Hello beatyful people ¿how are you?

I have a question and I wanted to know what you think.

I'm recording some guitars and basses for some of my own songs, rock, indie rock, pop, blues, soul.

My problem is that my bass and my guitar are not of good quality, My electric guitar does not tune well on all the frets of the fretboard, and no matter how much I calibrate it, often on some frets it does not hit the right note. And besides, both my electric bass and my electric guitar are not branded.

What would you do?

Would you use virtual instruments where your samples are of high quality instruments and are correctly tuned in all their notes?

Would you use loops or samples that are also recorded instruments of excellent quality?

Or they would use the instrument itself that, although it is not of good quality, it is you who puts all the nuances and dynamics of the instrument.

I'm confused on this, hope you can guide me.

 

That's hardly possible unless it's a faulty design. If you do not know how to tune your guitars properly with the truss rod and bridge, take it to a luthier or even a guitar shop. They should be able to fix it.

 

Adjusting the curvature of the neck
https://www-thomann-de.translate.go...l=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp

 

If your songs are really good some imperfections wouldn´t do no harm. Record a good demo with what you have, go find a contract and then buy better instruments. Please forget about samples.

 

A luthier taught me to calibrate the electric guitar, because he took it with him every once in a while since the first and second strings were out of tune by about -20 degrees.
Then he told me that it was because the guitar was already old. And he told me to adjust it from down here blah blah.
I learned there
the problem is that...
when calibrated in the octaves they sound good
the first open E sounds on pitch and the eighth on the 12th fret also sounds E, but if I play on the third fret which should be G, it gives me about +20 above the pitch. In other words, all the strings on the third fret add +20 above the pitch. but on air and in the octaves it gives me the right pitch.

thanks for sharing the article. I'm going to read it.
So you recommend that it would be better to fix the guitar even if it is of poor quality, that is, for you it would always be better than a loop or a virtual instrument even if it is not a Fender guitar.
My guitar brand is hyundai

 

You could always use both. You could use something like EZBass or ModoBass mixed with your recorded instrument on top.

 

Shure, a perfectly tuned virtual bass with a detuned live instrument on top. Good luck.

 

Well I've already tried to do this in many ways and it really doesn't work.
Not only because it is not in tune, but because they have different timbres. In the low notes it is not so noticeable, but in the highest ones it is, because by having more harmonics the timbre is more noticeable and of course, also if it is out of tune.
I have solved this with melodyne, I tune my bass or guitar and then put them together or use separate lines (a real part and a virtual one). But it really doesn't look good. It even tries to mix bands (one band for the real instrument and one for the virtual one). But it sounds weird, confusing, strange.

 

You mean like in a perfectly tuned digital synth along with an analogue synth, guitars, bass, piano & e-piano all in slightly different tunings? Yep, that works.

 

I guess I do not really understand the point of asking a question when you have already formulated your opinion.

Do you want someone to say your damaged instrument is going to sound great just because it is played in some special manner? Not going to happen. Do you want someone to say a Virtual Instrument alone will make you feel like that isn't "cheating" or whatever you have going on? I'd be patient waiting for that answer either. Or you can do a mixture of both, as people often do with those 2 particular plugins, or Kontakt instruments. Your only other option is to fix your instrument, get a new one, or find a bass player who has one.

 

(personal opinions only - of course)

The deciding factors will be...

[1] "Are you prepared to develop hands-on guitar playing skills?"
Is that your passion or not?

[2] What kind of music are you producing
how important are the guitar parts?


[1] "Are you prepared to develop hands-on guitar playing skills?"
A skilled guitar player will deliver performance features that are (practically) impossible to replicate using sample-based instruments.
A skilled guitar player can even use an imperfectly tuned instrument and still make it sound good.
A skillful performance with a physical fretboard will always be better - IF it's available.

Those are not just biased comments from a guitarist. They are comments you'll hear from skilled guitar players who primarily love playing their instruments (for good reasons) but who also love computer-based guitar packages and would really love to squeeze convincing performances out of those computer-based instruments - if it was possible! You can do a lot - but realistically still nowhere near as much as when physically holding a fretboard!


[2] What kind of music are you producing
For some music those guitarist performance features will be overwhelmingly important - be or find a guitarist!
But for some other music where the guitar parts are less featured, maybe the absence of those nuances won't matter.
Sometimes it's just a sound you want rather than a performance and that's ok.


