How do you get a good rythm guitar sound ?

Geoff Barnes · Post by **Geoff Barnes** » 21 Aug 2007 12:17 pm

I use this baby for the "Jangle" (it has had toasters installed since this pic was taken). Years ago, Keith Richard said that the Stones always laid a couple of accoustic guitar tracks well down in the mix to give body to a track

Bill Dobkins · Post by **Bill Dobkins** » 21 Aug 2007 2:11 pm

In case no-one has tried this. electric shave will make strings sound new for a while. So will WD 40.

basilh · Post by **basilh** » 21 Aug 2007 4:18 pm

Geoff Barnes wrote:Nashville String Sets may be found here

Sorry for the looooooong url there BasilH! For some reason it "wraps" in my browser

Thanks a million Geoff, It doesn't bother me too much as I use A G5 mac and twin cinema displays, BUT long urls Can cause some people problems. I read only last week that over 75% of internet users still have dial-up and 17" or less monitors.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 21 Aug 2007 5:50 pm

Tony Prior wrote:I was at a show where EC was playing...

You have to take this in perspective. I've played with Clapton. He and I were born at the same time in England. During the 60s we were still recovering from the second world war. Things were rationed. England made the mistake of being on the winning side, so there was no Marshall Plan for us. You had to be an enemy of America to benefit from the Marshall Plan, America's allies were cast aside. There were no American instruments available. The reason the Beatles used German instruments was not because they liked them, it was because no Fenders or Gibsons were available in England at the time. No-one would throw away good strings when they may have another 20 years in them. Strings were short, and expensive.
What Eric may have said during his early career, when he was just a lead guitarist for an unknown English group yet to make it worldwide, is going to differ from what he advocates nowadays, when he's a world-recognised guitarist. It's all a matter of perspective and getting things in context.
We can (maybe) afford to throw things away nowadays which still have some life in them. In the 50s in England only the rich could do that............
Basil knows this. He and I lived through the same austerity. It's all a matter of then and now. Things change,,,

Bill Dobkins · Post by **Bill Dobkins** » 21 Aug 2007 8:30 pm

Alan will you be at the convention in StL.

basilh · Post by **basilh** » 21 Aug 2007 11:48 pm

Basil knows this. He and I lived through the same austerity. It's all a matter of then and now. Things change,,,

You can bet on it, remember the 'Utility" furniture and the "Sweets" ration book ?

The "Good Ol' Days" In 1962 a car ( Austin Mini ) was £550 and a Fender Strat was £149 and a Twin Reverb was the same.
That's a guitar and amp equating to half the price of a car !!
UNLESS you bought a Rossetti Lucy Seven £49 and a Watkins Dominator £55.

Now with Martin acoustic guitar strings costing me less than $3.50 a set when I buy them in the 'LONG" uncoiled packages, and a complete set of steel guitar strings costing less than a Quarter Pounder and fries, there's NO excuse for the miserly approach. (Unless of course you ARE one, and that's unlikely if you own a Steel Guitar)

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 22 Aug 2007 1:29 am

Austerity is when the gas company puts
a 2 penny cash box and timer on your kitchen stove.

Many a young english bloke was sent out by mum
to scower the streets for small change to get
a warm dinner. Or become an expert pickpocket.
Back when.

Come on then Gromit, time for walkies!

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 22 Aug 2007 2:53 am

I may be wrong but I believe nobody has even mentioned the PLAYERS abilities to play rhythm with clean tone and phrasing.

Or the engineering

Just wanted to throw that in there.

Why ?

how many times have each of us heard a recording by someone who was really excited and told us that they used an XXX mic , a YYY Guitar and a special blah blah blah, all the best stuff..

And when you listened..

you said.."Sounds Great"

and walked away and said to yourself

"Good grief"...

ps..I may be one of the ones in the Good Grief catagory

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 22 Aug 2007 7:24 am

Obviously, the guitar picker is a primary concern. I've heard Odell Martin make a $100 import accoustic guitar sound great and someone else play the same guitar and sound like crap.

Jimmy Capps, who is a great lead picker (and about the last of the "oldies" on the Opry) gets a lot of rhythm guitar sessions (or at least used to) because of his competency on rhythm.

For those that never heard of Odell Martin, I met him in the early 70's when he was picking lead for Faron Young and working part time at the Grammer Guitar Co factory. Odell was a great picker and well known around Nashville. Odell, and Little Roy Wiggins who did the narration, made a demo record for the Grammer Guitar Co. When they did the session, Odell got a guitar from the factory that some had sent in for warranty work, didn't change strings, etc and took that guitar to the studio and did the session with it. The guitar sounds great on the recording and he does everything from Jerry Reed licks to Merle Travis stuff on the album.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 22 Aug 2007 8:03 am

Tony I did mention about the engineering.

Picking the RIGHT mics is the 1st step in engineering.

Next is the mix blend and other devices.

There are so many DIFFERENT correct rhythm guitar sounds
to chose from.
The question wasn't really well defined.

