Your Ears are Lying About Your Guitar Tone

[saddletramp77]

I think you mean my calves....

 

[vonbrun]

 

[JWDubois]

Suspect there are many people who care more about ease of dialing in a good tone and less about fidelity of the amp controls. They don't have the experience/intuition of 1940's technology. Not for everyone, but not for 1 in 1,000,000 people.

I agree, I've never played 99% of the amps in the Axe III and I suspect only a very small number of people have played them all. All I care about is how the models work.

Some of the models are so authentic that they require ridiculous amounts of EQ, drives with big low cuts to keep from mushing out, turning off the crazy bright cap, etc.

The Axe gives you all the tools to do this, but I often wonder why people are so gaga about authenticity, when it makes you have to virtually recreate all the real life bandaids necessary to make the real life amps livable.

 

[Big Chippie]

Igor Stolarsky (the guy who‘s written a mich of the code for the Helix at Line 6) put this video upon his YouTube channel last night... It’s full of useful information, not just about guitar tones, but making music in general.

Are we to believe this guy or any normal person can play something that sounds exactly the same every time?

 

[richardlpalmer]

Igor Stolarsky (the guy who‘s written a mich of the code for the Helix at Line 6) put this video upon his YouTube channel last night... It’s full of useful information, not just about guitar tones, but making music in general.

This is really fantastic!

 

[phil_m]

Are we to believe this guy or any normal person can play something that sounds exactly the same every time?

I imagine he just re-amped the audio from the guitar part he played for the first video each time.

 

[Brad2]

It would have been good if he had demonstrated the sound of the Helix and the sound of the real amp at the same volume

 

[gitapik]

Awesome! More ammo to convince the lead vocalist that I need to turn it up.

Oh...that’s right: the EQ.

Still think the extra air is more important.

Great post. Thanks!

 

[yeky83]

I agree, I've never played 99% of the amps in the Axe III and I suspect only a very small number of people have played them all. All I care about is how the models work.

Some of the models are so authentic that they require ridiculous amounts of EQ, drives with big low cuts to keep from mushing out, turning off the crazy bright cap, etc.

The Axe gives you all the tools to do this, but I often wonder why people are so gaga about authenticity, when it makes you have to virtually recreate all the real life bandaids necessary to make the real life amps livable.

Cus that one amp you'd use that's perfect without bandaids isn't the one I'd use without bandaids, and vice versa.

 

[Tonatic]

More of these, please! Subjectivity reigns on TGP, and the psychoacoustic science behind listener preferences can account for many heated postings on this site. Good producers milk this all day...

 

[Heraclitus]

I like real amps. They're little magic boxes that make cool sounds.

 

[LucasVidler]

One cavete I would add is that even level matching is not as straightforward as one might think. Our perception of loudness is frequency dependent. So, simply matching levels of two different signals with one's ear doesn't necessarily give a fully accurate representation of the relative differences across the spectrum. While there is no perfect method, I think the best approach is to level match using a sound level meter on the slow A-weighted setting.

 

[fingertip]

It's true. This is your ears and we've been bored with your guitar tone and we've taken up with the Camaro next door with the stainless exhaust. Sorry.

 

[Jynx]

I thought the first two sounded the same. I mean, they were, but I didn't have an expectation of one sounding better than the other.

 

[Jynx]

I think what he's talking about here is something I need to get used to myself. I'm not very experienced at this stuff and today I was making a cover of Metallica over a backing track. I made two tones I was impressed with on Helix with different amps and then played the intro of the song on both separately, panning them left and right.

Both tones sounded really good to my ears, as I said, and even when I played back the track on reaper after I recorded both guitars I thought it sounded great. But when I listened to it this evening I straight away both tracks sounded too loud in the mix and I had to turn them both down and one I had to turn way down. The tracks weren't even of a level volume.

I may even have to re-do one of the tracks because it doesn't seem to fit the tone of the song, sounding quite sharp. I might be able to save it with an EQ. If I do I'll be sure to use the option to keep the volume level as I mess around with it as shown in the vid.

