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james90

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Everything posted by james90

  1. So is this basically working as a standalone pitch shifter/sequencer? I've been experimenting with this a bit more... seems like two signal paths are necessary. I don't think the live and original version have the same routing configuration though. 281234071_380526140698293_2260485775436396371_n.mp3
  2. Yeah, sort of - it's possible they used more than one setup in the original recording. There's a slightly newer interview (2007) where Matt mentions three amps being used on the album, rather than synths. Live version is the G2 though.
  3. Guitar > MIDI controlled loop switcher > three amps Loop switcher had a whammy (two different settings) and reverb pedal. Amps 1 and 3 receive the same signal and are EQ'd differently. Amp 2 doesn't have any effects besides distortion. The most difficult part is isolating the reverb to the upper octave only. MIDI controlled reverb works best for that.
  4. For what release? I was referring to that guy who was hyping up his cover of MOTP but came up with a bunch of excuses and never posted it.
  5. And I'm sure we'll be waiting another 15 years for him to upload the cover he was hyping up. Trying something a bit different here... similar to how the original setup was described. No synths though. reverb.mp4 Also, Bs blocked and deleted me on Facebook ages ago. I don't blame him.
  6. I do believe you mean team ossim. It isn't, but I wouldn't know as I never got accepted!
  7. Because the power hungry K&T mod closed the previous thread early. Surely you would remember that though...? I hope you all are well ... especially Bs... I think he lost it a while back. Blocked me on Facebook without warning. I can't imagine why. I'm here for you, Bs... just like the bridge magician was. Oh wait.
  8. Yeah, there's an article where Tommaso Colliva (the engineer/producer) discusses that pedal briefly and how it was used for having a scooped sort of sound. Thing is, they were running it through that Ampeg head, so it will end up sounding quite a bit different depending on how the EQ is set. I think Matt's words were "extreme mids" Supposedly some guy on twitter got the last of those pedals directly from the builder, but I saw he still has a website up - although it looks like a work in progress (as of 2018, and hasn't been updated since). Contacted him through there, but didn't hear anything. If you find anything out, let me know - I'd be interested in one too, and I'm sure there's some demand at this point. Having said all of that, it might not be the best choice for what you're currently looking for. It seems to be more of an overdrive, and I'm guessing you want a versatile high gain distortion of some kind? Not sure of your exact price range, but here are some others that come to mind. -Keeley D&M Drive -MI Audio Crunch Box -Fulltone OCD The D&M is sort of an overdrive/boost (or boost/overdrive - you can change the order) and it has quite a bit of drive available. Probably the most versatile of the three. The other two are basically high gain Marshall voiced pedals. The Crunch Box is definitely one of the best out there for that sound. The Wampler stuff is great too, but I've only tried their fuzz pedals before. Only other suggestion is some of the Mesa/Boogie pedals, but I know anything made by them is quite a bit more expensive outside of North America.
  9. Yeah, I'm sure he's got various presets he uses on it. Might have replaced that mystery reverb pedal he's been using for several years now. I never found out what it was, but there are other pedals that can do the same effect at least It is a bit expensive. Might be worth seeing if there are any of the older versions around? As for the Mind Abuse, is that the one on The Globalist you're referring to? That's the Machsonic Thrust Drive. I don't think they're being made anymore, and I've only seen two for sale in the past few years. Doesn't seem like anything special, but probably works well in that particular setup with the bass amp and 7 string.
  10. So is this all on the phaser patch, but you're changing various parameters by MIDI? Sort of related, but it looks like Matt now uses a Big Sky. Looks like it's on the Spring setting in this picture. Yeah definitely a good idea about the loop pedal. I really should have one of those anyway, though my delay pedal can do a 40 second loop, which should work for this. As for distortion, the obvious choice would probably be the Diezel VH4 pedal - but at the same time, Matt has said that the "core" sound is AC30 and he just blends the other amps with those. Even as early as the Absolution tour, I'm pretty sure he was running a separate direct fuzz signal on top of that. Might have just been from the Line 6 gear. I generally get the distortion from the amp and only use pedals for overdrive or fuzz, but I've been intrigued by the Revv pedals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPp_UsoypA4 Sounds like that could work pretty well. A big plus is that it has the individual EQ controls (which seem to have a large sweep too) so you can likely get it sounding how you want with your setup.
