jimmarchi1's forum posts 8022

If I'm ever in Texas again I'll have to come to a show. I'm a huge pilots fan.

Well, if it's just a mutron and not the ehx microsynth you could try a current production ehx octave multiplexer or a POG for a more modern take... but the ehx multiplexer has a really similar circuit to the old mutron octave divider... mutron is back and there's also the original designer's mu-fx from a few years back but their reissues are very expensive. I believe behringer has cloned most or all of the mutron pedals including the octave. I can't speak to the quality but a cheap copy finally exists and will be about 100 clams like everything from behringer city China.

Ehx still makes the bass microsynth.

Or you could invest in a line6 multifx box that models these stomps like HX stomp or the older pedal modelers which I think sounded close enough for bar gigs. Obviously make sure it models the right pedals and try it out first.

Personally I have never been slavishly devoted to recreating album sounds when I cover a song. In fact I usually go the other way and want my band to make it our own. If your band mates are insistent then tell them all to chip in to buy you the right pedals. They will probably feel less persnickety when it's their money and not yours lol. Or you'll wind up with a free toy... friends are always giving me shit. Ya gotta embrace it and also pay it forward sometimes.

Good luck!

I hear it now. Robert has a bass micro synth and an old mutron octave divider according to our page for him, so its 1 or both of those. The octave sections are similar in design but the mixrosynth has a resonant filter after it modulated by an envelope detector and an lfo. That's the most likely to my ear. It's dialed in subtly but it seems like there's more happening than the mutron can do on its own... I think hes got the ehx on his board specifically for that intro and that's the sole effect employed in front if his SVT. It could be the mutron though, that's a wild sounding box though.

If you use google drive that's usually how I do things for overseas projects... get the whole project folder with audio zipped and copied to your drive and share it with me. I'll download it to my working drive, unzip and make sure the ableton project opens right. It should. We're on the same version. My email is my equipboard username at gmail. Leave your panning up so I can kinda get an idea what you're thinking for stereo balance. You can probably disable compression and eq unless its something with a heavy handed special effect quality. Once i hear the roughs I'll probably email you with some questions and options.

I'm pretty sure that's post production processing. Its way more subtle than a guitar effect. There's something hapodj about ng but it's pretty refined. I think I still have Dean's email and could see if he remembers.

These guys don't have big pedalboards. What is it Robert's doing in the beginning that you're asking about? I just listened to it last night and I'm hearing a p bass and over driving ampeg with a di track that's p ett processed for extra bottom. What am I missing?

Let me get back to you when I'm in my studio again. I need to reacquaint myself with the bass sound on accurate speakers. After the first 2 records they got elaborate with their studio instruments & gear and also really indulged in a lot of post production wizardry.

It might not be our front of an amp. could be a mix effect like a dbx subharmonic synthesizer or aphex big bottom or even a H3000 in octave down applied to a DI bass track that's filtered and tucked under a traditional microphone on a bass cabinet.

Good luck to you. If you want beta testers, count me in! I'll put your prototype through its paces.

Don't neglect a traditional midi DIN connection (maybe put 2 or 3 parallel outs for those who don't own a midi patchbay or distributor wishing to manipulate various synths simultaneously), it's way more stable than USB and doesn't require a host... and a lot of us use pre-USB gear anyway. If you do mini midi on 1/8" trs connectors please provide a switch to go from the now standard korg pinout to the novation pinout. I wouldn't complain if you put a bunch of CV outputs on it. A lot of next gen midi gear neglects the modular crowd.

Let me know if I can beta test for 30 days. And don't forget to incorporate if you're planning to market your invention.

Dusty is sorely missed... Frank Beard doesn't wear a beard.

