Question about blending different amps into one guitar track

[Ezequiel Romanko]

Hi guys i was trying to record guitars for my songs, and i've heard about blending different amps into one guitar track but i don't have a clue how is it done. so if some one can enlight me on this would be great.

PD: I would want to do this with Virtual amps like bias fx 2 or Amplitube since i don't have any real amp with me now.

 

[Rad Synner]

Hi guys i was trying to record guitars for my songs, and i've heard about blending different amps into one guitar track but i don't have a clue how is it done. so if some one can enlight me on this would be great.

PD: I would want to do this with Virtual amps like bias fx 2 or Amplitube since i don't have any real amp with me now.

There's different ways that comes to mind but the simplest one would be to record your track with a DI and when you have the DI track, you will then be able to reamp it either virtually or physically through different amps or plugins and then you will have to start experimenting around to find the tone you are looking for.

As I said, there's other way to do that like recording your guitar track playing the same progression through 2 different amp (that one will require you to be very tight) or also when recording, to do it with a spliter that will send your signal through different amp (that one is mostly when doing recordings with physical gear. Virtually, you can just set up multiple track with the same input).

But yeah, all and all, blending is a great thing but it will require experimentation!!

Let me know if you need more details!

 

[Brian Haner Sr.]

The best way to get a big sound is to record your guitar track - and then pan it hard left. Record another guitar track (same sound) and pan it hard right. That doubles your track and puts you in full stereo. It's impossible to play something exactly the same way twice, so the differences make the guitar sound gigantic. It's done with vocals as well.
As far as two amps go - the easiest way is to record your guitar track direct, (no amps or effects - just the raw sound of the guitar). THEN - copy that raw, direct guitar to another track. Now you have two raw guitar tracks. Run each one through a different amp on Amplitube. Then pan one left and one right to get some separation.
It's easy with Amplitube because the amp and effects are added as "effects" to the raw guitar track.
With AxeFX it's a little harder because you are recording the amp and effects to the actual track. If you know anything about send/return (bussing) then it's easier. You can send the raw track to the AxeFX and then return it to another track and record that. You can do it as many times as you like with different amps.
Hope that helps!
Cheers!
pg

 

[Ed Seith]

#WhatPGSaid

 

[Ezequiel Romanko]

Thank you guys this definitely helped me a lot, tho i still have a question left, so let's say i want to blend 3 amps in to one big guitar track but with the 3 amps on each side of the spectrum, is that factible? if so should i record 3 different DI for each side or just one DI and then do copies of that DI in each side? then i will reamp them with an amp modeler plugin.

 

[Ed Seith]

Not sure what you're going for. Two or three amps running at once (real or virtual) will still just give you one track of guitar with the three amp tones blended into one tone. That won't thicken or fatten anything up, if that's what you're going for. It's still going to "sound" like one guitar track through an amp, it will just be a different-sounding amp because it's a blend of two or three.

 

[David Aceves]

Cool I've been wondering this myself recently. Thanks for the tip gentlemen!

 

[William B.]

awesomeness

 

[Brian Haner Sr.]

Thank you guys this definitely helped me a lot, tho i still have a question left, so let's say i want to blend 3 amps in to one big guitar track but with the 3 amps on each side of the spectrum, is that factible? if so should i record 3 different DI for each side or just one DI and then do copies of that DI in each side? then i will reamp them with an amp modeler plugin.

The best way, is to record your guitar track 2, (or 3) different times, (played exactly the same way). When you copy a track, it's too perfect - BUT - a trick I use if I'm in a big hurry is to copy a raw guitar track and then either move it physically, so it's a split second behind the first track, or put delay on it. If you opt for delay it's important for the delay to be at 100%. No mixing. So ALL you hear is the delayed track. You'll have to mess with the delay time to find the sweet spot. (but it's usually just a few milliseconds. It doesn't take much).Again, when the first track is panned left and the delayed track is panned right, it's easy to hear when it's "right". It just sounds huge.
So to actually answer your question - it's totally scalable. 3 amps per side. I would probably go with the same 3 amps. So amp 1 - left & right, then amp 2, left and right, etc. And I would play all 6 tracks individually - no copying.
Not sure I would go with 6 different amps. That's a lot of conflicting frequencies. Might end up being super mushy. More is not necessarily better.
Each track needs to have a purpose. Maybe one amp is fully saturated and heavy in the mids, the second amp is dirty with a lot of low end, and the third amp clean to add definition and highs. Or better still, an acoustic guitar. You'd be amazed at how many great rock tracks have a tiny bit of acoustic mixed in with the heavy guitars to add dimension and definition.
When you think big, don't just consider numbers (amount of amps), think about covering the frequency spectrum. Maybe turn down the mids on one guitar and boost the mids on the second guitar, etc. You can do A LOT of damage (in a good way) with very few tracks. Also consider different amounts of gain. Heavy saturation mixed with clean makes a guitar sound 3-D. So there is depth. Not just left and right, but near and far as well.
Another mistake a lot of guitar players make is saturation. If you listen to isolated guitar tracks from your favorite songs - they're never as saturated as you think. A little dirt goes a long way.
Hope that helps!