  11. You're probably in the same one in that case. As for the backing track, that's true, though I did need to keep the LFE channel (which has the low frequencies) as well. But since that still had some guitar in it, I ended up duplicating the center channel and cutting everything above a certain frequency. Worked well enough. Yeah that makes sense. Does the Strymon have MIDI control? The buffer does affect the sound as you say, but I think that's one of the reasons he used the DT for this song. When you combine settings using each side, you don't lose nearly as much sustain/fuzz with the -2 octave sound. If you listen to any performances of The Groove from 2015, the riff is played with that setting on the drop tune side - so it's basically that, but shifted down another octave by the whammy side of the pedal. That's what I was thinking. He's said in the past that he likes plugging straight into the desk and cranking the gain up. I think in recent live performances it's the AC30 (Kemper) mixed with the VH4, which is his main high gain sound. I've definitely found that amp distortion works better than fuzz pedals.
  12. Sounds good - I'll send you the link to the one I'm in if you want. I think there are a few, but haven't really checked the others. Here's the original post https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/muse-unsustainable.59805/#post-745908 I know what you mean about the filter effect though. I ended up making a backing track from the 5.1 audio from the Rome Olympic Stadium DVD and noticed this. The center channel only has the bass, drums, vocoder, and newscaster - the crowd noise and guitar are barely audible. Only issue is that the orchestra is missing. I think I looked at it quickly but never got to try it. Any chance you can send it again? What grid division are you using for the +2/-3 octave triplets? I keep going back and forth on the -3 octave and where it sounds best, but I'm starting to think that might have to do with the actual distortion sound. Also, did you notice the fuzz factory oscillating in the background in certain parts of the song? It's the same sound at the very end, but you can hear it underneath the low A notes at times.
  13. No problem, and thanks. Wasn't actually expecting you to see this, as it's gone quiet here! I haven't got an account actually. I'm really only in the facebook groups now. Not sure if you're in any of those. Latest version is sounding great anyway. I recently read an old post on the Fractal Audio message board from the admin (probably a reliable source) and he said the axe FX was used. Not sure in what way, but I wouldn't think the entire song.
  14. https://www.reddit.com/r/Muse/comments/f9xk7v/i_tried_to_play_unsustainable/ Sounds great giovannicovanni. Some credit for helping you with the track would have been nice though. At the same time, it's just for fun - hence not posting mine on youtube etc. More trouble than it's worth.
  15. Yeah this is definitely true. You could always get a file from someone else, but it will have to be played to match how it's written. Plus if you need to go in and fix something that doesn't sound quite right, it could become a bit tricky. I've learned so much about DAWs and MIDI from writing this file as well, so it's worth it in a way.
  16. Yeah that's definitely true. I stopped using my MacBook (same amount of ram) for these projects. Can't simply add more either, since it requires a completely different board. But yes, if you have several MIDI tracks with their own instruments and plugins going at the same time, it's going to slow things down a bit. So it does make sense to convert them into a single .wav file and re-import it into the project, just so you have that and the whammy control. I haven't checked if the Focusrite stuff is having any issues, but I don't think those actually require their own drivers like Steinberg does. I did re-install the driver and it seems fine so far. I think it was just the 1st gen Focusrite interfaces that had clipping issues. I had the 2i2 1st gen and I always had to keep the gain super low on it, but the 2i4 2nd gen that replaced it seemed fine. I recall it also had switches on the front to pad the inputs, which helped. I've not tried the 3rd gen models though. The one I have is the UR-RT2. Not familiar with the UR22, but this one is pretty decent. Main issue besides the driver is that some of the features that would normally be on the interface itself (such as the input/playback control on the Focusrite) have to be adjusted separately through the included software. I can't say I find their software particularly intuitive, though I've only used Cubase. It does appear to be easier on the computer, and is a little more flexible with drawing automation
  17. Sounds great - you're certainly brave for attempting that live, especially when Matt seems to have things go wrong with the MIDI stuff at times. Though I guess there's a lot more that could go wrong with the amount of stuff he uses. The one time I played that in front of others (just to demo the track) I didn't have the box ticked. Didn't go too well. Also, unrelated, but if you're using a mac - I'd take caution if you plan to update to the new OS. I just did, and it doesn't recognize my audio/MIDI interface anymore. I gather it's more because steinberg didn't update their driver, but it does apply to other brands as well.
  18. The part about it being repaired by its owner really should be made more clear, especially if it's estimated (by who?) to go for that much...
