"Modern" Bobby Tones

[mkaufman]

For a good example of how compression use can help sustain, check out the video link below. At exactly 1:00, I hit a note and you can hear the effect of the UE700 compressor.

btw...I'd love to know the correct term/word that describes that sound I was getting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgNFGcuL55U

btw...that's Jonarobb on lead.

mk

[Stevo123]

Hey cool slipknot jam! Nice blend.

Definitely seems like you're right about hitting the sweet spot on the power amp side. Wonder exactly how much the speaker breakup and smoothing comes into play there as well.

[strumminsix]

MK, the UE-700 is a standard guitar compressor. Not a limiter compressor like Bobby uses. Different tool.

You cannot control the threshold or limit before compression begins.. I do not hear much compression, just a smidge.

I think Bobby is getting some, and that may help the notes ring out longer but I really think it's more to do with:
1 - high quality amps w/ high quality components
2 - cooking the poweramp tubes which give some natural compression and GREATLY to sustain
3 - stage volume and placement that contribute to sustain

[Stevo123]

I would really love to have an all rack rig with seperate preamp and power amp so I could experiment with some things. But I'm pretty convinced, although I may be wrong, that the breakup from the power section, without significant preamp clipping, is a huge deal. It really sucks it's that all or at least most combo amps are not designed to be able to do this! I know my amp has a narrow margin where the power amp will go get juiced a little with a fairly clean pre, but not enough to get it really screaming on the power amp side.

[strumminsix]

I would really love to have an all rack rig with seperate preamp and power amp so I could experiment with some things. But I'm pretty convinced, although I may be wrong, that the breakup from the power section, without significant preamp clipping, is a huge deal. It really sucks it's that all or at least most combo amps are not designed to be able to do this! I know my amp has a narrow margin where the power amp will go get juiced a little with a fairly clean pre, but not enough to get it really screaming on the power amp side.

It's fun to integrate rack pieces but good Lord does it get heavy to gig with after a while.

Clipping is always always a 3 headed beast:
- speaker
- pre-amp
- poweramp

If you aren't sending a hot signal you'll never clip your speaker and some don't sound good clipped.

A boosted preamp sounds nice but that gets loud or if you have a MV amp you are gonna be cold on the poweramp side

If you lower your signal to the preamp and blast your poweramp you won't get a hot enough signal going in nor that preamp tube warmth and natural compression

Still saying the right sized amp for the room is the key!

[inthedark]

I bought and had work done to a Vox AC15 instead of an AC30 so i can crank it to the sweet spot, like a few other folks mentioned. A lot of his tone def comes from the VOX amp (although he was using Savage amps on last Ratdog tour). Add a little delay (Guyatone), BBE sonic maxizer, BBE boost. Its pretty damn close and its a simple setup. Def gotta say for me i have a lot of trouble even using humbuckers at all, just dont sound right through my setup. Now my G&L Legacy damn that things amazing.

[Stevo123]

I kinda had a breakthrough lately figuring out what exactly is going on with these tones. It isn't so much about preamp vs. power amp distortion like I previously thought.

It has very much to do with setting EQ curve before and after the preamp and/or distortion pedal. One thing that was tricking me was that the tone sounded so incredibly trebly to me that I wasn't realizing just how strong it is in the low-mids and bass. There really is a lot of percussive "thump" which comes somewhat from compression, and a lot from having strong, clean bass present. However, if you run too much bass and low mids before the preamp or distortion pedal, you get too much really hard-clipped "heavy" distortion. You don't have to cut a LOT, but just a little scoop out of the low mid frequencies before the preamp. I leave 100hz flat and scoop between 100 and 500 hz. Then you jack the sh*t out of everything above 1khz. Max it out, +15 db or whatever your EQ pedal goes to. When this hits the preamp and/or distortion pedals, super high frequency harmonics are produced and that is what creates the jangly awesomeness characteristic of his tones. Now the sound will be a bit unbalanced coming out of the preamp, so after this so you have to even it out with the amp's EQ and "add back it" enough bass to give the tone the punch and authority. Run the bass on the amp as high as possible without causing the amp to start distorting the bass frequencies. Mids probably somewhere around 5, too much and it will get too "thick" and lose clarity. With the treble, you'll want to dial it back. If you run it maxed (as I was doing in the past to try to get this tone), its going to be far too harsh since so much was added in before the preamp. So dial it back down to 6 or so.

The rest just comes down to some compression at the front end of the signal path, a phaser/flanger of some sort to wierd things up a bit, a distortion pedal placed just after the intial EQ (before the preamp) for dirtier sounds, and some balance of slap delay and reverb.

Try it out!

[SarnoMusicSolutions]

I had the good fortune a couple of times to stand there with Bobby and AJ to check out the guitar rig. Here's the roadmap, as of last tour.


Guitars - (3) wireless - Lehle 3 into 1 splitter - Steel Guitar Black Box tube buffer - Digi Eleven (amp modeling - VOXAC30?) - Avalon for compression - TC G-Major (stereo fx) - DI to PA system & split off to Savage tube amp driving unmiked speaker cab's. Bi-Filter is placed in the Digi-Eleven Rack loops for certain presets.

Bob uses the Savage or Mesa power amps and speaker cabs for stage gut feel, but that tone does not make it to the PA system. He even turns the cab's backwards now, so it seems that they're just for generating some nice fullness to augment the in-ear monitor experience.

So basically what we hear is this : Black Box tube buffer - Eleven for amp modeling - Avalon for compression - TC for stereo fx - DI to the PA system, and that's it.

Brad

[SarnoMusicSolutions]

IMG_4796.jpg (60.84 KiB) Viewed 877 times

IMG_4791.jpg (68.53 KiB) Viewed 877 times

IMG_4793.jpg (74.21 KiB) Viewed 877 times

[SarnoMusicSolutions]

Command central:

IMG_4798.jpg (71.39 KiB) Viewed 876 times

[Stevo123]

I assume the black box probably plays a big role in preserving and doing cool things with the high frequency content so prominent in his sound?

[SarnoMusicSolutions]

The Black Box is kind of a subtle thing actually. It doesn't really EQ or change the spectrum all that much, but it does harmonically sweeten the highs and dynamically smooth out the feel and the transients making things feel bigger, punchier. Guitar signals love tubes, as we all know. The Black Box is a VERY nice companion to digital modelers. Ideally, Weir would use the Black Box as the first active device, but since he uses wireless transmitters as his first device, the next best place to have the Black Box is right after the wireless receivers, which is essentially where it falls coming right after the Lehle switcher. It does make the highs more silky, still clear and bright, but less hard and edgy.

Weir's quote on the Black Box was this:

I'm loving your Black Box. It's making my guitars explosive. I haven't tried it on my acoustic yet, but I'm giddy with expectation there.


B