That’s the THR10X? Not bad at all for something that size.
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Yeah I have to say as far as digital modeling amps go, it’s certainly one of the best sounding.
I have a Friedman BE100 through a Marshall 4 X 12 for my stage rig, but for recording, practice or teaching it’s a perfect little amp.
How’s the BE100 at bedroom levels? Heard good things about it’s master volume.
It’s awesome. I need to make a proper clip with my full rig setup with some reverb and delay, but I have a short clip from a couple of years ago when I first got it, I was just demoing it a little, at low volume, maybe barely at 2 on the dial? This is with my 1986 BC Rich custom strat with a DiMarzio X2N in the bridge, plugged through my board same signal chain as the Yamaha, Boss Super Overdrive and ISP Decimator. No reverb/delay.
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That is badass man; cool guitar! Your great with the tapping thing, I need to start working that into my playing, currently working on carprice 5, it’s a killer.
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Ok, I tried to get a decent tone with Overloud, here’s a clip of me practicing a Vinnie Moore song last night (several mistakes and possibly poor tuning, it’s a work in progress 
). Soz it’s a bit long (and the end is a bit shambolic), I hadn’t had time to crop it - but the first minute or so should be sufficient to have an idea of the tone:
This is obtained by plugging my Charvel St Dimas (coil tapped - mix of bridge + neck pickups) into a Focusrite 2i4 (interface gain just below the clipping threshold), then into Reaper with the guitar plugin Overloud THU. This is a snapshot of the signal chain, for the cabinet simulation I used a (free!) Vox AC30 Blue IR from Seacow Cabs:
I’d be very happy to get feedback on this tone and what the rest of you would do different. For reference, this is Vinnie’s original (I’m going for a slightly more Classic Rock sound than him, I guess, but in general we’re both into “lots of Mids” I would say). Thank you
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Tommo, you’ve been holding back!
Your playing is exemplary! You have the track down, great choice too! On my radar now, I remember listening to his meltdown album a zillion times, I think I know every note in my head by heart of from that album.
Loved the tone, very sweet without excessive gain ( which I’m guilty of :D) — a very legato type of tone.
I had never heard of overloud, need to check it out, learn something new every day!
If I’m to say anything it would be that it masks the pick attack a bit, the only thing I’d change to show off your excellent chops a lot more.
May I ask how you worked this track out, did you transcribe it or use his tab book? And also how long did you take to learn it all. Just asking to know how everybody works here, I could def learn a lot from you guys. Also is that a free backing track.
Thanks for sharing, was an absolute pleasure to listen to it. Post more!
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Thank you so much! Are you sure you didn’t listen to the original instead of my recording? 
Gotta run to give a lecture but will write more later! In short it was a combination of tabs / ear and sometimes full-on making up my own licks because I couldn’t figure out the real thing Still needs cleaning up but I hope I’ll be able to record a version soon.
And yes, you can find the backing track on youtube for free!
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interesting because I was going to ask about this. I might be persuaded to try to cover some stuff (at least partially) if I could find backing tracks. I doubt I would ever invest the time it takes to make backing tracks though lol.
What all type of stuff is available? lots of varied shredder type tracks? (Yngwie, Vinnie, what else?)
I’ve been experimenting with software modeling myself lately and I have a very similar issue. In order to get a good pick attack, you need to sound a bit shrill. Haven’t yet found a way to compromise. I’m not sure why this seems to be a universal problem with modelers.
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Awesome! Great playing! 
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Big Vinnie fan here, amazing playing 
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tommo would you mind sending me the dry signal of what you played? I can re-amp it through my plugins and explain step by step what I’m doing in order to help get tones worthy of your amazing playing! Your stuff really made my jaw drop, I’m a VM fan and dream of playing his songs.
Your tone in this clip isn’t bad at all, don’t get me wrong, but I think I can help you get better with a few real life examples.
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That’s been my experience too Eric, I’ve had better results using regular OD pedals for the preamp bit. The rest of the chain is ok in the comp though I’m very interested in the new Two Note CAB M unit, for complete independence. I will put it down to my lack of knowledge or experimentation though.
The kemper had a pick attack control, and a killer compression setting in the deep edit amp section, I always thought of them as cheating, unnatural or GOD mode
@BillHoudini Quite right, Tommo’s playing is stellar! I’d be really interested to learn how you set up your patches too.
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I’m using quite a lot of different plugins, I’ve been in a rabit hole for a few months, buying one plugin after another. I ended up using the Helix Native (Line 6 Helix in a software only format), the Mercuriall Spark (very accurate Marshall amp simulations) and some Eventide plugins for delay-reverb-EQ.
In the past I used a traditional tube amp with a Torpedo Captor into my studio monitors and I loaded Impulse Responses from the my DAW via Torpedo Wall of Sound. Before that I used an Axe Fx Ultra and an Atomic Amplifire 3 (which I’ll re-buy in a few weeks).
So as you can see I had my fair share of experience with digital stuff, in fact I consider it way faster and easier to have a great home tone with that kind of setup. The problem is that the learning curve is a bit steep, but once you get there, your workflow lets you practice/record/reamp in a very efficient way.
@tommo I’ll be glad to help, I’ll have a bit of time the following days to do the re-amping process and write a small guide with your track as an example. Just let me know if you need anything! 