  19. Well it depends which live version - I think he was using the fuzz factory (or possibly the fuzz head?) in the T2L era (2012/2013) recordings. In that last video I linked (from 2018 I think) it seems to be one of the high gain channels on the VH4. It's definitely easier to get a good sound with amp distortion rather than a fuzz pedal. You could probably use that Strymon pedal with similar results though. I think I get what you mean. I ended up changing that part slightly, but just so it wouldn't use the dry signal from the DT side of the pedal. Seemed a bit closer with the dive-bomb only. So at the minute, the only part using both sides of the pedal combined are the A notes on the 12th fret. -1 octave with dry signal on the DT side combined with -1 octave on the whammy side. As for external instrument, in this case, it's for the MIDI interface. It's that bit highlighted in blue in the channel strip (left of the window) where you select the MIDI interface and channel. It might just show up as "External I" until you click it, and then you'll see this: It sounds like you already have it configured to work with the whammy, but you'll want to have that box ticked like above. As for the signal bleed, that shouldn't be happening. I wouldn't think there's any audio that travels through the MIDI interface. I will say that I've noticed similar behavior with my setup, but I always assumed that it was due to the mic bleeding into the monitors - as if the gain control on the interface still let some of the sound through, even when turned all the way down. I'll have to look into it though - might be the exact same issue. My initial thought is that it's related to the computer, since the MIDI and audio interfaces are completely separate. And no problem at all - glad to help
  20. Yeah that's normal. You just don't want it turned up too high so that it affects the sustain. The other option is turning the stab control all the way up and the almost all the way up, but that doesn't sound quite the same to me. I haven't tried the file myself yet, only just had a quick look at it. It's definitely a tricky one to get a decent sound for, and there are different ways you can approach it. For what it's worth, Matt seems to have recorded it with the 007 which does have a P90 (single coil) in the bridge. If that's the case, it would likely be pretty noisy with a fuzz pedal on high gain settings. But as far as I know, it's that same setup where he's running it direct, and has the input gain cranked up so it's clipping there (while having a reasonable setting on the fuzz pedal) And maybe - I'll have to pay closer attention to what he's playing in the live videos, but it sort of sounded like there were two sounds at once. I did find the same about the 5th fret compared to 12th fret though. Here's what the DT file sounds like at the minute. No video this time, but better sound quality anyway. The expression automation is exactly the same as in the picture, but I corrected some of the program changes (mainly the ones for bypassing, so it doesn't make much of a difference I guess.) This is with the low A notes played on the 12th fret, using settings from both sides of the pedal. The nut strikes will sound a bit off in this one. The guitar has a 3+3 headstock, so I just hit the open strings instead. Should still give you an idea though. This was just with amp distortion and some post EQ to brighten it up slightly. One downside of the DT that I think I mentioned was that it doesn't seem to track MIDI well. You can hear that on the wider/slower pitch bends (the -2 octave ones). As for the lag issue, go to the external instrument plugin and make sure the auto compensate latency box is ticked. I know mine has a significant lag if it isn't. dt.mp4
  21. It's definitely a DT in the studio video. You can see the extra switch and LED on it. The whammy 5 can still get super close and seems to track MIDI better, but the range/sweep of the pitch bends on the DT is slightly more accurate. The main thing is that it sounds much better on the low notes, due to the dry signal being mixed in. @giovannicovanni here's some of the DT MIDI track if you want to have a look. I ended up splitting the program changes into two separate tracks (one for each side of the pedal) as it was far too messy, especially with two events often happening at exactly the same time.
