EQ Matched Amp Blind Shootout: Can You Spot the Imitators?

[@mr.esabsurditiesatrocities1805]

I fucking HOWLED at the #5 reveal! Outstanding demonstration and results.

[@LeonTodd]

Well there you go, the greatest tone you'll ever hear from an MS-2.

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

And it only takes $50 worth of plugins to do it!

[@LeonTodd]

@@PlagueScytheStudios "with this ONE SIMPLE TRICK!"

[@jjs8426]

Hey Leon big fan!

[@jmasson3272]

One of the most interesting vidéo about guitar stuff that I 've ever watched. Great job

[@hbomb495]

Finally, a rational explanation to all those who complain to Ola about how he always makes all these different amplifiers that he demo’s sound the same. He should totally shout you a beer for your efforts here.

[@alfaalex101]

I died when I saw 15:40 Utterly humiliated and crushed. I liked that tone so much...

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

I must admit, I'm quite proud of pulling off some trolling of this magnitude. Magical things can happen when the plugins to fix the "amp" cost more than the "amp" itself.

[@jotunbjorn]

Not even EQ matching can hide the Rectifier's low end :P

[@dcp10200]

The Recto got a big thicc instagram booty!

[@SlyHikari03]

It’s so chunky

[@danieltravis5082]

Your method of eqing definitely got the modelers to sound close to the amps. The line 6 (and to a lesser degree the mercurial) post eq matches were pretty obviously digital modelers because of the sharp, brittle, high end artifacting. No one can seem to dial it out - no matter what EQ they add. The addition of pre-eq helps them sound even more similar, but this artifacting or brittle high end is baked into the character of the gain itself in all of these modelers, at least that I've heard. It's less obvious when in the context of a mix, but I (and many others for that matter) can absolutely tell (for example, in many newer Andy sneap recordings) when they're using a modeler in the recording because of the ear fatigue this brittle high end effect seems to have. I don't want to sound like a naysayer or a hater...it's very useful information that you've presented here. Especially for people on a budget, attempting to make their own demos, etc. But it would be an interesting deep dive to investigate what exactly causes this unpleasant high end "thing" that many people can hear in modelers. I know a couple people who can't hear the artifacting itself - but at the same time, get the sense of "fatigue" from listening to an entire album of modeled amps. Show idea: perhaps explore this phenomenon, what causes it, and ways it might be mitigated?

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

With everything else equal, the general cause of artificting in amp modelers usually boils down to oversampling. Old hardware like the POD and even newer plugins that go light on CPU usage don't over sample the incoming 44.1 - 192 kHz signal enough to prevent the alliased harmonics a lot of us hear and feel. Anything over 40K samples per second is fine to reproduce audio linearly, but not if you then manipulate it through amplificaiton, clipping, EQ, etc. More contemporary modelers do a much better job in that regard. Then you get into the weeds with the accuracy of individual amp profiles, tube modeling, speaker IRs versus straight EQ... I would be more inclined to cover all this in a multi part "history of amp modeling," whenever I have everything necessary to make such a series.

[@danieltravis5082]

@plague scythe studios Interesting, so you also think oversampling is the cause of "modeler fatigue" on records? Or just the artifacting?

[@danieltravis5082]

@Ruud Lexis interesting that even modern, expensive, high sample rate modeled tones are fatiguing to listen to, and have the weird crispy top end, then. I am no expert on this - except in that it sounds bad, and makes many modern albums a chore to listen to. As of the current tech, I prefer old school amp sounds on records🤷‍♂️

[@danieltravis5082]

@Ruud Lexis interesting thanks for the information! I didn't know the details of it; only that it exists - because it's a *tell* for a modeler. And I'm tired of KZbinrs telling me it's physically impossible to tell the difference - because I *can*, pretty reliably. That's not to say that modelers aren't a useful tool, far from it in fact. I've used the line 6 toneport and ux2 for many demos. It's just that if I was paying for a recording, I would want real, un-quantized drums, and real, un-modeled guitar amps. Because I can do that shit on my own, for *free*.