You didn't read all the bold. low into high is okay on solid state, but always match a tube amplifier

Advanced info for people with a little experience, understanding and a good attention span: impedance matching devices that are robust enough to use safely at high wattage contain high voltage transformers and will cost more than a speaker swap. You may be thinking you could solder a $1 flame proof high wattage resistor with the same ohm rating as the speaker in series or parallel with the speaker to double or halve the impedance while cutting your output power in half. Just don't try something like this unless you're an experienced tech or can afford to blow up an amp as a learning experience. If you have to mismatch a tube amp keep in mind that it will probably blow if you plug it into a lower impedance speaker than its rated output impedance and it might blow if you go into a higher impedance. A solid state amp loses output power driving a higher impedance but a tube amp tends to produce more power, so if your speakers don't have the power handling for a good 3x the amp's rated wattage you will melt the voice coils, the load on your output transformer will go open or short and your amp will blow up.

Most modern tube amps offer at least 2 common speaker impedance rated output taps on different jacks or a selector switch. Utilize this on stage to match your amp. Be aware of the impedance setting and cabinet ratings before taking a tube amp out of standby. If the amp does not have a standby, verifyall speaker connections and impedances before powering on. Tube(valve) equipment contains lethal voltage even when unplugged!!!!

so to sum up don't mismatch a tube(valve) amp, don't run solid state amps into a speaker rated BELOW the amp's minimum rated impedance, don't scrww around with resistors to match speakers to any amp and don't use a passive impdance matching device unless you really trust the manufacturer and never rely on a cheap or flimsy device regardless of the device's or manufacturer's internet reputation... and don't restate half of what I said unless you're trying to get some kids electrocuted, the bit you picked out was conditional. Do exercise caution and ALWAYS respect the ability of electricity to kill humans and light fires. DO OBTAIN THE OWNERS MANUAL TO YOUR AMPLIFIER AND READ IT UNTIL YOU UNDERSTAND THE CONDITIONS IT WAS DESIGNED TO OPERATE UNDER!

I have been dealing with amplifiers for 30 years... if you haven't, heed the bold print in all of my posts. The non-bold is purely information and should only be applied by people with general electronics knowledge.

For how long should a request for adding artist be reviewed?

In theory, moderators have the ability to approve these requests, but there's been a bug, at least for my account, where my approvals don't go through. Who is the artist you are trying to add?

I can't approve artist adds either. I never really worried about it because at this point all the artists I've heard of have been added. The modern music scene is too bewildering to me. We really need to get some of these bugs cleared up. I was really close to throwing in the towel on equipboard recently but decided to stick it out. I mean, if I stopped coming on this message board people would probably get some mythology fed to them and wind up electrocuting themselves.

Yes, technically but no... waste of money in this instance ... an impedance matching device here will either cost as much (or more than) a matched speaker and/or throw away the same amount of power as running low into high, give or take a couple watts.

The rule if thumb is "low into high and your amp shouldn't fry, high into low will definitely blow"

However, tube (valve) amp users should only use speakers matched to the rated impedance(s) on the amp's output. not all output transformers are created equal, even from unit to unit in the same batch. I don't care that weber makes an impedance matching box. Just don't. If you can afford a tube amp you can afford (a) matched speaker(s). Mist modern amps offer 3 different transformer secondary windings (4, 8 and 16 ohm taps) on a switch or on different speaker jacks.

Bridget, while you're not technically wrong you're making it more complicated than it has to be. The OP is buying solid state. An 8ohm source goes into 16 fine from a solid state amp. It's a minimum 8ohm rating on the amp and the speaker's 16ohm rating is a nominal load. Fine in solid state. Fine.

Well that's so broad. Basically anything that was on the radio when a genXer or a younger boomer grew u... and I guess older millennials too. If I were a boomer or millennial I'd be offended but I'm just mildly bemused.

I had a feeling you were young enough to be my kid. I don't know what dad rock is supposed to mean so I can't take offense. I was just out making noise with some friends friday, some of whom are dads too, and between jams we were listening to Alec Empire's generation star wars... so I guess anything can be dad rock.

Did you ever try to contact the guitarists from Duster?

