I had a long recording session yesterday. We have several amps at our studio. After trying them all out with all kinds of mic's ranging from $100.00 to $2000.00 with a bunch of cabinets ranging from vintage Vin 30 equipt 1960A's from the 80's, 5150 cabs and Mesa cabs we settled on:
Rhythm track 1: Marshall DSL100 through a Mesa Boogie 3/4 back cab w/90w Black Shadow using a Shure SM57 off axis.
Rhythm track 2: Soldano SP77 through the same cab and mic.
Rhythm fill track 1: Vetta using the Marshall JPM-1 (Spinal Puppet) model through the same cab and mic.
We found that the Vetta didn't sound the best live in the room but it sounded fantastic mic'd at the console. Its hard to explain. It sounded a tiny bit processed when standing in front of the speaker but at the console listening to it mic'd, it sounded more real than the real amps and it was set on the JPM-1 preamp setting. Go figure.
The Marshall DSL100 (I know how much everybody hates them), sounds killer recorded. Just dial in some basic settings and you are good to go. Its simple. I really like that amp for both recording and live use.
The Soldano filled in all of the spaces that were lacking in the DSL100 track. It has more "grain" to it and makes the DSL100 sound more agressive when its blended in.
The blend of the Soldano, Marshall and the Vetta (JMP1) really gave us that 80's high gain metal tone which is exactly what we were after.
We haven't figured out what to use for the guitar solo's but we are leaning towards the Soldano. I played all the rhythm tracks with the gain on 6. We were thinking about turning up the gain and cranking the amp up for the solo tracks. I also want to try out the Vetta and the POD.
We didn't use the block letter 5150 or the 5150II because they both sounded too harsh and agressive for what we were looking for.
Having a Vetta in the studio is outstanding. We were able to scroll through amp and cabinet models until we found the exact tone we were looking for. It ended up being the Marshall JMP-1. It has an instantly identifiable 80's high gain metal tone very similar to Iron Maiden's tone.
Rhythm track 1: Marshall DSL100 through a Mesa Boogie 3/4 back cab w/90w Black Shadow using a Shure SM57 off axis.
Rhythm track 2: Soldano SP77 through the same cab and mic.
Rhythm fill track 1: Vetta using the Marshall JPM-1 (Spinal Puppet) model through the same cab and mic.
We found that the Vetta didn't sound the best live in the room but it sounded fantastic mic'd at the console. Its hard to explain. It sounded a tiny bit processed when standing in front of the speaker but at the console listening to it mic'd, it sounded more real than the real amps and it was set on the JPM-1 preamp setting. Go figure.
The Marshall DSL100 (I know how much everybody hates them), sounds killer recorded. Just dial in some basic settings and you are good to go. Its simple. I really like that amp for both recording and live use.
The Soldano filled in all of the spaces that were lacking in the DSL100 track. It has more "grain" to it and makes the DSL100 sound more agressive when its blended in.
The blend of the Soldano, Marshall and the Vetta (JMP1) really gave us that 80's high gain metal tone which is exactly what we were after.
We haven't figured out what to use for the guitar solo's but we are leaning towards the Soldano. I played all the rhythm tracks with the gain on 6. We were thinking about turning up the gain and cranking the amp up for the solo tracks. I also want to try out the Vetta and the POD.
We didn't use the block letter 5150 or the 5150II because they both sounded too harsh and agressive for what we were looking for.
Having a Vetta in the studio is outstanding. We were able to scroll through amp and cabinet models until we found the exact tone we were looking for. It ended up being the Marshall JMP-1. It has an instantly identifiable 80's high gain metal tone very similar to Iron Maiden's tone.
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