 

[Hanlon92]

Thst was the best video on audio that I’ve seen in a long time

 

[Boxy]

My stock answer for this kind of thing every time....none of it matters till YOU are the one playing it. You feel no touch dynamics, you don't hear it nearly the same. Not to mention the age old amp in the room argument vs a freakin video on you tube thru full range speakers! Vids like this are a waste of youtube bandwidth *for me* at least. Secondly, even when u ARE the one playing it, even then you will never hear/feel it clearly till you become used to the amp. At that point the amp will not sound or feel exactly as u first felt it did. Thats why people buy an amp thinking they like it only to find after a time they TRULY hear it and sell it. All these kinda things leave me puzzled because they're it's like watching a guy drive a car in a review of it and assuming you know how it feels to drive it. It's not remotely the same. As an example, look at tele saddles. I have a bag full of them, all sorts of materials and brands.Some sound and feel radically different from each other. I know because every set has been swapped back and fourth with other sets many times over and over till the difference becomes super clear. But heres the point....while one set always become clear as my fav, if you did a video of them i couldn't tell which was which even if you took the 2 most radically different sounding sets and A/B'd them in a video ad nausium. I couldn't tell with a gun to my head and i doubt anyone else would either. Yet they matter so much to me that when i put another set on, after a time i start seeing i don't pick that tele up often anyone because it's not quite doing it for me and the previous set goes back on and i find myself playing it a lot more from then on. Pretty amazing when in a video i couldn't hear it with a gun to my head eh?

So for me at least videos like that are 100% worthless. And i heard NOTHING different between the 2 sounds. In fact, i rarely do in any video comparison even when i see everyone else suggesting which one sounded better regardless if it's a trick video like the above or an actual vid between two amps. So to sum up, maybe i'm different than most but i hear and/or feel even subtle differences in even small parts let alone amps, but if i am not the one playing and it's a online video, fuggetaboutit ! I'd be hard pressed, REALLY hard pressed to hear the difference between a tele and a strat. But put them in my hands blindfolded and if somehow you could mask the feel so i couldn't tell physically which was which, i'd pick the strat and tele every time with one ear tied behind my back. Anyways, this is all true FOR ME. Maybe not others but if i had to wager i would put my money on the likelihood most others are the same whether they know it or not.

I agree sounds are only as good as the speakers your hearing it through period! As for the digital get all sounds from one unit goes I find it easier and less time consuming to just plug into my Tube amp throw on a few pedals and play easy peezy.

 

[Ejay]

I agree, I've never played 99% of the amps in the Axe III and I suspect only a very small number of people have played them all. All I care about is how the models work.

Some of the models are so authentic that they require ridiculous amounts of EQ, drives with big low cuts to keep from mushing out, turning off the crazy bright cap, etc.

The Axe gives you all the tools to do this, but I often wonder why people are so gaga about authenticity, when it makes you have to virtually recreate all the real life bandaids necessary to make the real life amps livable.

I think people appriciate authentic response cause it allows comparison...and validation through a/b that their digital device delivers on its promise. I appriciate “generic” amps that get me what I want fast and bypass any quircks that real amps come with.

about the video....I agree with all of it, but I can’t help to think it’s very convinient for the manufacturer of the lower priced units to note that we can not always trust our ears...and suggest things are equal whenour ears tells us different.

There are differences between manufactures. Maybe to a lesser degree in amps...those you can measure, write code...and check your work with metering. Lots of comparisons to support that case. Profiling/ampmatching...whatever..show us modeling is “measure and copy”.
Everything surrounding that is subject to less objective things. Cabs, verbs, how EQs respond...thats where taste (or used benchmark) of the designer shines through.
I’m no fan of L6, and I think it’s because of this. Maybe a bit like bringing your great amp to a studio where everything else is not to your taste, and the engineer makes choices you cant fix in the mix. To me this also shines through in how the presets sound, and demo’s from representatives....those are clearly the result of different desired outcomes then my personal. In theory modelers should have the tools to recreate any reallife sound...even If thats true...I feel im 10-0 behind at the start of the match compared to units I appriciate.

 

[warren3333]

He has the whitest neck Ive ever seen...

Interesting video.

 

[Spooky88]

He lost me on his second non comparison. Create a better thread next time OP. I'm going back to play a "real" tube amp.