Line 6 Spidervalve mic'd with CAD Trion 7000 test

[elmagoo]

Over in the guitar forum I've been talking about the new Line 6 Spidervalve as well as the CAD Trion 7000 ribbon microphone. Hence I wanted to create a small test to let you guys hear what they sound like. I dialed in a sound fairly quickly and tried a few different mic positions and combinations. I settled on a single mic configuration, putting the CAD up on the grill just a tad off-axis with the mic pointing straight into the grill (on the right speaker when facing the amp).

Here's a quick run down of things:
- Using Cubase 4, recorded at 48K 32bit on a PC
- Interface is an E-MU 1820m
- CAD Trion 7000 into a UA Solo 110 mic pre (low cut filter was on)
- Guitar is a Jackson Dinky Reverse Professional series with a Seymour Duncan Trembucker bridge pickup (it's about 14 years old)
- Double tracked the guitars, each track panned hard left and hard right
- The only EQ on the guitar during mixing is a UAD Cambridge EQ low cut at 20hz, 36db / octave. The guitar is bare besides this (no compression or FX)
- During the stereo master, there's a UAD Fairchild compressor with mild settings to get a little more punch out of the whole thing, following this there's another UAD Cambridge EQ with a 2db boost at 10khz for some air. There's also a UAD Precision Limiter at the end of the chain to prevent clipping.
- Drums are done via Addictive Drums
- Bass is a Fender Marcus Miller 5 string Jazz bass, played passive, going through a Sans Amp Bass Driver going through the Solo 110. There's also a UAD 1176N on it as well.
- MP3 is exported from Cubase at 192kbps

The first half is a riff taken from a Boom Boom Satellites song called Easy Action. The second half is something I made up .

I would have liked to play around a bit more with mic placement as I wasn't 100% happy with the guitar sound. Alas the one thing I 'discovered' is that I can not turn the amp up very loud, so this was recorded with the Master set at or below '1' on the amp, and the channel volume a tick under half (apartments with thin walls suck). Hence I really don't think the amp was able to sing as much as it can, which puts me in a pickle of figuring out how I'm going to record guitar in the future.

Anyways, have a listen and see what you think. I can put together some other samples as well if people want to hear a different perspective of the amp. I'm limited to micing it only on the weekends as during the evening even these settings are too loud .

Enjoy

[lolgreg]

It sounds quite nice. I played one at guitar center and thought it was kickin' too!

Now record a full song with it! =)

-Greg

[thesilentdrummer]

The sound is really sweet. I don't know if it is really necessary to turn it up any higher. Of course, though, I am a guitar idiot. Just my thoughts.

[brandondrury]

The kick and bass don't do much for me, but you can tell that there is some real tone in this amp. I may have to seriously take a look at one of these. I wonder if the Line6 Spidervalve will be the first Line 6 amp to actually hold it's value.

Brandon

[elmagoo]

Originally Posted by brandondrury

The kick and bass don't do much for me, but you can tell that there is some real tone in this amp. I may have to seriously take a look at one of these. I wonder if the Line6 Spidervalve will be the first Line 6 amp to actually hold it's value.

Brandon

Thanks. I put this together with more emphasis on the guitar than the other stuff, so I didn't put as much time into making them sound as great as they could. But what would you change about the bass and the kick? Also how do you prefer to record bass?

Thanks again

[brandondrury]

I put this together with more emphasis on the guitar than the other stuff, so I didn't put as much time into making them sound as great as they could

I know all about that! It's a pain in the ass to throw together a good mix in 5 minutes when the focus really should be the instrument at hand. However, if the mix isn't right, it'll distract from the elements that need to be highlighted.

My issues with the kick and bass were more about how they were presented in the mix. It's clear the kick has been compressed really hard, but the way it's done I think it is bringing out the unflattering elements.

The bass has a ton of 100-120Hz stuff going on with my computer speakers. I guess you could say it's really boomy. On my speakers it sounds more like you are highlighting the bass more than the guitars. I'm generally not a fan of this kind of bass tone anyway. I'm more of a Fender Jazz kind of guy. The super low end bass sound never did it for me.

Brandon

[elmagoo]

Originally Posted by brandondrury

I know all about that! It's a pain in the ass to throw together a good mix in 5 minutes when the focus really should be the instrument at hand. However, if the mix isn't right, it'll distract from the elements that need to be highlighted.

My issues with the kick and bass were more about how they were presented in the mix. It's clear the kick has been compressed really hard, but the way it's done I think it is bringing out the unflattering elements.

The bass has a ton of 100-120Hz stuff going on with my computer speakers. I guess you could say it's really boomy. On my speakers it sounds more like you are highlighting the bass more than the guitars. I'm generally not a fan of this kind of bass tone anyway. I'm more of a Fender Jazz kind of guy. The super low end bass sound never did it for me.

Brandon

Cool, thanks for the info. I'm putting together something else that I'd like to turn into a full song, but it's just the ideas at the moment. I'll throw it up when it's done and keep this in mind.

I hear the boominess of the bass you're talking about, I dunno why I didn't catch that the first time around .

[brandondrury]

I hear the boominess of the bass you're talking about, I dunno why I didn't catch that the first time around .

Story of my life!

Brandon