Ask A Sound Guy

Big Red Button is our weekly recording advice column.  Check it out every for tips on all things recording.

 So you’ve practiced and practiced and you’re finally feeling ready to record that killer guitar line for your next track.  …You did practice…right?

Well, even if you didn’t (and I think you always should before recording), here’s some tips to get you started.  

Use Your Ears

Seems kind of stupid, but the best way to get the recording RIGHT is to listen.  

Setup your amp, plug in with a long cord and start playing.  Walk around your room and really listen to how the amp sounds from different distances.  Stand up, sit down, get close, move away, try everything.  Move your amp around the room, it makes a bigger difference than you think.  If you’ve got a smaller amp, try placing it on a table or other sturdy piece of furniture.  You can also try putting rugs underneath the amp an pillows behind it.  Try to find a place in your room and a setup that sound good to you.  

OK, so you might be asking, “What am I supposed to be listening for?”  Well I try to listen for things like, am I getting enough bass/treble?  Are the effects too much or too little?  Is the part sounding clear, or is it muddy and hard to determine notes? Am hearing too much street/AC/dishwasher/roommate noise?

Now when you find some setups that sound good to you, remember where your head was, literally.  Here’s a little insight into how a lot of sound guys think about miking things.  Our mics are like ears.  Each one kind of “hears” things differently, and just like an ear, moving it around really changes what it hears.  So to start out, try putting your mic where your ear was happy.  It’s not always the most obvious choice, and doesn’t always end up getting used in the end, but try it out.  

I’ve come up with some weird, cool, terrible, awesome results with this “technique.”  And Artists tend to like getting recordings that actually sound like what they’re hearing when they play.  

If That Fails

Other times, I tend to go with the old stand-by of a dynamic cardioid mic close up on the front of the amp.  Still, even in these scenarios using your ear helps. Get down on the ground and listen to your amp (someone else will probably have to playing through it) and move your head around the front of the amp.  Note: Try not to get too close to really loud amp, it doesn’t take much to damage your ears.

Generally you’ll find that as you get closer to the center of a speaker cone you’ll hear more high-end and more sizzle/hum/buzz amp noise.  This tends to get you a more aggressive, harsh tone. As you move towards the outer rim of the speaker you’ll start to hear more bass, and you start to get a more mellow, “round” tone.  

Tip: If you can’t see  the speaker cones on your amp through the try shining a flashlight at an angle on the amp front and it’ll generally help you see through the fabric. 

If your amp has multiple speaker cones, definitely listen to each one, because speakers are kind of like people.  Each one has some slight difference that might or might not be what you’re looking for.  

Funky Stuff

Now if you’re looking for a funky, wonky, or experimental sound, there’s a WORLD of possibilities.  And don’t rule these out, especially if you’ve got a lot of guitar tracks stacked up, because sometime the weird recording sits better in your mix than the standard “proper” approach.

Port miking is one of my favorite weird things to try.  A lot amps, especially bass amps and guitar amps with closed backs, have sizable holes in their front, sides or even backs, that are usually designed to let more bass frequencies out.  The sizing of the port tends to determine what frequencies escape the amp casing through the hole.  

Sticking a mic in front of that will get you some weird results, and sometimes give you that lowest part of your “wall of sound” if you’re guitar track stacking.  You might even try some kick drum mics to capture more of that low end.

If you want some other weird tones, try sticking a mic around the back of your amp. Get in there and point it at some corners inside the amp, or at the back of the speaker cones, etc.  At this point, you might as well try anything and everything. 

Lastly, my favorite weird thing to do is putting the amp itself in a weird place.  Try your bathroom, kitchen or garage (rooms that tend to have more hard,reflective surfaces) to get more bright reverberant sounds.  If you’ve got your own dryer (or your landlord doesn’t care/find out) try playing your amp towards an open front-loading dryer with the mic facing into the dryer just outside opening.  Get ready for weird $@#! to happen.  

Don’t Forget…

To get good recordings, you’ve got to put in the time, and really try things out.  And as always, listen as you’re trying.  Until next week, happy sound-hunting!