….or something like that… anyway, here’s some thought on reamping. i mentioned this a few times before, reamping seems to be a great thing. basically, it’s recording a guitar track (or bass or whatever) dry and then send that dry track through some effect algorithms to get the final sound. this is really good because you just need one good performance and then can do with it whatever you like. you could change the sound many times but still have the same performance. for example, if you record your guitar, apply some effects to it and mix it together with the other instruments – it could sound a lot different than it did before. maybe bass and guitar don’t fit together, maybe the guitar sound is too distorted and gets in the way of the vocals etc.
doing it the “old-fashioned-way” would mean you’re stuck with it. reamping however provides you with the opportunity to simply change the guitar sound with a few mouseclicks, so it matches the rest of the song.
another advantage would be the volume during recording. you can record the dry track through a di-box and therefore doing it all with headphones in your livingroom. recording a fully tubed laney stack turned all the way up though requires not only a room to record it in but also a few squaremiles of wasteland around your location to not p!ss your neighbors off big time…
but still there is this one point which makes it impossible to just use the reamping-method. only a tube amp sounds like a tube amp. and i hate to say this. i’ve yet to hear a software that does sound like the real thing but no matter what i try, it’s not quite it. don’t get me wrong, programs like native instrument’s ‘guitar rig’ or certainly the line 6 pod or other similar products have come a long way in simulating guitar sounds and they are still very versatile and great for many purposes and styles. but if you want to record anything rock-related, you have to go tube – simple as that.
i was amazed when i checked out native instruments ‘b 4′ organ simulation (sorry, i’m not able to provide links with this handheld-thingy i’m writing on at the moment…), because this software does sound real. and i’m quite sure there will be authentic-sounding programs for guitar as well in the future but right now there aren’t. at least not that i know of. if you do know something, step forward, help out legions of guitarists and become a hero…
so what good is reamping anyway? well, it’s the first choice if you don’t need a tubesound. and, that’s what i will use it for, it’s great to shape the overall guitar sound and add some spice to it. meaning, to record the basic sound with a tube amp and a microphone – and then add some reamped tracks to it to achieve a best-of-both-worlds-sound in the final mix. at least that’s my plan at the moment….
and this gives me a deep satisfaction, because my main guitar amp that i bought at the age of sixteen (the laney stack mentioned above), is still an important piece of gear – and it still sounds as awesome as it did 17 years ago. yeah!