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Thank you again for the kind words everyone! Before posting this I could only hear my mistakes, but you made me realise that I played most of the track well which is very encouraging
@BillHoudini I’m gonna grab your offer immediately… this thread is really awesome
I put two DI tracks here: one is a slightly improved version of thinking Machine (this one is done with a Shaftesbury Telecaster, neck pickup) - I recorded 4 sections separately and then glued the wav files together. The second is a good take I recorded in December of the Erotomania solo (guitar = Chapman ML1)
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1inBW1JTrYlkyZVGLRNDL0eP74EqtiIQb?usp=sharing
PS: In the last couple years I have accumulated the following plugins: Bias FX (which I regret buying now), Overloud THU, Mercuriall Reaxis, Mercuriall SS-11X, Mercuriall U530 , JamVox (not great but comes for free with a handy portable interface), Audio Assault Hellbeast (Got it for $9!). Can’t use any of them properly 
@Twangsta: I started learning Thinking Machine by ear as a kid (17y old or so), I believe I got many riffs right in the first half or so of the song, except perhaps some of the crazy runs. I went back to it since a couple of years ago, looking at tabs but also at youtube covers, yet for some of the craziest bits nothing I found made sense, hence I made up my own runs, trying to keep the vibe of the original ones (in particular the stuff around 3:50).
In terms of practicing/recording, this can be quite an overwhelming piece of music so I decided to divide the song in 4 sections and try to record them separately, not necessarily in chronological order to avoid stagnation (last night for example, I tried to record the end first). Note that the speed is not super high for shred standards (108bpm), yet many of the runs are sort of tongue-twisters for the left hand (especially the diminished stuff). Actually I could go on for ages about this song, so if people are interested I may do a mega-post about it in the future, like I did a while ago for the Erotomania solo
@JonJon my method for finding backing tracks is to google “free XYZ guitar backing track”, or something like that. It usually works because the internet is (mostly) amazing!
Well, that was fast! When you have a great DI track things are always easier! 
The only “editing” I did was to sync the DI tracks with the backing tracks I found. I managed to do it 100% on the Thinking Machine, on the Erotomania the part just before the solo feels a bit shaky but I couldn’t bring them closer in sync. The actual solo is 100% there though, fantastic playing!
I’ll start with the Thinking Machine, because I split the DI track into 3 different ones. The main one, one crunchier with a bit of delay and one gainer with delay. If you listen to the original you will definitely hear 3 different guitar sounds.
The basic principle for 99% of the guitar suite plugins nowadays is to treat them like a traditional setup. Think of it as an ideal scenario, where you are inside a candyshop full of gear and you can use anything you want instantly. That’s what a good plugin or modeler/profiler is. My advice is to tweak things like you would in real life. For example don’t put 3 overdrives and a reverb pedal before the amp. It was an exaggerated example but you get what I mean.
Let’s go a bit in depth in the main DI track. As you can see in the yellow highlighted areas, I use a simple setup with an overdrive pedal (Klon Centaur model) into a Friedman HBE, into two Impulse Responses of a Marshall cab with V30 and Greenback speakers. The basic EQ of the amp is highlighted in the bottom right of the screen. This is it! No post EQ or hocus pocus, just a bit of room reverb by an Eventide plugin, nothing fancy there either. I treated this plugin like an actual setup and I tweaked things like I would if I had a Friedman with an overdrive and two cabs in front of me.
Now, let’s go over the Erotomania solo. After I finished Thinking Machine I saw your post and you mentioned that you own Mercuriall Reaxis, which is a Mesa Boogie plugin, so I decided to re-amp through that, so you can have the same sound if you end up liking what I did. Here I worked with the same logic, I tried to shape my sound like I would if I had a Mesa Boogie Triaxis with an overdrive and a Mesa Boogie cabinet with V30s. This is what I ended up with. Instead of the stock cabs, I used some OwnHammer Impulses of a Mesa cab, but the stock ones work really good as well.
This is it basically. I did all that in less than an hour, but this is because plugins are integrated in my workflow for years. I don’t think it’s rocket science but of course there is some learning to do, which I would prefer spending on guitar so I can play like you! 
My last bit of advice is to record a small segment, loop it and tweak while it’s looping. That way you don’t have to constantly play and tweak at the same time, you can just sit there and find the tone you like. Don’t do that over 30 minutes because your ears will get tired and you won’t be able to tell the difference in the tweaks you do.
Here are the tracks in the mix, but of course I can send you the solo tracks as well.
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Wow thank you that was quick! For some reason the embedded media players don’t work for me though 
I’m looking forward to hearing your mixes though!!
PS: oh and the backing track I used for the Erotomania solo is this one: DREAM THEATER - EROTOMANIA (GUITAR BACKING TRACK) HD AUDIO - YouTube - I think the time signatures in some of the pre-solo section differs from other versions, which may explain the impossibility of matching the solo with the track you found!
I just found a workaround, they wouldn’t play for me either in the embedded form. Have a listen, I hope you like them!
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It’s really cool what you did with my tracks thank you! In the next few days I’ll try to reproduce your Mesa tone, I think you came close to Petrucci’s sound in the studio album 
My partner even said “hey finally your guitar doesn’t sound shrill”!
I also liked a lot what you did for the Thinking Machine, but at the moment I don’t plan to invest in a Helix native (I think it costs as much as all the plugins I have combined :-D). I assume that I should be able to approximate that sound with the things I have though.
This is the full amp list from Overloud THU, if/when you have a minute, can you spot something that could approximate well the Friedman amp?
And thank you so much again
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