The Doom Room: ILF Edition

[D.o.S.]

I mean if we're already stealing Sabbath riffs we might as well just steal the lyrics too.

[odontophobia]

I used to write about whatever I wanted. Sometimes I would be reading and I'd come across a line I really liked so I'd steal that or adapter that.

I wrote a whole song around this line from a book called Giraffe. "We are bound together, all of us, by suffering even more than by joy."
I was really inspired by Gravity's Rainbow on another track.

Recently read an interview with Conan and dude was saying that he likes to sort of separate from reality when he writes. I sort of took that to heart. The lyrics that I'm writing presently are all just super weird fantasy based shit. I'm a weird dude.

[dub]

I'm pretty sure there was an Assuck EP where they did some indecipherable vocals first, then just attached a bunch of political lyrics afterward.

[Wes Mantooth]

So decided to do a recording test with my SM-57 and e609 because I was really digging the tone I got out of my OR-15 today. But whenever I record no matter how loud I turn up or where I put the mics, there always seems to be this unpleasant top end sizzle that I hate. Any advice on how to get rid of it or should I just work on my eqing skills in post?

[skullservant]

I would just tweak your EQ post production. You can only get so far while recording, especially if its something simple like just putting a 6 band EQ flat except rolling some of the higher frequencies off. I do it almost all the time!

[Kacey Y]

So decided to do a recording test with my SM-57 and e609 because I was really digging the tone I got out of my OR-15 today. But whenever I record no matter how loud I turn up or where I put the mics, there always seems to be this unpleasant top end sizzle that I hate. Any advice on how to get rid of it or should I just work on my eqing skills in post?

That very high end sizzle/static sound is usually one or a combination of the amp EQ settings, gain pedals (or their settings), speaker choice and mic choice/placement. If you want a quick tip for dialing it back a bit with EQ while mixing, pick a high band on whatever EQ you're using to mix, boost it up really high (or max it out), sweep the frequency around until the sound you're hearing is accentuated, then dial it down to taste. Some channel strips have high and low shelving, so that can be useful, but surgical EQ (graphic or parametric with a very tight bandwidth/Q) can be helpful if you're losing too much of the high content you want while trying to get the sizzle out. In my general experience I usually try to avoid that kind of sound before the mixing stage if I can help it, but that's not always an option, depending on your resources. Sometimes people just tend to have the High EQ or the Presence on the amp turned up louder than they need, but the amp is sitting on or close to the floor, so they don't hear how much high end is really in the signal until they're recording it.

[Iommic Pope]

I second everything everyone said about lyrics. I used to handle vocal duties and conk is right, it's a shit responsibility. It's good to hear I'm not the only one utilizing these tactics, but it's nice to have a big bag of tricks to pull from. I gotta say though, cogniscent, hyper-sexualised breakfast serial does sound like mike Patton should be involved somewhere.

Summit, your jam space sounds like fucking doom Mecca man. Hopefully one day I'm gonna have some scratch to travel with, and I can plug into the guest rig you got there.

I got to jam. With one of my mates on the weekend. I have some great friends. He lent me his hiwatt t10 practice head and a cab while the sovtek is out so I can get back to playing at home. He warned me it loved effects, but hated dirt. He was right. It's fairly stiff and brittle sounding when clean, but basically gets real tinny when you blast it with dirt. Usually, I try and dial in the treble and mids for cut and clarity on my pedals and guit, but I find myself cranking all the tone knobs down to tame it. It seems to be more ok with the tones dark and wooly. I put an at in the preamp instead of the ax, didn't make too much difference. Might be the shitty ruby el84 though. Fuck I hate rubies. I don't care though it's good to make noise again.
I played through his 80s Marshall 800, got to bust out the ape blaster at decent volumes, couldn't get the black forest to sound how it usually does for me on that rig, but paired with the revelation and holy fuck. Awesome sauce. Getting some decent tones out of the revelation with the volume and gain decranked and the bf blasting it on the hiwatt, too. I didn't record any demos on the Marshall and I know I owe vid a demo, but it will have to be a home practice amp one dude. Sorry.
Other than that we just got our Om on and played some spacey, quiet delay biz and fuzzed it out here and there. Got to break in the disaster transport jr and it has me gassing for the sr.
Good weekend. Sucks to be back at work.
Getting more pumped about going back to uni now, too.
Edit: forgot to add, my mate has a minimat (v2 with reverb I think) that he was playing through my orange 212. Holy shit, that thing was sweet. Makes me want a quality lunch box amp for home use as well, but my budget be low.
Was wondering what you guys thought of the various options available. At this point, strong contenders are or15, dark terror, ampeg 15w head dealy and this hiwatt, if there are any mods to make it sound better, cleaner and handle the dirty betters, and if I can get a cheap one on the flip.
What say y'all?
Not sure if this is already a thread...