I listened to stratosphere. Not my taste these days. I might have liked it more at the time. Imma check out the other tunes you mentioned when I have time again. Were you going to shows in the 90s?

Time to buy a turkey.

Okeydoke, added. There was an ebony one in our database that I'll need to merge when I'm on the desktop site... glad you caused me to see that. All of these year and color specific entries are a mess. I have to get back to organizing it. Last time I did that after the admins and my fellow mods agreed on the criteria for merging just the vintage amps, people turned around and added new items, undoing my work in a few days. This is one of the many factors that lead us to the current link system, which is different bad.

So I don't do spotify anymore. I'm boycotting them along with a lot of friends and colleagues because of their unfair business practices and piss poor sound quality. Anywhere else I can hear this stuff?

I did break down and preview some tracks from your singles collection. I would like to hear all of "dead to you." I concur with @pkennethk that you hit on something there. You might want to police yourself while singing and playing slide... you tend to be pitchy on both so get in touch with your inner tantrum-throwing record producer and give yourself a stern dressing down sometimes. 'Producing' your own vocals is tough. But don't turn into Phil Spector!

You are not off base in admitting your mixing is a bit wonky. It sounds like you don't have monitoring you can trust. That's pretty important. The quest for affordable, honest speakers that work in your space is a Parsifal type journey. I highly recommend arturia's iLoud MTM with room correction for an untreated room. They lack a little bass extension but I find them to be very reliable, not hyped anywhere even if you don't calibrate them. Hard to believe that something that looks like a 90s sound blaster pc speaker us so accurate. You need the dual woofer version, not the cheap ones. I've heard good things about the slate headphone system too but have yet to try it.

What I did like is your total embrace of the solid state amp sound. There are moments of totally fizzy distortion in a cloud if ethereal reverb that was really refreshing in thus age of amp simulators. You're like, "these are my tools, they are my sound and I'm more than comfortable with it!"

Overall I'm impressed with how much you've done with very limited resources. You really believe in yourself and it comes right through in the finished product. You're sincere, creative and resourceful. I've had clients who could learn a lot from your patience, persistence and attention to detail.

I'm going to make an offer I seldom make. Maybe it's just because I've had such dreck in here to mix lately that your stuff, while not much better recorded, is a breath of fresh compositional air. I see you're using live. I'm on live11 standard. If you aren't using extras from live Suite or paid plugins I might not own (unless its stuff that's not important), why don't you send me the audio and ableton project file for your best cut from the new lp and I'll sit down for a day or 2 and if I dig it, I'll mix you a single free of charge. Please have a rough mix up so I can hear what you're going for and I'll disable a lit of that, route it though my console and fire up the outboard and attempt to exceed the production values of you've done so far while staying true to your vision. If you're down, please make sure you're not sending me noisy material and that your edits are properly crossfaded to be click free so I can focus on making things sound cool. Keeping it to 24 chanbels is good if possible. I have a 32 channel inline desk with a lit if aux returns but I like to keep the last 8 free for crestivity and use my tape returns for mults.

I'm not sales pitching you. I'm offering a free service. I can also take a look at what you're doing and how you're doing it and give you some tips.

Jim mentioned a sort of Polish vibe in his comments, and if he's referring to Seaton Park Blues, specifically, then yeah, that one jumped out right away for me too. The 2/4 (2/2?) time feel on that one is great. It's ear-catching. What was the crowd reaction for that one?

Yup... very different. Not the type of thing you hear at a small outdoor gig in the states. Maybe it's not Polish but its European.

That's current production isn't it? You should be able to add that even with low gear iq points

Usually sharing with other bands isn't that bad.. maybe not my taste in speakers but people take care of their gear typically...its rental companies and venue owned stuff that are the absolute dregs. Still prefer my stuff.

...total mood-killer...

I didn't know the OP was trying to set up a romantic evening lol

Ha. I just meant that it would be awkward to then have to ask that artist, who was cool enough to respond, if you could screenshot their private/DM conversation so that you could then post it here on EB.