  22. Exactly. I know the one Matt tends to use in his live setup is a slightly older Vexter (the one after the initial black/green print version), but those shouldn't vary anywhere near as much as the old pedals did. Tolerances aside, the older pedals did have differences in component types as well, but it seems like they became fairly consistent after he switched transistor types in 2003/2004 But as far as the settings go, the sound I'm describing is... well, it's that effect you get when turning the comp control up. It seems to take away a bit of low end and make the high end a bit smoother? But you don't want to turn it too far (past where it stops oscillating) otherwise the sustain is affected. You basically just want it to have that subtle effect on the sound. I'd also keep the stab control on a higher setting (around 2 o clock as mentioned) since it does take away some low end. Same with the drive control (keep this above 12 o clock). I'd try to set the gate around 9 o clock, but you can lower it if it's affecting the sustain too much Here's a good example. He probably has the comp control turned a bit higher than I'd suggest for Unsustainable, but you should be able to hear the effect I'm referring to. With the nut strike bit, I think I see what you mean. The reason it works better switching between active/bypass (rather than active with expression CC 0/CC 127) is because of the difference in high end when using the pedal. In other words, if the pedal is on the whole time, it will be reducing the high end the entire time, as the signal is going through the pedal anyway. But if you switch between active/bypass, the nut strikes stand out a bit more for the bypassed sound, since it's not going through the pedal's circuitry. And yeah, I can't say for sure if they did it that way, but... the low notes sound so much better (even with the whammy straight into the fuzz factory) and the sweep of some of the pitch bends seems a bit closer. Another combination seems to be the second +2 octave triplet part. Seems like it might be the +1 octave dry setting mixed with something else. Have a listen to 1:36 in this video - almost sounds like the harmonizer? As for the tuning, worth a try I guess. Might make the pitch bends sound a bit different though, but I guess that's less important than the low strings. Got halfway through the middle part, but got sidetracked when I realized the DT is setup differently for the entire song. 🤦‍♂️ So I'm trying to figure that out at the minute. It doesn't really require rewriting anything, but just trying as many combinations of the drop tune/whammy sides as possible to see what works best.
  23. Right, I see - just as long as you don't have the preamp gain on the amp turned up. As for the settings, you still want it to oscillate clearly and have good sustain, but not exactly the same as when the comp and gate controls are all the way down. It's sort of hard to describe the difference. Basically keep the gate around 9 o clock, turn the comp up until the oscillation and hum stops, and then turn it back down until the sustain is how you want. If that makes sense? The gain should be somewhere around half, with the stab around 1 or 2 o clock As for the string tree sound, I looked at your file. First - it's really impressive, so well done on that. But as far as the string tree sound goes, there's more of a difference if you have the pedal actually switching on and off - especially if the fuzz factory is in front. So with the whammy 5, you'll want to have it at CC 127 throughout that part and just have it switching between active and bypass on the dive-bomb setting. If you look closely in the making of video a few seconds before Matt starts playing, you can just about see the computer screen with the automation patterns, and it appears it was done this way. Regarding the triplets, ignore that - I had thought he was switching to a different setting, but it seems like it's just the open strings being hit when he's moving back up the neck. I will mention that I've experimented with the whammy DT a bit more, and while the whammy 5 is more than good enough, there are a few settings on the whammy DT that get those low notes and the sweep of the pitch sounding a bit closer. In other words, the drop tune (which also has upper octave settings) section is before the whammy section of the pedal. So you could basically have the pitch anywhere between +1 or -1 octave BEFORE it goes into the whammy part of the pedal. What this means is that the heel position of the whammy isn't the unaffected guitar sound, as it's already being shifted up or down by the drop tune part of the pedal. As for the tuning, it's definitely in standard. You can see him play the E string on the 5th fret for that low A note in live performances. I only discovered this today, but I think it's due to the -1 octave + dry setting on the drop tune section of the pedal. You can combine this with the -1 octave setting on the whammy side and get a better sounding -2 octave, which is likely how he did it in the studio.
  24. I see what you mean - where do you have the gain (preamp volume) control set? If you're running those fuzz pedals, I'd definitely set the amp for a neutral clean sound without too much bass. Otherwise it'll likely be far too compressed sounding. If there's a bright switch on the amp, you'll probably want to have it switched off if it's at low volume. As for the fuzz factory. I worked out some settings a while back which seemed to sound right - I think I wrote them down somewhere. It wasn't anything too extreme, but it was on an oscillating setting. If I remember correctly, it was gate 11 o clock, comp 1 o clock, drive... can't remember, and stab 2 o clock (?) What I do remember is that I was intentionally turning the comp control up to the point of the oscillation cutting off, and then turning the gate control back down to where it was consistently/clearly oscillating. Regarding the live version, the MIDI track is different during that part, but that's definitely true about not playing the exact notes. And I got it thanks, will have a look and let you know. I set my backing track up based on the one from here (definitely check it out - great resource) and adjusted everything until it sounded close enough. Still need to work on the bass though, especially that big bend. http://www.rppmf.com/muse.htm It's in French, but easy enough to navigate and download the files. Most are fairly accurate, at least compared to the ones you get from converting the guitar pro files from ultimate guitar for example. Also, as for those triplets being in -2 octave and returning to normal pitch - I think he just might be hitting the open strings instead, but it doesn't sound high enough for it to be that. I do have some ideas of what it could be, but it's something that only works for the DT. Basically requires using both sides of the pedal at the same time. Still experimenting with that though.
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