Your choice.
Guitar performance skills take a long time to develop.
You need a period in your life when you have some serious dedication to the instrument.
Without those skills you might as well just accept that you're better off using a computer-based guitar-oriented sample instrument, where you will find a vast array of tones, perfect tuning, and even some canned (and tweakable) performances that will often sound better than a novice guitarist, and definitely sound a lot better than a novice guitarist using a wonky-out-of-tune guitar.

 

Last edited: May 29, 2022

Sorry, I didn't want to less appreciate your answer. I really appreciate all the answers.
I just wanted to tell you what my experience was mixing real instruments with non-real ones.

Of course I have my opinion, but if I'm here asking, it's my opinion, I'm not convinced, and I'll tell you again. I really appreciate your opinion and that of others because it is what I will take into account when finishing my songs.

 

It's not for guitar or bass solos. I play the guitar solos.
I feel the difference in the accompaniment of the music.
For example, I feel that when I play a bass from a loop or a virtual instrument, it seems as if the song sounds more professional, as if the sound is more compact. But when I play exactly the same thing, it doesn't sound that way like "professional" it sounds more like homemade, playing exactly the same thing. And I'm talking about super simple bass and guitar lines. That's why I thought that it was because the instruments, being of better quality, that's why they sounded like that.

That's why I asked what you would do. Because maybe it's just a feeling of mine, believing that it sounds better because they are better quality instruments.

I tell you an anecdote.

A few years ago with a friend we spent a whole weekend recording his drums with several microphones, and several takes. when we compared the sound of what we had recorded with virtual drums like toontrack, our drummer was laughable, even though he played the drums very well.

 

i think you confuse compare recording drums to mixing drums

 

I own different guitars (electric and acoustic) of different qualities - they all share the same issue: it is not possible to tune them correctly if the strings are too old.

 

I, Lois Lane am an instrument psychic/healer and have worked with some of the best players of the these last two centuries aura & chakra cleansing their beloved guitars, basses, pianos, violins, erhus, sitars and any other stringed instrument (even Miles Davis's sympatheticly strung chimera hybrid flugelhorn that was a birthday gift from Count Basie). In the past I have successfully worked with Pete Townshend to purge the evil demon possession of his guitars so that they no longer invade his mind and have him destroy them, and now the spirits have guided me to you, Brother Ryck that I might help in any small way, that the life force of your precious musical tool once again vibrates precisely and in synchronousity with the universal tuner.

Since it is impossible for me at this time today (I am currently involved with my game partner Yo Yo Ma in a preplanned Bacce tournament on Lake Neuchatel, and we're doing quite well thank you, currently in the lead this second and final day.) I will at this moment beacon my spirit guides as we are between sets and beers and so focus my attention on your intonation issue.

Please hold the troubled guitar above your head facing northward and the positive magnetic pole of Gaia's celestial body, the pickups upwards aimed toward the heavens that she might bestow her holy harmonic gifts on both you and your beloved....Perfect, well done. I can feel the spirits coming...closer, closer. They are here now but they are not happy...they are now taking posession of my body, spirit and mind that they might impart their sacred wisdom...arghhhhhhhhhhhh...they speeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeak......

TAKE YOUR GUITAR TO A GUITAR TECH, SPEND THE SHECKLES NEEDED, SAVE UP IF YOU HAVE TO. ALSO, YOU USE TOO LIGHT A GAUGE STRING AND PRESS TOO HARD. NOW GO RYCK AND DO OUR BIDDING OR FOREVER SUFFER THE BARB OF ILL TUNING. WE'RE OUTTA HERE...OH, AND YOU LOIS, TAKE A FUCKING SHOWER, YOU STINK

 

Last edited: May 29, 2022

You made me laugh a lot. You reminded me once my acoustic guitar started playing by itself, and I said "what's going on here" and it was my dog that touched the strings with its tail. If I plan to buy a new guitar in the future

 

Hi @Ryck, if you own and can play an instrument yourself, you should always prefer your own instrument over ready-made presets. You have not learned guitar and bass guitar painstakingly to have the skill done by a digital machine. The self-played songs have a soul
and they sound more alive than static samples.

How to Intonate an Electric Guitar

G&B basics: fret purity, octave purity and intonation (Please read the comments at the end.)
https://www-gitarrebass-de.translat...l=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp
Original article in German: www.gitarrebass.de/akustik-gitarre/bundreinheit-oktavreinheit-und-intonation/

How to do a Fretless Guitar Conversion (Cheap Electric or Bass)

 

Believe me, on very bad guitars, it can happen.