Panterachat

Ok, so my band is going into the studio in 3 weeks. It's not a big fancy professional studio by any means, but rather a guy who has a pro tools studio in his house.

We met with him today and he was talking to me about recording guitars and he claimed that when double tracking guitars it's best to do one track on a guitar with stock/passive pickups. I think he's full of shit. Which one is it?

guy sounds like a pussy

I think he's full of shit, now I know producers who hate active p'ups in guitars but not in basses. Yet, usually mixing active with passives really shouldn't make somewhat of a huge difference.

I've done lots of recordings. Active pick-ups are a pain in the ass because the frequency spectrum that it covers is that much wider and doesn't translate well to being miked. My rule of thumb is to record the instruments as bare as possible. You can always add something to nothing, you can't make nothing from something.

And I have an active bass, but when I record with it, I run it passive. Active pick-ups are really there to make the instrument sound more wide and full when playing live, that's counterproductive to the recording environment. Most producers prefer to double or triple track the guitars to simulate that because you have a lot more control over it that way.

so.....should I do one track with my axe with active pickups and one with my axe that has stock pickups?

Personally I'd just use stock pickups for the whole thing.

I've used both active & passive in recordings with decent results & so have about 30 million other bands on the planet, the guy is speaking out of his hoop. It isn't such an enourmous variable as he makes out.

Don't stress over such a small issue.. It won't really make or break your sound.
You should be more concerned about your amp's tone, mic & mic position. Those are the 3 elements that I find make or break a guitar tone.

Pflöyd wrote:Personally I'd just use stock pickups for the whole thing.

truth. and when recording, less is always more. only the bare things, and low distortion

Tweel wrote:

Pflöyd wrote:Personally I'd just use stock pickups for the whole thing.

truth. and when recording, less is always more. only the bare things, and low distortion

Precisely. Active pickups add to the input gain, which boosts the signal and colors the distortion. I love when a guitar player will want to record with his full stack with the volume and gain cranked to 10.

"This is the only way my guitar sounds good!"

Fucking idiots.

Case Closed

I only use the gain on 3.5 on my 5150 when recording

anything more is way too much on that thing, jesus!

i know, i have the same amp. its nuts

My 5150's preamp gain is set around 5 or 5.5. I use a BBE 482i which cleans it up nicely and it doesn't sound muddy, but has tons of cinder block to the face chunk to it.