Trying to find Metal Guitar Sound

[Sentence27]

Hello.

I'm trying to find somekind of metal guitar sound which is "tight" and that I am able to hear quite well different notes. So little bit like metalcore sound (although I don't like that genre much I like the guitar sound).

As for hardware I have Line6 Toneport UX2, good EMG pick-ups and I get my guitar sound from Guitar Rig 3 software. Common problem is that in my opinion sound is too fuzzy or something when recording with distortion.

What comes to recording stuff I am still really amateur, so please help me and tell me what is wrong with my sound/what my sound is lacking of.

And small example from one of In Flames' song.

[Guitarfreak]

My personal opinion... Get rid of the EMG's and emulation software. EMG's are great if you like shitty, compressed, undynamic sound, the rest of us use Seymour Duncan or DiMarzio. Software Emulators are great as the whipped cream and cherry to an already good guitar track, but trying to make it hold an entire mix together is fighting a losing battle.

Get a nice amp and mic it. There are a lot of links in the chain of great guitar tone and missing/skipping a few will cost you. You need good pickups (because they are the source of all your sound), going through a solid preamp stage (not cranked, but one with a few tubes does the job), through a cranked power amp stage, through a distorting speaker/cab. When you crank your power amp you cause the speakers to overload and changes the way the amp sounds. You need that cab to distort because without it your chunks on the lower strings will sound like FUH FUH FUH FUH. And as a metalhead I'm sure you want it to sound like DUNN DUNN DUNN DUNNN!!!!

Other than that, without a sound clip of you playing I can't tell you what's wrong with YOUR sound.

[Sentence27]

Thanks for your reply. Yes I know I should buy those things, but now quite short on money unfortunately.

Hmm... That's strange. Because I posted sample of me playing and at least I can see and listen it on this site? So didn't you just notice it or can't you really listen/see it?

[sullivan12]

When I listen to the example you posted what jumps out at me is that there is maybe too much distortion. I have found that I get much better results using less gain than I normally would playing live. The extra gain may smooth out some things to your ears but it also takes some of the pick definition off what you are doing. I rather like to hear the pick strike sound so I use just enough to not obscure it.

It also sounds as if you're using the neck pickup instead of the bridge pickup. If that's the case, that may be a lot of your problem too.

I hope this is helpful to you.

[Guitarfreak]

Oh sorry dude, I thought you posted a clip of In Flames to show the sound you are going for. But on the other hand at least that means it was pretty good

No it's not as bad as I thought, actually it's pretty good for processed sound on a budget. Try rolling back that gain control a bit, that might clean things up a bit. Not there yet, but close

[Sentence27]

Sorry. My mistake, because I forgot to told that I recorded that.

Tomorrow I try to reduce gain/distortion, but I think this might get better with some EQ, not sure though, 'cause I am not so familiar with EQ yet.

Also it's very hard to get sound to "stop" even with palm-muting with this sound, I think. Or then I just can't do palm-muting so well.

[PeterSimonRussell]

Me thinks you worry too much. I've heard a lot worse than that!
Play about with gain and eq till you like it best.
Think you need a proper tube amp and cab miked up to get much better ( - and about a month to play with it if you've not done it before).
Love
Tigs

[Sentence27]

I didn't re-record this, but tried to fix something, although I don't know did it went better or worse.

So I took out little bit gain from both guitars and replaced that with master from those amps. Then I limited 70hz to 130hz little bit with EQ and kind of replaced that one with MIDI-bass. (I have listened some "guitar only" tracks from some songs and I have noticed how much low frequencies come only from bass and drums.)

Still I know I should buy real amp, mic and maybe Duncan pick-ups, but it's interesting to play with these computer things.

[Guitarfreak]

The kick drum is muddying things. Fix that and I think the mix will sound better, as it is now it is obscuring the guitar track.

[PeterSimonRussell]

That's much better but I agree with Guitarfreak about the muddy kick drum - sorry don't know enough about digital recording to know what to do with though!
Love,
Tigs.