You say mood killer killer and Depeche Mode conversations, I'm thinking blind date with a goth.... dude, totally joking both times here. Philly humor.

and we'll usually use whatever amps they have at the venue (or for smaller gigs, we might bring our own)

I hate having to use backline... even if they hire amps you requested they're always beaters.

As for that gig we played, we did actually do a soundcheck before it, but it was all a bit rushed... ...we didn't have a drummer at that point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BxFUpRQGhc

perhaps he was thrown by the lack of banging

it was a smaller gig though, but possibly the best we've played, in fact that one I also uploaded! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMb69BOadU0&t=2814s

this immediately reminded me of the film Dummy in which introvert ventriloquist Adrian Brody's riotgrrrl non-jewish best friend played by Mila Jovavich forms a klezmer band and throws down the most intense bar mitzvah performace ever... I like that the sound seems to embrace Polish musical traditions. Ir it could just be me. Never been to Poland.

I gotta do dad stuff, looking forward to lsitening to your non-live recordings before bed.

Does the photo retouch look ok to you on the custom concert nylon string?

Can you name one Duster tune I should check out that exemplifies what you like about their music and tone?

...total mood-killer...

I didn't know the OP was trying to set up a romantic evening lol

If Trent Reznor can be nice to us mortals then everyone ought to be.

This should be on a t-shirt.

I could also do up a "what would Reznor do?" shirt... his classic hits have lyrics that raise a lot if funny answers. I wish I remembered where my silk screen was stored!

That's not something I usually would add as a separate item, we have so many people adding guitars that are just differentiated by finish and some goofy inlays already but I'll think about it.

I added your other requested guitar, the nylon string one. Took a sec to find a good photo if the whole guitar light background and I had to do some quick cleanup on this one.

Mods Please add

Name: Gibson J45 Custom Vine Edition

What differentiates thus guitar from a regular j45 custom apart from the impressive inlay work?

I don't have a superlead, and depends what you mean by a big venue!

1) see, this is where the rubber hits the road for me with guitars... I have often done shows with a number of guitars like a genuine rock star (instead of a bum, which is what I am... 10 points if you name that classic film line) and I would typically have a #1 guitar that does the bulk if the songs. Then I'll have a backup, same basic model, same electronics (usually put in myself), same hardware, close year. The #1 will be a higher end model or a custom, my #2 is typically a studio, special, whatever the brand calls the cheaper b-list version. At low levels I can't hear a difference but at big venue volume into a professional amp I always hear a more complex tone with better dynamic response to my right hand. These are classic tonewood guitars. The more expensive version got the tap tested 1 piece body and nicer fretboard slab while the leftover stuff went into the budget model and that's the difference, everything else has been evened out so I can swap guitars if I break a string... the most extreme version if this was with different wood types on mexican strats, a jimmy vaughn I still own and a mexican standard that I loaded with the same hardware and electronics. The jv is alder and the standard was poplar. That poplar strat played fine, weighed out the same on a bathroom scale, had a similar neck mass if not the same tasty V shape but sounded like dogs ass at volume... okay, comparatively like ass. Mushy attack and annoying low midrange resonance that really popped out under overdrive with my greenbacks sweating a little under the wattage. I sold it. I know this anecdote isn't science but if we designed the right test I think we could generate data that supports my ears. If you're playing a solid state amp with a lot of heavily voiced fx in line thru a vanilla high wattage handling, kapton voice coil speaker at moderate volumes a lot of those resonances and reflections into your pickups are getting suppressed rather than accentuated and it's easy to tell yourself the tonewood crowd likes wasting money.

