Tag: guitar

Of past and present guitars

2023.02.25.

Well, to cut a long story short, I have a new Jackson (a fast, and modern metal axe) in the Darkwave family. Buying a Jackson finally put an end to a decade-long yearning: the fact that I had to sell my old PS2 Performer approximately 20 years ago always made me somewhat sad. Since then, I’ve been constantly eyeing Jacksons from the corner of my eye, until now… Look at this beauty:

The new Jackson actually put me into a somewhat nostalgic mode: it made me remember not only my old PS2 Performer but also my very first electric guitar, a Jolana Strat. For those who are not familiar with this gem of the former Czechoslovakian music industry, let me show you a couple of pictures of this highly uncomfortable and suboptimal guitar. Still, I’m grateful for this very simple musical instrument, because this gave me the first impetus to become a guitar fanatic.

New sound sample

2022.12.04.

This is not at all a song: this is just a short collage of riffs that I upload here to show you guys how the new sound is evolving. I’m slowly proceeding towards a substantially updated audio and I would like to ask you, how do you like it (at least in its present form).

Please give it a listen and let me know your opinion!

New gear, new sound

2022.11.22.

Recently I performed a couple of major updates on my gear. To cut a long story short, significant changes were made both on the hardware and software side.

Firstly, I was constantly struggling with the suboptimal output sound of the VST instrument I used to simulate drum sounds in Cubase (the DAW I’ve been using since the beginning) with. No matter how hard I was trying, I couldn’t improve the final drum tone beyond a certain point – and despite all the improvements, I found this particular point still somewhat suboptimal and artificial. Then someone (actually a professional musician, whose opinion I value very much) suggested me to switch to Get Good Drums. I, therefore, started to use “One Kit Wonder – Metal” from this company, and the result was immediately (without any further mixing and/or mastering) amazing. Secondly, I changed the original pickups in my LTD EC-256 guitar to Seymour Duncan’s Pegasus and Sentient passive humbuckers, which resulted in a dramatic and immediate improvement in the quality of the rough guitar sound. And thirdly – following years of using pre-programmed guitar presets – I started to experiment with setting up my own virtual guitar rig using the Bias FX2 amp-and-effects processor.

Below you can listen to a short demo sample of the basis of the new – still experimental, raw, unpolished and unmixed – guitar sound. Please let me know in the comments, how do you guys like it!