plug in and record using the 12-string neck active, and play using the open notes on the 6-string neck; the sympathetic strings vibrate. It sounds pretty cool.

[dolivas]

Nashville Tuning/12-string on a 6-string.

1. Buy a 12-string electric guitar string pack only use the regular high E-B strings for the high E and B string.

2. However for the lower E-A-D-G strings use the higher octave strings.

3. All the "lower" strings are just one octave higher, the lower E is tuned two octaves.

4. Instant, jangle!!! Works best if you double up a recording or playing with a regular strung guitar.

[smopo24]

Originally Posted by dolivas

Nashville Tuning/12-string on a 6-string.

1. Buy a 12-string electric guitar string pack only use the regular high E-B strings for the high E and B string.

2. However for the lower E-A-D-G strings use the higher octave strings.

3. All the "lower" strings are just one octave higher, the lower E is tuned two octaves.

4. Instant, jangle!!! Works best if you double up a recording or playing with a regular strung guitar.

I did something similar myself with a capo. Record one track, tune down half a step, put a capo on the first fret, then tune back up, and overdub. It sounded kinda cool when i did it last time.

[dolivas]

Originally Posted by smopo24

I did something similar myself with a capo. Record one track, tune down half a step, put a capo on the first fret, then tune back up, and overdub. It sounded kinda cool when i did it last time.

Easier than that would be to put a capo on the 12th fret and record that part then overdub over that a standard non-capoed part. All of this in standard tuning.

[smopo24]

Originally Posted by dolivas

Easier than that would be to put a capo on the 12th fret and record that part then overdub over that a standard non-capoed part. All of this in standard tuning.

Easier, depending on if you find it easier to play the same chords on the higher frets; with my way, you won't have to worry about that.