Native Instruments "Guitar Rig"

Big Ed D's Owned it since day one, it seems. Sure he'll pipe in...

 

I'll say this about guitar rig: it's flexible.

I'm not a fan of it's high gain tones, but for clean stuff it's great. The fact that you can build complicated rigs with multiple amps and cabs simultaneously, and have an interactive feedback between the two makes it unique. These complicated setups quickly turn into CPU hogs.

Native Instruments has (slowly) beed adding better sounding amps and modules. As long as you're not going after legitimate Marshall tones and the like, you probably be amazed at what this software can do.

Do NOT use the preamp that's in the pedal board. It makes quite a difference if you're able to use a higher quality preamp to get your signal into the computer.

Also, the pedalboad gives you some interesting options. The pedal, which can be linked to a slew of different settings, gives you a whole new pallette of interactive options.

One other thing that you can do with Guitar Rig is bypass the amp and cabinet emulations and just use it for all the effects. Then run that signal into your favorite hardware amp and you've got something VERY unique and as legitimate sounding as your amp will allow.

I'd recommend it, as long as you don't rely on it exclusively for distortion.

 

I think the amp sims are useless, but for Cabinet simulation i find it incredible, and and absolutely indispensible tool. Nice effects too.

 

I have to disagree with you, I think the Twin is a great model and super flexible, the Marshall sounds nice for classic rock type stuff, the Vox and MESA are so-so but have their uses.

I probably use the Twin 95% of the time, in various forms (different bias and variac settings really alter the basic character in a useful way)
For direct recording, Guitar Rig is my fave setup.
No, it's not going to replace my vintage amps but I'd have no problem cutting tracks with it and as a do-it-all one stop solution, it's awesome.

However, the O/D pedals do sound awful to me, but then I was never a fan of the TS, RAT or DS-1 that they are modelling.
The treble booster works well, or I'll just crank up the input gain if I need more drive than the amp has on tap.

I'm even considering it for live shows, where we have to fly and rent amps, especially after having to use some POS solid state amp last night...
(I'm not saying all SS amps are bad, but this one was)

I figure I can run a setup where I run a cab sim to the FOH desk and run a direct (i.e. amp sim with no cab) to whatever amp I get for onstage, this way I can control my own monitor level and discard most of my pedals too.

 

My observation is very much the same. I've been able to get some very useful tones from the Twin.

As I said before, I think it's the pedal sims (and all those that are coming in future months) and the complicated layout-potential that make this such a great piece of software.

Unbusrt - I've been trying to decide if I should put a copy of GR on my laptop with a good soundcard and tow it around to sessions when necessary. If you (or anyone) has done this successfully, I'd like to hear about it. In theory, it should be great (for clean stuff).

 

Yeah, yeah...the models come in handy for stuff...but Anton is right, compared to a decent head loaded down it's no contest.
I also agree that the cab sims are bitchin. The only modelling cab sims I prefer is to "roll your own" via Waves Q-clone.

 

So you guys can pretty much throw your Boo-ti-que amps out
the window then, eh? Gotta love D--S--P!

Throw in a whole band and I bet you won't even know the
difference between using the amp models and your own.

--Tom

 

Right...

 

I just model the rest of the band, too. Then I can control everything. Then, when this all comes together, and SUCKS, there's only me to blame

Every boutique amp owner knows that that won't be happenin'. But I may not need to carry them around to every gig when a Strat and a laptop might just do the trick. Kinda takes the romance out of it though, doesn't it...

 

Or you could just take a Marshall or Fender with that Strat.

 

What's the firewire latency with that rig?

 

Huh? No issue what soever. But it really depends on your sound card.

 

Funny you say that. Probably just trolling, but here's some hard learned experience. I'm very familiar with DSP. I've owned most company's modellers, I've written a guitar amp simulator plug-in roundup cover article for EM, and as fate would have it, I was just contracted to write a book about forthcoming guitar amp simulator software.

I have found that if you are willing to work like hell at it, you can get an amp simulator to sound like a real amp. And when I say "work like hell" I mean you end up using EQs, compressors, and other processors. And you end up with ONE amp sound--in other words, with a real amp, you can use your volume knob to change the dynamics of how the amp interacts with the guitar. But with your sim, you may have gotten a very respectable Rectifier tone, for example, but while playing with your guitar volume will raise or lower the volume, it will not change your tone dynamically like a real amp.

But in full band recordings, I've found the EXACT opposite to what you suggest. If you have full band recorded and ALL the guitars are digital simulations, they are VERY hard to mix. They always sound mushy and take up way too much of the frequency spectrum. They don't cut, and the digital simulations tend to change character when you EQ them far more than real guitar amplifier sounds. And that is when mic'ing a digital amp, using a digital simulator hardware device, or simulation plug-in.

Orren

 

It's funny, I went full circle as far as playing gigs. First, I went out with a Marshall head and effects. Then, I switched to the "rack of doom" approach, which broke my back and basically made me loathe playing out. So finally, I switched to a Roland VG setup, with just a 13-pin equipped guitar, VG-88, GR-33 guitar synth, and switch box. But it did take the romance out if it...it all sounded "guitar-like"...but not quite real. So I've not played live in a while, but I'm back to real amps. I'll just need to get real roadies to go along with them!

Orren

 

Well, I'm not about to throw any amps out the window but I did work on an album recently where we tracked a lot of guitar in one day, I used my amps on some tracks (Fender Twin, Vox and Pro Jnr) and Guitar Rig on some others.

If I heard the album now I doubt that I could tell you which part was amped and which was GR.

I was an early adopter of digital modelling back when the VG-8 came out and I much prefer it to using an amp with a speaker sim.

 

Your article was helpful, and actually made me subscribe to EM .

Do you find the mixing problem mostly with distorted guitar tones rather than clean ones?

 

Aw, thanks!

Distorted. Clean tones are definitely easier to mix, and hold together better.

Orren

 

don't think so. GR has one input and one output, as far as I know. Try something like this:

guitar -> tonebone -> AMP direct out -> GR cab sim -> monitors

hmmm, come to think of it, you can probably setup GR on two different channel strips in your mixer, in Cubase for instance.. you may be able to use a send to do some really fancy stuff, not sure. I'd have to try it myself.