 

[Rad Synner]

The best way, is to record your guitar track 2, (or 3) different times, (played exactly the same way). When you copy a track, it's too perfect - BUT - a trick I use if I'm in a big hurry is to copy a raw guitar track and then either move it physically, so it's a split second behind the first track, or put delay on it. If you opt for delay it's important for the delay to be at 100%. No mixing. So ALL you hear is the delayed track. You'll have to mess with the delay time to find the sweet spot. (but it's usually just a few milliseconds. It doesn't take much).Again, when the first track is panned left and the delayed track is panned right, it's easy to hear when it's "right". It just sounds huge.
So to actually answer your question - it's totally scalable. 3 amps per side. I would probably go with the same 3 amps. So amp 1 - left & right, then amp 2, left and right, etc. And I would play all 6 tracks individually - no copying.
Not sure I would go with 6 different amps. That's a lot of conflicting frequencies. Might end up being super mushy. More is not necessarily better.
Each track needs to have a purpose. Maybe one amp is fully saturated and heavy in the mids, the second amp is dirty with a lot of low end, and the third amp clean to add definition and highs. Or better still, an acoustic guitar. You'd be amazed at how many great rock tracks have a tiny bit of acoustic mixed in with the heavy guitars to add dimension and definition.
When you think big, don't just consider numbers (amount of amps), think about covering the frequency spectrum. Maybe turn down the mids on one guitar and boost the mids on the second guitar, etc. You can do A LOT of damage (in a good way) with very few tracks. Also consider different amounts of gain. Heavy saturation mixed with clean makes a guitar sound 3-D. So there is depth. Not just left and right, but near and far as well.
Another mistake a lot of guitar players make is saturation. If you listen to isolated guitar tracks from your favorite songs - they're never as saturated as you think. A little dirt goes a long way.
Hope that helps!

Just to add on specifically to the last part: Bass plays a huge role as well in the tone which is why it's good for your guitar tone to not overlap too much on the low frequencies so you leave room for the bass to come in and complement the guitar

 

[Calvin Phillips]

A lot of my recordings have 2 rhythm panned left and right. Each take is a different rhythm tone. I have 1 left and 1 right. To give you an example of how it sounds on the end. You cant tell whennkts all together but kne time is thicker then the other and I feel it gave my recordings added flavour. Worth playing around with to find your sound.

 

[Ezequiel Romanko]

The best way, is to record your guitar track 2, (or 3) different times, (played exactly the same way). When you copy a track, it's too perfect - BUT - a trick I use if I'm in a big hurry is to copy a raw guitar track and then either move it physically, so it's a split second behind the first track, or put delay on it. If you opt for delay it's important for the delay to be at 100%. No mixing. So ALL you hear is the delayed track. You'll have to mess with the delay time to find the sweet spot. (but it's usually just a few milliseconds. It doesn't take much).Again, when the first track is panned left and the delayed track is panned right, it's easy to hear when it's "right". It just sounds huge.
So to actually answer your question - it's totally scalable. 3 amps per side. I would probably go with the same 3 amps. So amp 1 - left & right, then amp 2, left and right, etc. And I would play all 6 tracks individually - no copying.
Not sure I would go with 6 different amps. That's a lot of conflicting frequencies. Might end up being super mushy. More is not necessarily better.
Each track needs to have a purpose. Maybe one amp is fully saturated and heavy in the mids, the second amp is dirty with a lot of low end, and the third amp clean to add definition and highs. Or better still, an acoustic guitar. You'd be amazed at how many great rock tracks have a tiny bit of acoustic mixed in with the heavy guitars to add dimension and definition.
When you think big, don't just consider numbers (amount of amps), think about covering the frequency spectrum. Maybe turn down the mids on one guitar and boost the mids on the second guitar, etc. You can do A LOT of damage (in a good way) with very few tracks. Also consider different amounts of gain. Heavy saturation mixed with clean makes a guitar sound 3-D. So there is depth. Not just left and right, but near and far as well.
Another mistake a lot of guitar players make is saturation. If you listen to isolated guitar tracks from your favorite songs - they're never as saturated as you think. A little dirt goes a long way.
Hope that helps!

Thank you so much for this info, i never thought in that way, to add different things with different amps or even a clean tone, i guess i missed the purpose of blending amps but now it's all clear! also it's recomendable to play even on a different guitar on other tracks for rythm or is it better for lead doubled parts?

 

[Ezequiel Romanko]

I've heard about it from Fred Archambault, in the Avenged's albums he doubled the lead parts with different guitars to wider the spectrum, but i don't know if that can be applied to rythm parts too

 

[Brian Haner Sr.]

Thank you so much for this info, i never thought in that way, to add different things with different amps or even a clean tone, i guess i missed the purpose of blending amps but now it's all clear! also it's recomendable to play even on a different guitar on other tracks for rythm or is it better for lead doubled parts?

Absolutely. I almost always use different guitars playing the same part. Mostly for rhythm. But definitely experiment with leads as well.

 

[Calvin Phillips]

Thank you so much for this info, i never thought in that way, to add different things with different amps or even a clean tone, i guess i missed the purpose of blending amps but now it's all clear! also it's recomendable to play even on a different guitar on other tracks for rythm or is it better for lead doubled parts?

I believe van Halen did a lot of the left raw guitar right side all reverb. I saw it in Rick's beatos video on one of their songs. It really does make it wider.

 

[Ezequiel Romanko]

Absolutely. I almost always use different guitars playing the same part. Mostly for rhythm. But definitely experiment with leads as well.

Thank you i will try it to see what it sounds like

 

[DXMG503]

I have the same question, but I’m wondering what are some of the basic fundamental concepts for blending amps for building guitar tone?

For example:
-Are there basic EQ curves you should sculpt for each amp so that they fit together properly (Maybe scooping one, and making the other mid heavy or something like that)?
-Is blending amps always a case of one higher gain amp for the body plus a low gain amp to increase the punch and cut through?
-Are blended amps always multi-tracked and treated as two tracks, or is it more common for them to be used as 1 track?

I spent some time recording in a studio once where two high gain amps were blended, but it honestly just sounded fuzzy and muddy after - wasn’t that great.

 

[William B.]

what if 3 amps, 1 for bass 1 for mid and 1 for treble.