Modeling vs Tube amps live

[roodyrocker]

Traitor!

Burn him!!!

That wouldn't work, I would simply retaliate with my ESP Flamming Skull guitar

[RacerX]

I would simply retaliate with my ESP Flamming Skull guitar

Italian battery skull? :think:

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[Hellbat]

Hey, lets keep it civil and try to minimize the flamming here guys...

[xenophobe]

And of course, everything I'm saying is from my personal perspective and observations in a somewhat limited variety of music.

When you start talking mainstream music... I'm clueless. I've almost always played some kind of extreme metal and have even gone into bars with messed up and old PA systems and had to figure all that crap out, soundcheck all the bands and setup, play. I haven't played anything big or huge, but I've gigged my share of bass and guitar.

I've also seen my share of fucked up rigs that surprisingly sounded decent, as well as those that just sucked.

I still think a players natural tone trumps the difference between tube or solid state.

[VitaminG]

Italian battery skull? :think:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]4480[/ATTACH]

buh-bowww

He said Flamming, not Fiamming.

This is flamming

[Twitch]

Alright JG. I have the Spidervalve HD100 MKII. I used it live for about 6 months (I still have it, just dont play out anymore). Out of all the amps Ive had, Marshall, ENGL, Randall, Peavey, list goes on, the MKII was the only amp that sounded the way I felt it should sound day in day out, venue to venue. However, I didnt use it to imitate, I set it up to have the tone I wanted. We were an original band, so our tone is what we were after. Now I dont know about other modeling products, but the Spidervalve had no issue being its own amp and standing up with the true all tube or SS amps. Dont get me wrong though, the patches I use took hours and hours to dial in to where I was really happy with them. The Spidervalve is NOT a plug and play amp if you want it to truly come into its own. That being said, the tweaking time is worth the effort once youre done(if such a thing can be said, I still tweak with new patches based off of the original 2 I came up with, another bonus to a modeling amp).

All this being said, we played with a band once where one guitarist was using the FX2 with a patch based off the PB, the other guitarist actually had a real life PB. The guy with the real life PB sounded way better. Was it the other guys tweaking skills or was the real flesh and blood amp just that much better? Dont know.

[jgcable]

Alright JG. I have the Spidervalve HD100 MKII. I used it live for about 6 months (I still have it, just dont play out anymore). Out of all the amps Ive had, Marshall, ENGL, Randall, Peavey, list goes on, the MKII was the only amp that sounded the way I felt it should sound day in day out, venue to venue. However, I didnt use it to imitate, I set it up to have the tone I wanted. We were an original band, so our tone is what we were after. Now I dont know about other modeling products, but the Spidervalve had no issue being its own amp and standing up with the true all tube or SS amps. Dont get me wrong though, the patches I use took hours and hours to dial in to where I was really happy with them. The Spidervalve is NOT a plug and play amp if you want it to truly come into its own. That being said, the tweaking time is worth the effort once youre done(if such a thing can be said, I still tweak with new patches based off of the original 2 I came up with, another bonus to a modeling amp).

All this being said, we played with a band once where one guitarist was using the FX2 with a patch based off the PB, the other guitarist actually had a real life PB. The guy with the real life PB sounded way better. Was it the other guys tweaking skills or was the real flesh and blood amp just that much better? Dont know.

Thanks for the response bro. I saw a band recently where the guitar player was playing a spidervalve HD100 MK II half stack. The band was fantastic. They were playing mainly Dio and Accept covers. The only thing I thought was lacking was the guitar presence. The tone was there, his chops were spot on. The problem was the amp just didn't have enough presence to my ears. I was with 3 other musicians from my band and we all thought the same thing. We all said.. imagine how good this guy would sound if he was using a real amp like a Rectifier or a Marshall JCM or even a DSL or TSL.
Of course.. I owned a Spidervalve (would you expect anything else!!) and I though it was an outstanding amp until I brought it out for a gig and it just got shit on terribly by the other guitar player and his tube amp. I still think its a great amp.
Regarding a real Powerball live... holy crap. Amazing. One of the best amps I have ever heard live was a Frayette VHT. Incredible. Also.. the Bogner Ecstacy 101B. But.. the overall best metal guitar tone I have ever heard live was at Daytona Beach Bike week 2007. There was a band playing outside in a giant parking lot on the main strip. The guitar player had 2 full stacks of Marshall cabs and was powering them with a Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier. It was GOD type guitar tone. It ripped right through your body. He was playing with a massive amount of stage volume. Thats when I knew for sure that I needed to get out of the modeling amp business. Up until then I was totally sold on it.

[markD]

He was playing with a massive amount of stage volume.

THAT is the issue as far as i am concerned. to my ears, the modelling amps don't start sounding better as you crank themn - they start sounding shrill and farty. almost EVERY local "B list" original band around the bay area uses a spidervalve half-stack. most, if not all of them, sound like ass when cranked through the PA. i don't know anything about that amp - maybe it would sound better if the soundman took a cab simulated line out instead of micing the cab...beats me. i just know the amps don't sound "right".

now, the other "A list" original bands in the area often have guitarists equipped with tube amps - usually 5150 or a JCM800-900, sometimes a recto. the power and thickness of the guitar is LIGHT YEARS beyond those "B list" guitarists. it is quite surprising.

on a side note, my band almost exclusively opens for national, touring acts. NONE of the bands we have played with over the last 6 years has used a modelling amp. the only guitarist i have played with live that hasn't used a marshall, mesa, fender or orange amp is tracii guns. he was using the solid state DIME amps. he had 4 of them. they sounded pretty damn good for a cheap solid-state amp - but again, he plays with so much chorus it didn't matter.

we are opening for kamelot in sept. i am curious to see what thom youngblood will be using. i heard he uses an ampeg VH140C head, but i have also heard he uses a triple rec. at one point i saw them and he was using a line 6 HD147...again, i will be curious.