[Wes Mantooth]

So decided to do a recording test with my SM-57 and e609 because I was really digging the tone I got out of my OR-15 today. But whenever I record no matter how loud I turn up or where I put the mics, there always seems to be this unpleasant top end sizzle that I hate. Any advice on how to get rid of it or should I just work on my eqing skills in post?

That very high end sizzle/static sound is usually one or a combination of the amp EQ settings, gain pedals (or their settings), speaker choice and mic choice/placement. If you want a quick tip for dialing it back a bit with EQ while mixing, pick a high band on whatever EQ you're using to mix, boost it up really high (or max it out), sweep the frequency around until the sound you're hearing is accentuated, then dial it down to taste. Some channel strips have high and low shelving, so that can be useful, but surgical EQ (graphic or parametric with a very tight bandwidth/Q) can be helpful if you're losing too much of the high content you want while trying to get the sizzle out. In my general experience I usually try to avoid that kind of sound before the mixing stage if I can help it, but that's not always an option, depending on your resources. Sometimes people just tend to have the High EQ or the Presence on the amp turned up louder than they need, but the amp is sitting on or close to the floor, so they don't hear how much high end is really in the signal until they're recording it.

Will need to try again but I have treble turned all the way down and the hi band eq on my USB mixer at around -10dB, still getting it

This has happened with two different amps, 3 different types of speakers (a 10, 12 and now my 15) and a bunch of different pedals. I'm guessing I still need to work on my mic placement but nothing seems to work. I am running a shit-ton of gain from the amp but it has to be up pretty high for the low end to get thick like it does. If i run fuzzes into it clean with the volume boosted, it sounds pretty thin and wimpy.

[conky]

I second everything everyone said about lyrics. I used to handle vocal duties and conk is right, it's a shit responsibility. It's good to hear I'm not the only one utilizing these tactics, but it's nice to have a big bag of tricks to pull from. I gotta say though, cogniscent, hyper-sexualised breakfast serial does sound like mike Patton should be involved somewhere.

Summit, your jam space sounds like fucking doom Mecca man. Hopefully one day I'm gonna have some scratch to travel with, and I can plug into the guest rig you got there.

I got to jam. With one of my mates on the weekend. I have some great friends. He lent me his hiwatt t10 practice head and a cab while the sovtek is out so I can get back to playing at home. He warned me it loved effects, but hated dirt. He was right. It's fairly stiff and brittle sounding when clean, but basically gets real tinny when you blast it with dirt. Usually, I try and dial in the treble and mids for cut and clarity on my pedals and guit, but I find myself cranking all the tone knobs down to tame it. It seems to be more ok with the tones dark and wooly. I put an at in the preamp instead of the ax, didn't make too much difference. Might be the shitty ruby el84 though. Fuck I hate rubies. I don't care though it's good to make noise again.
I played through his 80s Marshall 800, got to bust out the ape blaster at decent volumes, couldn't get the black forest to sound how it usually does for me on that rig, but paired with the revelation and holy fuck. Awesome sauce. Getting some decent tones out of the revelation with the volume and gain decranked and the bf blasting it on the hiwatt, too. I didn't record any demos on the Marshall and I know I owe vid a demo, but it will have to be a home practice amp one dude. Sorry.
Other than that we just got our Om on and played some spacey, quiet delay biz and fuzzed it out here and there. Got to break in the disaster transport jr and it has me gassing for the sr.
Good weekend. Sucks to be back at work.
Getting more pumped about going back to uni now, too.
Edit: forgot to add, my mate has a minimat (v2 with reverb I think) that he was playing through my orange 212. Holy shit, that thing was sweet. Makes me want a quality lunch box amp for home use as well, but my budget be low.
Was wondering what you guys thought of the various options available. At this point, strong contenders are or15, dark terror, ampeg 15w head dealy and this hiwatt, if there are any mods to make it sound better, cleaner and handle the dirty betters, and if I can get a cheap one on the flip.
What say y'all?
Not sure if this is already a thread...

