Tír Na HiFi

I know that there are one or two guitarists lurking among us so I was wondering if anybody can help with this one or give any guidance please....

I have a friend who has sent a long time perfecting the sound that he wanted to produce with variations of amps and pedals etc. and who now wants to do some home recordings of himself playing electric guitar. He specifically wants to record using a microphone with the sole aim of preserving the integrity of the sound that he now has. He is using a good quality Sennheiser dynamic microphone with a USB attachment to connect it directly to a recording package on his PC. The volume of the amp is kept low as is the volume of the input level on the package but the quality is poor. I personally have a Senneiser dynamic myself and I have used it to record acoustic instruments with superb results. However, our current thinking is that the microphone is the wrong type and is simply being overwhelmed by what it is being asked to do and that he should be using a condenser microphone.

Does anybody have any thoughts or suggestions?

Have a look here... http://www.thomann.de/ie/instrument_microphones.html

Mics are a very personal taste and it's hard to capture and retain the sound you want without auditioning lots of them. It's a fascinating subject and endless.

Thanks for that Ivor....I will pass on the link.

I am currently using a Sennheiser 906 (606 will do fine) in front of my amp and a Shure SM57 in the back of an open combo amp. I use Digidesign sound card into Logic Express or Pro Tools LE with phase inverted on one track. The 906 will sound very good on its own, but the mic in the back really adds great bottom end. Using a condenser mic will also work, but the critical part is the audio interface. I used to have a cheap sound card and it just can't do the job properly. You are welcome to PM a phone number and I will be more than happy to help. I can also offer to record for him here in my home studio with his own setup for the price of being allowed to try out his equipment :)

Thank you very much Claus....I will certainly pass on this information to him.

Claus,
Just to follow up on our discussion when I met you recently my friend seems to have solved his technical issues and now is in a position that he is happily recording along to a backing track with the sound that he actually wanted to get in the first place. Here is an account on boards of how he got on from the very first attempt (all examples are quite short and just used to illustrate the progress) and the post dated today (01/02/2011) where he plays part of Sweet Child of Mine is interesting.

fergus wrote:Claus,
Just to follow up on our discussion when I met you recently my friend seems to have solved his technical issues and now is in a position that he is happily recording along to a backing track with the sound that he actually wanted to get in the first place. Here is an account on boards of how he got on from the very first attempt (all examples are quite short and just used to illustrate the progress) and the post dated today (01/02/2011) where he plays part of Sweet Child of Mine is interesting.

That was very interesting indeed.Thank you Fergus. At least it's nice to know I was on the right track!