[Axegrinder87]

I use the Mesa Dual Rec model on my patches, not because I'm trying to emulate, but because that's what I liked the best. Playing alongside my other guitarists REAL Dual Rec, I have a much more usable mid range that just kills. I've tweaked his Mesa for at least an hour trying to get the same tone but couldn't. I think it's like Twitch said, the Line6 just has it's own sound, regardless of emulation.

Slightly off topic, but I've got a demo gig coming up with Orange Amps, and I'll be playing through Oranges, and I'm scared shitless. Especially considering the potential endorsement. Not too comfortable with doing a whole gig through a different amp, not to mention I have no pedals, and use all the onboard effects.

[jgcable]

I use the Mesa Dual Rec model on my patches, not because I'm trying to emulate, but because that's what I liked the best. Playing alongside my other guitarists REAL Dual Rec, I have a much more usable mid range that just kills. I've tweaked his Mesa for at least an hour trying to get the same tone but couldn't. I think it's like Twitch said, the Line6 just has it's own sound, regardless of emulation.

Slightly off topic, but I've got a demo gig coming up with Orange Amps, and I'll be playing through Oranges, and I'm scared shitless. Especially considering the potential endorsement. Not too comfortable with doing a whole gig through a different amp, not to mention I have no pedals, and use all the onboard effects.

You may be very surprised on how good a high end high gain tube amp sounds live with nothing other than a guitar plugged in. Thats the other issue I have with modeling amps. You need to add a ton of "schmutz" before they sound good. A dry tone out of a modeling amp is horrible.
You may really dig the Orange amps. They get incredible reviews. I have never heard one live. Most of the guitar players in the big popular groups around here
use Marshall, Mesa, VHT, Engl, Fender and Peavey. The 5150 is very popular with the metal bands around here.

[jgcable]

THAT is the issue as far as i am concerned. to my ears, the modelling amps don't start sounding better as you crank themn - they start sounding shrill and farty. almost EVERY local "B list" original band around the bay area uses a spidervalve half-stack. most, if not all of them, sound like ass when cranked through the PA. i don't know anything about that amp - maybe it would sound better if the soundman took a cab simulated line out instead of micing the cab...beats me. i just know the amps don't sound "right".

now, the other "A list" original bands in the area often have guitarists equipped with tube amps - usually 5150 or a JCM800-900, sometimes a recto. the power and thickness of the guitar is LIGHT YEARS beyond those "B list" guitarists. it is quite surprising.

on a side note, my band almost exclusively opens for national, touring acts. NONE of the bands we have played with over the last 6 years has used a modelling amp. the only guitarist i have played with live that hasn't used a marshall, mesa, fender or orange amp is tracii guns. he was using the solid state DIME amps. he had 4 of them. they sounded pretty damn good for a cheap solid-state amp - but again, he plays with so much chorus it didn't matter.

we are opening for kamelot in sept. i am curious to see what thom youngblood will be using. i heard he uses an ampeg VH140C head, but i have also heard he uses a triple rec. at one point i saw them and he was using a line 6 HD147...again, i will be curious.

Well said. I agree 100%

[Chief_CrazyTalk]

Heh, I always thought it was stupid when recruiters based their assessment on the answer to questions like that (you know, some favorite trick question that they think is really clever). I'd rather hear the reasoning behind whatever answers I get. That tells me more about the person I'm considering hiring. For example, I wouldn't hire somebody who make gross generalizations without being able to back them up.

Just curious, what is your dream job? There aren't many jobs left in analog hardware, especially not anything to do with signal processing as we are discussing here. I imagine that in some parts of communication (e.g., antenna design, front-ends) electroacoustics (e.g., loudspeakers) and power electronics there are still some jobs.

As for simple, in many cases today, the simplest (and cheapest) solution is to use some standard digital platform and a standard algorithm. What is simple also depends on your point of view. A friend of mine just bought a Laney Ironheart. I was surprised to learn that it has a builtin digital reverb rather than a spring reverb.

I work in oil and gas drilling and exploration. In Texas. Enough said...lol.

[javert]

I work in oil and gas drilling and exploration. In Texas. Enough said...lol.

Ah, interesting. In Norway, many signal processing people are involved with the oil business, but not here for some reason. I always thought geophysics was interesting but never got into it.

[javert]

About the whole volume thing, one thing to consider is that if you take the same sound a play it louder, its perceived characteristics will change due to the nonlinearities of the human auditory system. For example, it usually leads to a perceived loss of low and high end when something is played back softer than it was produced for. Similarly, high frequencies that may be inaudible when played back at bedroom levels may become audible when the volume is cranked to band practice or show volues, and hence the sound becomes "shrill". This is why many high-end stereos have some form of loudness equalization/compensation built in. This is, though, well-known and should also be done by modelers, but I don't recall seeing any settings about playback SPL, so it probably isn't at the moment.

[xenophobe]

I've found I prefer EMGs on tube amps and passives on solid state. I find that SS has far less headroom when going for modern high gain sounds and on tube amps I get the sound I like with EMGs. Then again, I could just be really baked