Jcm800 and a Revelation is my jam. Dime that bitch and then slam it with a Revelation. Super heavy.

[Iommic Pope]

Definitely a good combo.
I've gotten so used to the cleanliness and headroom of the mig though, that I now freak out at even the tiniest bit of grit. The rev and the bf definitely make for a dynamic duo, that's for sure.

[D.o.S.]

So decided to do a recording test with my SM-57 and e609 because I was really digging the tone I got out of my OR-15 today. But whenever I record no matter how loud I turn up or where I put the mics, there always seems to be this unpleasant top end sizzle that I hate. Any advice on how to get rid of it or should I just work on my eqing skills in post?

That very high end sizzle/static sound is usually one or a combination of the amp EQ settings, gain pedals (or their settings), speaker choice and mic choice/placement. If you want a quick tip for dialing it back a bit with EQ while mixing, pick a high band on whatever EQ you're using to mix, boost it up really high (or max it out), sweep the frequency around until the sound you're hearing is accentuated, then dial it down to taste. Some channel strips have high and low shelving, so that can be useful, but surgical EQ (graphic or parametric with a very tight bandwidth/Q) can be helpful if you're losing too much of the high content you want while trying to get the sizzle out. In my general experience I usually try to avoid that kind of sound before the mixing stage if I can help it, but that's not always an option, depending on your resources. Sometimes people just tend to have the High EQ or the Presence on the amp turned up louder than they need, but the amp is sitting on or close to the floor, so they don't hear how much high end is really in the signal until they're recording it.

+1.

Try running a high cut filter at 6000khz.

[AxAxSxS]

So decided to do a recording test with my SM-57 and e609 because I was really digging the tone I got out of my OR-15 today. But whenever I record no matter how loud I turn up or where I put the mics, there always seems to be this unpleasant top end sizzle that I hate. Any advice on how to get rid of it or should I just work on my eqing skills in post?

That very high end sizzle/static sound is usually one or a combination of the amp EQ settings, gain pedals (or their settings), speaker choice and mic choice/placement. If you want a quick tip for dialing it back a bit with EQ while mixing, pick a high band on whatever EQ you're using to mix, boost it up really high (or max it out), sweep the frequency around until the sound you're hearing is accentuated, then dial it down to taste. Some channel strips have high and low shelving, so that can be useful, but surgical EQ (graphic or parametric with a very tight bandwidth/Q) can be helpful if you're losing too much of the high content you want while trying to get the sizzle out. In my general experience I usually try to avoid that kind of sound before the mixing stage if I can help it, but that's not always an option, depending on your resources. Sometimes people just tend to have the High EQ or the Presence on the amp turned up louder than they need, but the amp is sitting on or close to the floor, so they don't hear how much high end is really in the signal until they're recording it.

+1.

Try running a high cut filter at 6000khz.

I'd also try backing the mic off the amp. Does your DAW have a visual representation of the waveform as it recieves it? You can use this to see how far back you can place the mic and not be blowing it out, but still getting a good loud signal.

[emptyparadigm]

RE: Vox/lyrics, I like the way that Ryan from Trap Them approaches it: He writes a TON of stuff, way more than you'd need for their songs, and then uses bits and pieces here and there in the songs. In that sense, the lyrics themselves operate separately from the music. I sort of do the same thing in Galaxicon -- we always have long pages of lyrics, and we chop/move 'em around as they fit in the song. Sometimes we only use part of lines.

[Wes Mantooth]

Thanks for the advice dudes I'll try these tips out tomorrow!

[D.o.S.]

RE: Vox/lyrics, I like the way that Ryan from Trap Them approaches it: He writes a TON of stuff, way more than you'd need for their songs, and then uses bits and pieces here and there in the songs. In that sense, the lyrics themselves operate separately from the music. I sort of do the same thing in Galaxicon -- we always have long pages of lyrics, and we chop/move 'em around as they fit in the song. Sometimes we only use part of lines.

Eugene Robinson did that a lot on the Sal Mineo record. Also, Oxbow lyrics are rad, but a lot of the time I envy the dude of his presence and vocal delivery. Like, I know it happens, but who the hell thinks heckling a frontman like that is in any way shape or form a good idea?