Killswitch Engage - As Daylight Dies Guitar Tone with plugins (Neural DSP Soldano SLO 100)

First off, shouts to snapascrew for his video with Joel discussing the As Daylight Dies guitar tone. It's a favourite guitar tone for many people, and its great hearing that members of the band feel the same.
Using the information from that video I thought I'd see how close I can get, and honestly it was all quite straightforward. Neural DSP Soldano SLO 100 plugin, with my Mesa 2001 Traditional IR's. I'm not saying its exact, but for 5 minutes of tweaking I was pretty happy. No additional EQ or processing.
I just used an Epiphone LP with a JB - I'm sure using more similar guitars to them would get even closer. Also, apologies for the playing. KSE deserve better, and this was just thrown together really quick to show the tone.

[@snapascrew]

Nice!! I actually just bought a Mesa cab with some 2001 speakers in it. Love it.

[@eds4754]

Ahh nice! I’ve had Mesa cabs from 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2005 and the 2001’s are totally unique. You’ll love them

[@snapascrew]

@@eds4754 I have a 01 vs 08 video on my page. Pretty eye opening lol

[@eds4754]

@@snapascrew Ha I watched that one, they can vary a bunch. btw, any idea what pickups KSE were using on ADD? AOJB is JB, EOH is EMG85 right?

[@snapascrew]

@@eds4754 I believe it was a combo of 81 and 85. Joel said that some guitars had 81’s in them and some had 85’s in them. He wasn’t speaking directly to the ADD album tho. I’ll have a friend ask him what guitars they used tho.

[@eds4754]

@@snapascrew Amazing to know, great info man!

[@pubertbucefalus1795]

Amazing tone thats so cool. Can you share the rough amp settings you used please? And was this boosted or not, Ive heard both haha :)

[@eds4754]

its rhythm channel boosted with a tubescreamer. I’d need to check from my computer but the settings are nothing crazy. Main thing is the cab/micing

[@TheMrcalamity]

Sound so good! Did you use sm57? Just bought that pack! So you remember if it was top right speaker and What position?

[@eds4754]

@@TheMrcalamity Yeah it was 57, and one of the top speakers. I can check later on but I’d guess position 30-42 if it’s a left speaker, or equivalent on TR

[@TheMrcalamity]

@@eds4754 thanks! I really liked the 60 from top right speaker! Really good sounding speaker! Are 50 and down to the center of the cab?

[@metaljonesy]

Very decent!! I think I have the 2002 IR's from you that you sent a while back, is there a huge difference between them?

[@eds4754]

You can probably get close with the 2002’s but they have a bigger top+bottom and more of a scooped sound. The 2001 speakers are just kind of uniquely smooth/dark compared to every other year and this one particular speaker seemed to have a very similar character to that tone 🤷‍♂️

[@Xirrious]

Where do these IR's come from? I am new to nDSP, can't seem to figure out the IR thing. I see I can buy IR's from Mesa, but they won't work with nDSP?

[@eds4754]

these were IR’s I made myself. I hope to have them for sale at some point but atm they aren’t available. You can use any 3rd party IR’s in NDSP stuff, you just need them in .wav format. Should be easy to work out, as long as they are .wav files

[@levanchikvaidze3519]

@@eds4754 you know, we are waiting for them being available to buy :)

[@eds4754]

@@levanchikvaidze3519 mirrorprofiles.myshopify.com/products/cali-trad-2001-cabinet-ir-pack they are available here!

[@AndresPrass]

@@eds4754 Can I use the 48khz 24bit IR in a 96khz 24bit project? Would there be any differences?

[@eds4754]

@@AndresPrass Not really. It depends on the IR loader. At 48kHz the IR will have frequencies captured up until around 24kHz, at 96kHz it’ll capture up to around 48k. The IR loader will resample the IR to the correct format, and then filter before the audio returns to the DAW. Processes like high gain guitar amps tend to have a lot of LPF (and oversampling) anyway to keep the aliasing under control. Oversampling is good for controlling aliasing, but because IR’s aren’t generating harmonics, there’s nothing to gain really. I’d try and use the same sample rate IR as your session so your IR loader doesn’t have to resample, but I wouldn’t worry at all if not.

[@juanfelipeacuna1023]

a little bit harsher on the top end than the original mix but good tones nonetheless.

[@eds4754]

Thank you! I’ll pretend that’s down to them probably using EQ and me not doing it 🙊

[@GreatBurningNullifier]

@@eds4754 oh yeah that must be it, I’ve referenced this album’s guitar tone a lot in the past and comparing it to other metal core album from the same period I found out this tone leans more towards the darker spectrum, specially when compared to the end of heartache album. But your tone sounds killer man!

[@eds4754]

ahh it’s one of my absolute favourite tones too. These things always surprise me when they’re so simple to recreate, like they’re never fighting hard to make the tone come together