[@danieltravis5082]

@Ruud Lexis I generally go the opposite direction - miced tube amps through an interface to a DAW on a computer. But if it's late at night or something, having a modeler around to cut a quiet demo on Reaper is insanely convenient. I just can't imagine paying thousands of dollars to make a record and having some jackoff tell you that you're using a modeler with some cringy drum samples.

[@KevinFrasard]

Just came across your channel and have been watching and getting a great education, subscribed brother🤘 keep up the good work dude!

[@AndrewSmith-lg8dj]

awesome job, couldnt believe how great you made the POD sound. this is honestly a reminder to keep our GAS under control because its not going to make THAT big of a difference :) I have too many options now that are probably going to get me in the same place. Nice video, keep it up!

[@Atttuner]

Excellent video. This is exactly what people need to know about high gain tones and doing it by ear with your head shoved into the amp is exactly how Soldano and Freidman modded marshalls to develop the awesome tones we have today

[@AndrewStonerock]

I’m going to take this concept and use it when making presets in helix. Great video bro!

[@metal_helm]

Alright that Marshall MS-2 was definitely the sore thumb sticking out in the bunch, but it after your pre and post EQing it sounded way better than I would have ever imagined. gotta give that little guy some credit

[@alm000]

I learn so much here, now applying it, that's a whole other thing, :) Awesome stuff Man, \M/

[@Atttuner]

I believe the next frontier in pedals and tone is multi-band compression. As a novice I’d like to see a quick reference guide for a swatch of tones on a clean vs edge vs gain amp. Still the most informed low BS gear channel going 👍

[@ItachiUchiha-du9ub]

Absolutely priceless information as always!!!

[@SlyHikari03]

3:20 kinda reminds me of a riff from a Lasse Lammbert amp demo (I think his Uberschall vid). Ps. Love the background

[@whenfaithdies1]

I’d definitely like to see more of these videos.

[@Stevebergeron2000]

So interesting. And knowing what amps you used... Incredible. Do you think that can translate to cleaner sound? And why? Thank you for great content man.

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

Absolutely. Just like in this video, the main thing to consider is gain structure. An AC-15 breaks up a lot differently than a Twin for instance (and things get more complicated for power amp distortion), but if you stay under that threshold or compensate for it with a boost/pre-EQ, the results should be very convincing.

[@Stevebergeron2000]

@@PlagueScytheStudios What I would really like to see is that same kind of comparison, but on the reverse. Taking the same preamp/amp at low breakup, in different speaker TYPES. Jenson vs Celestion vs Eminence vs ... And then, cab sizes and types. I play with a REALLY OLD Danelectro from the 50' , that sound just awesome (for me at least). Its a 15 inch old Jensen, in a CARDBOARD cab!! It sound so unique for Blues and Jazz. I should try to plug another amp in it, I suspect that the sound wouldn't be that different...

[@tgchan]

simply unreal... LMAO This is as good as JIM LILL's videos xD Thank you for creating this GEM~!! I was really surprised when I saw POD @ 15:01 and then literally WTFed... when I saw it... @ 15:40

[@zosojstro]

So cool really helped better understand pre and post eq. Your playing gets better and better love the riffs! Was the Bloodeagle? I’m a huge Emg fan boy for heavy riffage. Thanks for creating such interesting content!😀

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

This was on the Typhoon this time, at least 7 strings of it tuned to drop Ab. The Lundgrens love the chug too!

[@vaermont3866]

that was....amazing.

[@rangerdoc1029]

Impulse Responses changed my world. Sold all my tube gear & have gone digital.

[@ok-tchau]

13:27 What's the point of showing the Yamaha THR5?

[@vaermont3866]

thanks dude. now my PRS MT15 sounds like the brand new Revv G20 :)

[@tickscollector9029]

Happened to listen to this while I was in a studio, here is what I thought in REAL TIME: Amp #1 (the vst, don't remember the name) was the best and closest. it really sounded 99.5% same even before the extra EQ. impressive! Well, before the added EQ? all the rest sounded bad in various levels :-) Amp #2 (Rectifier) no definition, vague, farty... after the EQ session sounded way better, bumped to 2nd place, but still amp 1 (the vst) was much better. Amp #3 (POD), the worst in all instances, I can't even describe how bad it was, even after the EQ it was bad. the worst. 5th place (6th, just because it was really bad lol) Amp #4 (Ceriatone) I was sure it was a digital something, had too much sizzle (sssss zzzzzz) top end. the EQ session did tame it well and got it to 2nd place as well, yes same level of outcome like the Rectifier. Amp #5 Well, yes it was bad, way way to much high end, but I thought it was close the amp #4 in character... just more top end :-) The EQ session made it better, it made it to 4th place. yes not 3rd... it wasn't on the same level as the others above it so I kept 3rd place empty to showcase the gap. Nice one, thanks.