2) see general comment above for my thoughts

Regarding tonewoods, point taken for the "feel" aspect of it. I don't believe they affect the sound itself for electric guitars (or certainly, not to the degree they do for acoustics),

Again, its about volume and this is where Friedman and I really see eye to eye. The body of an acoustic is a big resonating chamber. It IS the amplifier for the whole tone producing system if which it's a big part. An electric guitar is half the system and it's meant to be made loud. Give the system some sound pressure and work those speakers into their peak operating conditions where they're not heavily damped without a ton of intervening electronics losing bits of the signal and you start hearing stuff that you weren't aware of before even before the onset if audible distortion from amp or speaker. If the amplifier and wood aren't interacting a great deal due to over processing or lack of volume of course the wood isn't coming through much or at all... you've basically reduced the system to just the strings/pickup/amp/speaker and so that's all you hear. I don't sweat the specific wood or anything but I want a guitar that rings out well unplugged in the store and even better once I set it up at home and then if that doesn't translate to a plugged in tone i like at volume, the guitar is going to be sold eventually. I'll fiddle with electronics to fine tune a guitar that already sounds good in a full tilt band setting.

Though it was not easy to hear what we were playing,

If you can't hear your amp, turn up and ask to be muted in your monitors... then the monitor mixer can use the extra headroom to get your band mates super loud (and your vocals if you sing) in your wedge. If I'm in a tight group that has our shit together my personal monitor mix is kick, snare, bass if I'm not the bassist and my vocal if I'm singing backup. No lead vocal, no guitars. I play loud enough that I'm my own monitor anywhere on stage. I also dont use reverb live, I make my own reverb by vibrating the whole joint.

also the sound guy kind of messed up, the guitars were too harsh sounding

The sound guy can't make your guitars harsh. He can make them brighter. If he does that and the sound has harsh harmonic content in that register then they will seem to be more harsh but there were probably good reasons to make that adjustment viz a viz the whole mix even though it wasn't completely ideal. Some PA systems are just harsh and most of the stage mics customarily used for guitar amps like the sm57 and e609 tend to pick up extra nasty overtones if they're there to begin with. Couple that with a hard sounding pa rig and shit's going to be abrasive somewhere. Keep in mind the microphones have to be close to the speaker live so what they get hasn't been dulled down by air friction like the sound that reaches your ear a few feet above and in front if the amp. Also, a lot of guys angle 57s because it's the classic live positioning (look up electrical audio on YouTube for steve albini's thoughts on angling guitar speaker microphones). Step 1 is to know your sound a bgg d know its strengths and weaknesses l. Step 2 us to ask the sound guy to put th er mic dead on in a spot you gave taped off on the speaker grille as the best tonal balance with a dynamic mic and step 3 is pray to the PA gods for good crown or qsc Amps driving an array without a lit if old school horn tweeters lol.

and our vocals were far too low in the mix (especially mine, I guess as bassist he wasn't expecting me to do any lead vocals)

Did you soundcheck?

in fact I recently released a compilation album of some of my older stuff, and am working on a new album!

Then let's hear it...

link link LINK!

Sorry about the typos, in a rush.

Time for Jim to make the donuts.

By my reckoning the break point for a good sized music venue vs a glorified bar with a stage is about 500 seat capacity. This equates to a standing room only maximum occupancy of 800 to 1200 depending on local fire codes vs the number of emergency exits.

It's been almost 20 years since I played with a Yamaha endorser that I almost forgot they made drums! Now I'm remembering how great those kits sounded... if I ever buy another drum kit I'm going to have to think about yamaha. This thread is a total yamaha love fest. Now if they would only reissue some CS series synths...

And your snare is added.

Maybe I picked the wrong song to play. I went 90s output, perhaps they've evolved.

Edit: this is from equipboard, "Duster replied to a comment on instagram, stating what tape recorders they used." So they do answer questions.

If Trent Reznor can be nice to us mortals then everyone ought to be.

Found em on Google. Generic late 90s band. I was in bands just like that. Dudes would be like "dude, can you turn your amps down? I can't hear my hot rod deluxe, brah!" And I was like "dude, I'm just a dude playing like a dude in a different band with dudes who like my plexi, bruh."

