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Post by scripsit on Aug 19, 2013 1:17:11 GMT
I finally had a chance to listen to the tracks on a decent system over the weekend. I was most interested in the fingerstyle samples. www.dropbox.com/s/roub4becdrwss76/samples_screenshot.jpgAs you can see I tried to go all hard science, and spent some time looking at various spectrum meters on the samples, too. As you might expect, this did not tell me much more than I could tell from listening (and by the way, it's really hard to do a double blind type test when you're by yourself and having to use a mouse to select which track is active while pretending that you don't know which track is which). Anyway, as an upshot, I stand by my original impression: the Sobell and Dave's two guitars are similar in sound to each other, while the McIlroy is a different beast. The McIlroy sounds more like what I think of as a 'conventional' guitar sound, with a pleasant middle voice and a gentle top end (I think this is more than the old strings, too, having occasionally allowed some of my own guitars to go far too long without necessary string changes), while the other three are much more in the modern fingerstyle camp with much more pronounced top end. In my original comments I called the McIlroy 'woolly', which is unfair, because I think whether you want the added sparkle or not is a question of taste (ie some would call it 'strident'). Both of Dave's guitars seemed to generate considerably more overtones than the Sobell, the Buchaill Mhor in particular. I wonder if the comment that the Sobell needs to be driven hard is relevant here. The extra bass mentioned as being present in Dave's dread was not something I could hear. I think the impression was an artifact of a fairly evenly spread grunt at the low end in general. To me the Sobell had more bottom end than any of the other guitars, and this seemed to be borne out by the spectrum analysis which showed a fairly solid lump between 100 and 200 Hz, whereas both of Dave's guitars, while lifting the meter in this area, did so in distinct spikes. I'd happily own any of these guitars. Thanks for taking the time to do this recording Dave, it must have been a considerable effort. Kym [Edit] I tried to insert the screenshot image linked above (it sits in a dropbox folder) but can't get it to appear when inserted as an image. EDIT by Keith - done it for you Kym, via photobucket - hope that's OK with you!
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Post by scripsit on Aug 15, 2013 23:55:24 GMT
Wow! I certainly appreciate the effort you've made here, Dave.
I've only got crappy headphones here at work, so I'll have a proper listen at home on decent speakers over the weekend. I've been doing some comparison listening to favorite CD tracks in my DAW through the monitor speakers, trying to get more of a handle on the mixing and editing that's in tunes that sound 'good' to my ears, so I might lift these across, too.
First comment after running through the tracks here would be that the Sobell and your two guitars sound like they are part of the same family, with the McIlroy off on a different branch. I don't think it is just ancient strings: the McIlroy sounds darker and a bit more 'wooly'. The other three have a more authorative brightness (upper mid?).
Thanks again for going to this effort. Good playing, too.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 14, 2013 13:14:34 GMT
You might want to check out Anton Emery (the banjo player whose video starts this thread) as a guitar player, too.
He has his own website/blog where he describes and links videos of some of his performance interests, including playing in a trad session band and in a duo with a very good mandolinist. He writes instructional stuff for Guitarbench online magazine too (something else worth checking out).
I like his fingerstyle solo playing and arranging, and his CD of fingerstyle tunes is excellent. He's got an excellent touch for arranging traditional tunes.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 11, 2013 9:19:01 GMT
... running joyfully from appalachian hilltop to hilltop, pausing only to creep shyly down for a lap of water at dusk ...
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Post by scripsit on Aug 11, 2013 7:57:05 GMT
I notice Doug Young made some comments about this guitar over on the AGF: www.acousticguitarforum.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3579988#post3579988He's given some tuning details and pointed out that he used crayon to colour the central two bass strings, so that he could find his way amongst them a bit easier. I think concert harps have coloured strings for this reason. Those of you who have played harp guitars (like Dave White's, for instance), is this profusion of strings something you get used to after a while, or would visual clues like colour help? Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 11, 2013 3:56:12 GMT
Be really interested in hearing this, Dave. I've got very fond of the sorts of sounds Ed Gerhard gets out of his weissenborn style instruments.
Is the aim to end up with a detuned/lowered version of G tuning, or D tuning, or swap between both?
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 10, 2013 8:47:19 GMT
An intimidating instrument. The extra seven bass strings would fox me, for sure.
Nice tune, and excellent sound. He's a nice man, too.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 10, 2013 0:52:32 GMT
When I 'rediscovered' guitar after not playing at all for years, and deciding that I needed to learn fingerstyle acoustic, I worked for about 3 months on a hybrid system which involved a loosely held flatpick and two fingers (after all, it worked for Rory Gallagher, right?).
I got a couple of simple Bert Jansch DADGAD pieces down (and Rory's arrangement of 'out on the western range'), but couldn't really relax into any system that felt comfortable.