[@wakjob961]

Is it weird that amp #2 had more of a scooped sound, but less of a mid dip than amp #5 on the graph?

[@michaelgallegos8811]

hey Ryan how the hell are ya ?lol.. great channel dude..

[@FLOODtoFIRE]

New player Thanks for the experience

[@IntheDAW]

That pod actually sounded great why didn't you use your axe fx? Amp 4 and 5 sp8nded the worst but man that ms2 sounds better than anyone ever made it sound before.

[@martinmorales3195]

It would be awesome if an standardization of amp distortion existed. We just need to choose the reference and call it ((0,0,0,0...),(0,0,0,0,...)) an every other amp would be ((x1,x2,...,xi),(y1,y2,...,yi)) where x and y are pre and post eq gain. No more: I need an amp with more bite and less oohmp. How about: "Do you have an ((-5,-3,0,5,7),(-1,0,-2,0,1))? That's my favorite sound"

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

Youre speaking my language. I can just imagine some 20,000x20,000 matrices spawning from such a system... for each amp setting. Haha

[@kevinp_25]

This was very interesting. In terms of EQ, would you say there is something distinctive about a Peavey 5150? If so, what? It seems to do something different than other high gain amps in the mids but I don’t have the ears to figure out exactly what that is.

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

I would say it's a combination if factors that on their own aren't all that remarkable. Both the 5150 and two channel Dual Rectifiers after all are practically clones of the Soldano SLO 100 with a few tweaks to the gain structure and tonestack (and tube rectifier if you use that mode). Those few changes result in the "dry" and bass heavy Recto versus the saturated, plug it in and forget nature of the 5150. The II and IIIs are a slightly different story, but are nonetheless kind of dummy proof in the same way.

[@wahyukusumapraja755]

hii bro What effect is this using ??

[@ok-tchau]

I'm a bit confused. You set the preEQ to act like a TubeScreamer to match the "reference amp without the TS"? So if you were to match the "reference amp with a TS" you would kind of put two TS in a row on the contenders? Also, is there any reason for using the CurveEQ on Default mode instead of Average?

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

The amp I'm using as reference already tightens up pre-distortion the same way most boost pedals affect a preamp. All the other amps needed a pedal to match that behavior since they're limited to a single gain control (or sometimes two at most). The EQ curves were determined with pink noise, so it's all averages here.

[@ok-tchau]

@@PlagueScytheStudios Oh, got it. Thanks for the reply and for the channel in general.

[@alfaalex101]

Hey PSS - I got a question. Would you invest heavily in a next-gen modeller (Neural DSP floor unit) or next gen FRFR speaker (I’m assuming NAMM 2020 has something for us)? I guess, another question may be if IR > Amp sim

[@PlagueScytheStudios]

It all depends on what you're doing with it and what you feel your current rig is lacking. Speakers for playing out and IRs for recording or playing over FOH are far more important at this point than amp modeling, assuming you're using something along the lines of AXE FX, Kemper, Helix, etc.

[@gustanoid]

bro if you've recorded all of that with real mic instead of torpedo the difference would be much more organic

[@deadviny]

gamers nexus merch

[@AnyDrug]

Wow, absolutely nice demonstration. The end results are totally within the margin of differences one real amp could give you from day to day use. Thing is; if you work with distortion or calling it "Hi gain" it is a quite narrow window of wave form possibilities you navigate in before it "sqares out or thins out". So when ppl speak speak of distortion character or similar they usually mean EQ.

[@azzazelo]

LOL I was wondering when this hydrogen bomb was gonna drop on this channel. Well done sir

[@andybecker5001]

OG pod sounds better than rectifier lol