Sunday, August 21, 2011

POD X3 EQ trick (works with other gear too)

I have a method I've recently figured out to help get close to a specific guitar tone... I take a song(in the enclosed example, Cannibal Corpse's "Death Walking Terror") and I analyze a portion of it's sound frequency spectrum in Audacity(a free recording app). Just click and highlight a few seconds of a track and then click "Analyze>plot spectrum".  This gives me an exact detailed list of the frequencies and their respective levels in the audio track!  I try to get a section with only the guitars playing, as the drums, bass, etc. will skew to results... I can't get it exact, but I can get wicked close!  I dial in an appropriate amp setting as close as I can, usually(but not always) following a google search on that band's/guitarist's rig, and then go back with the EQ and dial in what I can from the sound frequency spectrum analysis.  Sometimes the mid frequencies might be as low as -20 or 30 db(because it's sooo metal  LOL), which my EQ on the POD X3 only does +/- 12 db, so I have to kinda take everything relative to each other, but anyways...

There's also something people have come up with called "the fizz trick".  I analyzed a simple tone in the POD X3 and there are some quite high frequency sounds that are just 'there' for some reason. Maybe because it's digital?  I dunno... 

*The 4-band EQ in the X3 is semi-parametric - the low and the high are 'shelving', meaning that what you dial in affects everything below or above that frequency you choose, respectively, whilst the middle two adjustments you can dial in a specific frequency, then adjust it's level, which results in a swooping or undulating type EQ curve(depending on how you adjust it).(see attached picture) 

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So, to do "the fizz trick", you take the high control and roll it as HIGH as it will go - then you take it's level knob and roll it as LOW as it will go. Because it is a shelving EQ, you have just killed that 'fizz' that some people complain about with solid state/digital modeling gear!  If you look closely at the picture attached, you can see that above a certain frequency, everything is cut off - they did the the fizz trick!

Pretty cool, eh?

2 comments:

P said...

I genuinly can not stay away from your blog dude, i am always checking out all the awesome music you are posting up and all the reviews on music equipment, you seem to really know what you are talking about and as a 17 year old teenage boy who has been playing guitar for just under 4 years your blog is somewhere I can come to check out reviews on awesome equipment, Love that you like Line6 as well, they are my life when it comes to amplification, rock out dude (y)

Tony said...

thanks very much for the positive feedback! Music is my life, either listening or playing...