What I would do for a bluegrass/country blues band
with an old flat top is similar to the above,
less on mic in back.
If it was solo or duet maybe all three.
It all depends on how much the guitar carries
the front of the band. Is it a constant sideman,
or really carrying the water to the well in the mix.

If it was acoustic rhythm on an electro acoustic track
then maybe just one 'crisp' mic
over the picking hand and hole,
aimed towards the table be farther down the body.

And that would be eq'd and possible lightly compressed
depending on the track and the playing style.

If it is a very busy layered song, and lots happening,
but this lone acoustic must stick out, then likely
fairly strong compression and eq to fit the
sonic holes in the other instruments a bit more.

And if it gets any 'up front'/'face of the mix' time,
I'd time line back both for a more natural sound
in those places.
EACH song is a different choice of how to do this.

Picking style and attack have a lot to do with
where you mic, and how you modify the pure tone later.

Certainly the shimmery sound is good as a backing track.
Electric instruments of course call for still other techniques.
But the thread has seemed to lean towards acoustics.

This help any?

Geoff Barnes · Post by **Geoff Barnes** » 22 Aug 2007 12:51 pm

Funny, I read the OP as asking about Rhythm guitar generally... but it has drifted into recording technique with a bias towards acoustic instruments, which is a real insight for me personally, and thanks to all who have contributed info on this subject... my approach is typically that of an electric musician.

My acoustics have piezos, so I run one track through a PodXP pro with one of my acoustic patches... The second track is usually a Rode NT2 running into a JoeMeek compressor as a pre-amp, and a TC Electronics Finalizer on an insert... The mike track is there to get more of a room sound and the piezo track to capture detail.

As mentioned, the real business of a great rhythm sound is an instrument with good intonation, and the player's ability to "nail' the part.

In the 80s-90s I ghosted on hundreds of recordings doing exactly that. One producer I worked with saw no point in arguing with bands. He would just wait til they left the studio and pull in his "regulars". Quite often it would be learning the original part, and "locking" it onto the bass and drums, Many times it might just be four bars that he felt weren't sitting right. In all the years I (and a few other players) worked with him, only one band ever "smelt a rat"... and that was about overproduction ("you made us sound like Savage Garden man!")... been to many launches knowing that 90% of a recording was not played (or sung) by the band who signed the contract.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 22 Aug 2007 2:17 pm

basilh wrote:...That's a guitar and amp equating to half the price of a car !!
UNLESS you bought a Rossetti Lucy Seven £49...

I did ! That was my first guitar. I had it for about a year and traded it for a no-brand jumbo. It was an archtop and they made acoustic and electric versions, the only difference being that the electric version had a plastic assembly containing the pickup and controls, which was held on by two small screws. The action was awful. It tore the ends of my fingers up. I almost gave up and decided I couldn't play the guitar until someone handed me a guitar with a good action.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 22 Aug 2007 2:20 pm

Tony: I didn't realise you were in Seinfeld !

Thomas Stanley · Post by **Thomas Stanley** » 27 Aug 2007 6:20 am

What about the perspective that sometimes "less can be better" or maybe "simple" would be a better word.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 27 Aug 2007 8:22 am

One mic placed for the best
'acoustic fit' can work great for busy mixes.

Of course if you use 2-3 mics early on,
you have the option later of losing some,
or all but one of them, later.

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 1 Sep 2007 8:28 am

Well in spite of the crisis caused by my trying to
kill off the candida infection I have been saddled with,
I have managed to record a jazz album with the two guys
that I have been playing with, and will gig with in the future.

Barry Wedgle on nylon guitar and Norman King on tenor sax.

Because of several issues, such as
the sax playing being a studio debutant,
we broke his cherry on this session,
and my ears being a bit intermitant (DRAT!)
plus general fatigue etc. and it needing upright bass,
and me needing more post-wedding upright playing
before recording, I didn't play on this session,
and it was a duet date. I just didn't feel
up to it. There is trio session planned.

But this does show some nice guitar
as total accompaniment and solo. ie rythmn.
This is live in one room, one take.
With the micing noted above.

On a country track I would do it quite differently.
But this is what it is. The players are letting me post and extract,
less than one half of a 6 minute track.

My One And Only Love

Tim Harr · Post by **Tim Harr** » 6 Sep 2007 9:58 am

Ray Edenton
Eldon Shamblin

Rhythm guitar masters!

Steve Stallings · Post by **Steve Stallings** » 12 Sep 2007 7:17 am

Listen to the acoustics in either of the tunes "Icehouse Time In Texas" or "Angel By Mistake".

I used one mic, a Neuman TLM49 and mic'd it at the 12th fret, not the soundhole.

This is two D35's with one capo'd. Then I pan them about 30% in different directions.

NEW STRINGS!!!! They make a huge difference. I change strings before recording any new tune.

http://www.soundclick.com/pro/view/02/d ... tent=music

Leroy Golden · Post by **Leroy Golden** » 12 Sep 2007 12:55 pm

Since I have the luxury of having 24 tracks I usually play the part open chords then play the same parts again capoed higher and seperately eq each part while panning the parts 9:00 and 3:00 oclock respectively...works for me!