Then I bought a Martin Simpson DVD (one of his early ones with dropped D as the altered tuning). He used a thumbpick, and it was reasonably obvious that he knew what he was doing. After a couple of weeks I bought a selection of thumbpicks and forced myself to work through the new pieces and the ones I sort of knew wearing the shortest bladed one I could find. It was six weeks of hell. Then, one night after work, my right hand just 'got it'. Haven't touched a flat pick since. I've got a thumbpick stored in every coat I possess (I eventually discovered 'slick picks', which don't seem to grind on the strings as much as the fake tortoiseshell/coffee grounds vomit ones, even though they have quite a large blade).
Can't get a sound out of the bass strings at all without a thumbpick. It's like there's been an amputation or something, and there's only a dull flubby sound. I suspect I'd have to learn a new wrist position, and I'm not putting myself through anything like that six weeks again. It made me realise why so many people give up when they're trying to learn from scratch. If I hadn't had some residual left hand muscle memory from all of those previous years playing electric, to at least keep the fretting going, I would have given up, too.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 6, 2013 23:25:42 GMT
Very clever! That looks like a variation of the traditional Australian instrument, the lagerphone. Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 6, 2013 0:57:12 GMT
Yet another excellent guitar player I had never heard of!
Thanks for the heads up. That's certainly a very pleasant tune.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Aug 1, 2013 9:26:43 GMT
Yep, ordered mine online today, so really looking forward to this.
Should make a nice bookend and contrast to the new Tony McManus album: great to have some new music around the house.
[edit] although I guess most of it in both cases is old music, in one sense ...
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Jul 26, 2013 10:59:45 GMT
Yes, I tried that ORFT thing, but couldn't get a decent result because I think it works best when you are a reasonable distance back from the microphones, and the room treatment (or lack of it) becomes an issue again.
The mid-side combination is recommended by some people whose recordings sound pretty good, but I haven't got that combination of mics either, and I must admit that even though the technique makes perfect sense when I see the diagrams of the microphone fields I can't really get my head around it as soon as I look away.
Have fun, anyway. Have you got a long headphones lead? That was a recommendation by Doug Young that I found useful: to try different seating and microphone combinations but listen to yourself briefly on headphones every time you set up to record even if you don't use the phones when actually playing for real, because often slight alterations of only a few centimetres of position can change what goes into the DAW and it's really hard to get everything exactly the same for different sessions.
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Jul 26, 2013 9:25:25 GMT
Robbie Very exciting that you are going to put together some tunes. I agree that the sound on the latest Tony McManus album is excellent, and I especially like his beautiful version of Gnossieme. I'm not sure how many inputs you can stuff into your preamp simultaneously, but if you can plug in more than two microphones you might like to consider the technique described on Al Petteway's site: www.alandamy.com/tech.htmlIf you scroll near the bottom of the page he talks about what is essentially a spaced pair with matching microphones and a third in the centre. I believe Doug Young has used this technique on his latest album, too. Mind you, they both use extremely expensive microphones. I know this is a (very) subjective thing, but the guitar sound on Mr Petteway's recent 'Only the Blues' album is the best recorded sound I have ever heard for a solo steel string acoustic guitar. I experimented with XY placement for some time, but found that the spaced pair arrangement gave me better stereo separation, and what I would describe as a 'crisper', more realistic sound. I haven't experienced any issues with phasing. I've been using ADK A-6 microphones about 35-40 cms apart, and pointing at fret 12/behind bridge from about 30 cms away. I think lots of excellent classical recordings are done from much further away, but then the room treatment (or lack of it) becomes a significant factor. I found the process documented here fascinating, but it must be hard to get access to the right sort of natural reverb: Enjoy the experimentation, and it will be great to hear some more of your playing. Please document the mixing/mastering process that you end up using: I still find the possibilities in most DAWs a bit overwhelming. Kym
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Post by scripsit on Jul 18, 2013 9:38:10 GMT
Is that 'Ms' Besttowel or 'Mrs' Besttowel?
Kym
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Post by scripsit on Jul 17, 2013 10:14:20 GMT
I spent some time looking for the thread without any result, too. Must have been removed because it is too unkind to the retail fanatics.
Like others I've found some very helpful and knowedgeable people on that forum: Doug Young and Fran Guidry are particularly generous with time and good advice about recording in particular.
However, a huge percentage of the denizens are obsessed with warranties and return policies and whether or not some thing they've only just noticed is an imperfection in their instrument. It's like a supermarket/Walmart frame of mind is permanently in place for those folk: they are constantly looking for absolute dirt-cheap bargains, but are outraged and feel dudded if someone points out that they got stuff that's actually worth about what they paid for it. It's bizarre, especially because for them the price of manufactured goods, including factory guitars, is about a third of what people in (ahem) more civilised places pay. And they hate anyone who successfully games the system.
So, I feel mean, in a bolshie socialist sort of way, but I would have enjoyed reading the outrage in that thread.
Kym
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