But the point being, if the OP wants to know what the homebrew pedals are he could just reach out on like Instagram or something. I've never even heard of Duster so I'll bet the guy is going to be flattered to be asked about his pedals by a die hard fan.

If chappersdale is right and they like to rehouse pedals and ignore instagram questions then they're just toying with people anyway... I'm sure it's funny for them but with all the annoyance of rehousing commercial pedals in undrilled hammond enclosures it seems like an overly elaborate joke. If I have my own circuit housed in a commercial pedal case like I sometimes do and someone asks me like what's up with my 2 knob, 1 switch big muff I'll flat out tell them it's not a big muff anymore. I just liked the enclosure and put something useful in it.

Dean from the pilots tied with Trent Reznor and Charlie Clouser if NIN but I had scored backstage passes through work so I don't know what trent's like when you're gate crashing or hovering between the back door and his bus. Most folks who made their bones in the 90s are really nice... not all. Some of them are rock star stereotypes. I'm not going to name names since maybe they've been humbled as the spotlight moved on to the next guys.

Edit: Honorable mentions from LA parties and trade shows: Butch Vig is a total gentleman and entirely devoid of ego. Jeff Skunk Baxter is possibly the nicest, wittiest guy currently living. The memes about how cool he is are not off base.

Before the internet was a thing I would always sneak backstage or vulture the backstage exit at shows to strike up gear conversations with guitarists.

I don't know which one of them uses that pedalboard. Likewise, my interest comes from wanting to be able to make sounds like Duster

Perhaps you should just contact Clay from Duster on social media and ask him. He's just a dude. I'll bet he will be excited to tell you about his setup.

I really think the pedals in question are home made. Pkennethk mentioned rehoused cheapie but as a member of an electronics club I can tell you the behringer rehousing process will often cost as much as getting the boss version if you factor in your time and is only worth it for the superfuzz/hyperfuzz or other discontinued models. They could general guitar gadgets or byoc versions of classic circuits or something totally new that the op will never replicate without reverse engineering thus guy's shit.

its a preamp pedal, I have one of these and I quite like it. but yes it's Like a cheap Teisco transistor amp in a pedal

I bumped 8nto thus through social media:

https://www.musicradar.com/news/troy-van-leeuwen-queens-of-the-stone-age-in-times-new-roman

Yoyr pedal reproduces a garbage peavey amp. I don't know that these guys are being honest at any time. I think Homme's point in keeping secrets and spreading misinformation is that you're over emphasizing gear and under emphasizing how you use it and how it interacts with your natural sound from just your hands alone. He wants you to think for yourself and do your own thing in a way that expresses YOUR playing, not his.

Or not, what do I know?

Did you know Roger? I never got to meet him before he passed, but everyone who has seems to have nice things to say.

Vaguely from AES when I still paid my dues and the internet. He was not one to keep secrets, if you asked the right question you got a straight answer.

Oh yeah. I know some people over there because I use mixbus32c for in the box mixing. Harrison is very service oriented. They still support the vintage desks you know.

I like weather report, four play with Larry carlton and lee ritenour, and even some jamiroquai too...

Speaking of the roots and conventions of that idiom, Roger Nichols told me (and anyone who asked) the secret of THAT 70s fusion/disco kick which was all over dan... this is insane but it works; you stick an EV664 stage vocal mic (with the hinged stand mount, on/off switch and art deco look) way into the hole in the front head and point it at the batter. The thing has low spl handling but the voice coil is indestructible so the batter causes the capsule to 'bottom out' for a microsecond which produces mechanical click and thump and then returns to a natural sound for the decay... shit totally works, funkiest kick sound on earth. Not great with busy kickers but perfect for waiting room jazz fusion. Ot also gates really cleanly with the right decay setting.

Oddly, though you would think philly international would be the same method, the Tarsias had different tricks. Dude did they love keying gates.