I used to have a plugin called a Sonic Maximizer by BBE. I can’t remember using on anything that I kept or what qualities it had. If I am remembering correctly it had pretty simple settings.
People these days probably laugh at POD xt since there are so many “better” products. Still, back before Periphery got big Misha got some really great sounds out of a POD xt and not really much else in his chain.
I was right about the JCM and Peavey though. It felt to me like they were using some JCM and Peavey-like amps, but did not occur to me they could be using anything digital.
I have an older bbe sonic maximizer in a rack case. It was originally a piece of outboard studio processing gear that added more or in their words corrected hi and low end response. It was essentially an enhancer. It in reality kinda of just makes things sound a little scooped and ratty.
Is it available for download anywhere?
I’ve found some JS plugin that is supposed to do the work, but I am not sure if that’s how it’s supposed to sound.
Yup, pretty much what the JS plugin I’ve found does. Only it’s very subtle, so much in fact that I could as well just not bother.
I’m unfortunately not aware of any. I’m totally out of the loop on obtaining plugins without paying for them. In fact, I’ve always been and the only non-paid plugins in my possession were given to me by Misha 
Hopefully that doesn’t incriminate him lol!!! It’s not like I ever made money off my recordings, they were just a fun little hobby.
Too bad. I’ll have to experiment with JS one.
Also forgot to mention - there are some feedbacks in the song, especially on fade in. I tried to replicate it in a DAW with plugins and routing but no luck.
So I decided to plug guitar into a cheap amp in parallel to the plugins, and placed mic just for kicks. Didn’t bother with proper placement.
To my amazement that cheap, terrible amp sounds not too shabby when miced, but mixing it with ampsims yields interesting results.
I could probably try again and post some samples if you want.
I got some more info:
He says they used POD with SLO100 preset as “main gain”, whatever that means - the rest he does not remember.
Rythm guitar sounds like a Marshall to me though - he said POD was plugged in input jack, so maybe it was just to add more gain.
So here’s the plan - I guess I will keep using Nameless for rythm tone. The original sounds a bit more darker to whatever I got - maybe due to Laney cab. I don’t have any Laney IRs, so I’ll see if EQ helps.
As for lead - I don’t have any SLO ampsims IIRC - if I don’t find any in my library I think 5150 will get me close enough with some Orange cab IRs.
Of course mics will be a huge factor here, but I don’t suppose I’ll ever find out which ones were used exactly and in what spot, but at least I have something to work with now.
Now I guess only thing left to do is learn the song, program drums and bass and wait for new strings - I’ll be getting 9string set for that .105 oomph in (double) drop D.
Update:
I guess I’m getting close.
I did find SLO plugin in my library but I must have done something wrong as it sounded awful with IRs I wanted to use, so went for 5150 instead.
And I’m no longer sure if SLO was supposed to be lead and Marshall rythm or vice versa:
In any case I still have some more song to learn. Actually I have almost no clue what they play when clean guitar kicks in, even worse - no idea what’s going on when they go back to overdrive. I mean I sort of know which chords, but the voicing sounds off to me, especially when I see weird shapes fingered on fretboard in their lives:
My guess is the pinky actually does something in this example (that’s @ 7:44 here:Obscure Sphinx LIVE @ 7er Club Mannheim - 6.5.2016 - Dani Zed - Epic Crust Doom Sludge - YouTube).
I’m back.
Turns out SLO was supposed to be rythm and Marshall (really though? I think POD simulation of SLO was going through both amps, but whatever) lead.
I’m mostly finished with learning guitars parts, so on this occasion I decided to revisit the tone.
I’ve found “allegedly” decent SLO100 sim for free - it’s in the free version of Amplitube. I can’t however find the right tone.
I knew they were using some Orange cab on rythm guitar with the SLO sim, I haven’t found any Orange IRs that I liked though so I went on and used almost the same IR’s as the lead one, at least for the time being.
Of course I’m still struggling to capture the characteristic of the original tone:
Here’s what I came up with:
Full mix (no double or quad tracking)
just right guitar:
just left:
For comparison, here’s the original:
Right:
Left:
It seems like my chors in the later riffs are muddy and the low notes not powerful enough.
Also it kinda feels like the right guitar in the original is a bit more honky still maintaining some brightness and clarity, while left is softer in it’s attack and top end.
Apart from the tone itself, the guitars in original appear to be much fuller and punchier.
The low D is earth shattering, it’s like each note has enough energy to open portal to another dimension.
I honestly don’t have a clue how they did it. And it’s the same live, even with just one guitarist, so it’s not down to mastering magic.
I don’t expect changing strings to fresh, heavier gauge will give such a massive difference, there must be something fundamentally wrong with what I’m doing or my rig.
Please have a look at the newest version of the mix:
I noticed the guitars in the original have much more gain than I thought, however I might have overestimated it this time.
I have also added some plate reverb on the right guitar to soften the chords in the intro and tweaked bass EQ and set both guitars to 60% pan.
I generally like how the heavy parts sound now, even though it’s not identical to the original, it has a lot of energy now, however a touch less gain (and tweaking with the tone a bit) should yield better results.
It fills the space nicely now though, it has some weight to it now that I beefed the bass a bit.
What I don’t like:
The right guitar tone in the beginning is still far off from the original. It sounds glassy, but if I put some high cut eq it gets dull. Alternative is to target specific frequencies, and I really tried, but can’t snip the glass out precisely without making it dull again. I just can’t balance it properly.
Perhaps it’s got something to do with the boost pedal being active (and Horizon Precision Drive at that) in this part, but if I disengage it it gets dull again.
Also the drums, especially cymbals/crashes/whatever suffer from compression - there is very noticeable flutter going on that I can’t get rid of right now. It must have something to do with applying compression on drum bus instead to each track individually - I’ll have to find a way to break the SD drums into separate tracks instead of having them all on one track in reaper and then separate in the plugin itself.
As far as the tone itself goes I get a feeling the original is more “airy” or “breathy”, can’t describe it properly. Some “kshshshshsh” going on. Probably down to proper IRs, but while I got my hands on some Orange cab IRs for the right guitar, none of them sound exactly (or even close to) like I want, so I ended up blending them with my fav Zilla cab IRs, which unfortunately don’t have mic placement adjustment available (just 2 IRs).
Left guitar is another topic altogether, but since it has less of a role in the song I don’t have much problem with it. Originally it was supposed to be Line 6 (actually both guitars were) into some Marshall into (IIRC) Laney cab, but I used NDSP Nameless and maybe it’s not that close, but I kinda like how it sounds. Maybe except the first lead part…
In any case I’m awaiting new strings right now - I order 9 string set, the 9th .105 gauge will act as my 8th string, hopefully it’ll work better with fresh set.
Let me know what you think, I’m especially keen on fixing the intro chord part and the drums.
EDIT: OMG now that I listened to the original (and my older versions) right next to the new one I must say my tone is atrocious.
Back to the drawing board it is:
I changed the strings recently and decided to use NDSP SLO100 trial, also grabbed some Orange IRs:
Now I’m getting similar vibe, but the original seems a lot brighter, but the top end is very soft and airy.
I can’t simply bump the top end in eq or I’ll get more of the same that I have, it’ll be too harsh.
I am not good at mixing, but I tried to automate some stuff, after this part, when heavy riffs come in, I set it to engage boost pedal to add a bit gain and make low end tighter - so this sample is without the boost.
Other than that I tried to use some reverb hoping it will soften the top end, but it seems to be not enough.
Can you guys point me in the right direction? Any specific mic model/position? Or do I do something fundamentally wrong?