Doubling guitars and avoid phase problems

[skipkent]

In general I just don't double, it's a rock thing that I just don't go in for anymore. Personal preference. I think it sounds cooler to use stereo delay (or the old trick of panning the delay opposite the guitar) to create a stereo image if needed or more often just subtle depth.

Can you describe how best to do this using the basic Live devices? I've tried to do this before with less than stellar results, but am very interested in learning to do it right.

[anybody human]

In general I just don't double, it's a rock thing that I just don't go in for anymore. Personal preference. I think it sounds cooler to use stereo delay (or the old trick of panning the delay opposite the guitar) to create a stereo image if needed or more often just subtle depth.

Can you describe how best to do this using the basic Live devices? I've tried to do this before with less than stellar results, but am very interested in learning to do it right.

For a regular stereo delay, use Ping Pong delay or Simple Delay. I would Group (command G) them to make an Effect Rack - Ping Pong w/ a Utility to control Width, Simple Delay followed by Auto Filter and again a Utility to control Width. If you put the delay on a Return track, you can Pan the guitar track towards one side and pan the delay return track towards the opposite side, for the classic widening/doubling sound. Hope that helps, PM if you need clarification. Cheers.

[Greeg]

There's pretty nice free plugin called ADT
http://www.vstcafe.com/2010/01/adt-arti ... g-vst.html

it takes the mono signal and then makes it stereo. you can set the delay , panning and other things. Actually I use it a lot, mainly because it's very quick plugin. You just throw it on some mono channel, set the delay (ie. minimal) and you instantly get quick stereo preview. It should work for guitars because that's the purpose this plugin was created, but to be honest - if you already have two different tracks, I would just use more effects - delay, EQ, maybe even some saturation.

[anybody human]

Here are a couple of tutorial videos that I think are really helpful. They happen to be for Fabfilter's Pro Q, but the techniques covered will work with most any eq.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSNYBbPA ... r_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_-PjWts ... r_embedded

The 1st video deals with things like frequency masking (i.e. kick & bass can't both be booming away at the same frequency). The 2nd video covers Mid/Side techniques, among other things. Some of this might help with mixing multiple guitar tracks.

Live EQ8 has a Mid/Side mode (click under Mode to choose L/R or M/S), and you can use Spectrum for the frequency analyzer (in Spectrum's title bar, click the arrow to expand the display, drag top edge up or down to resize). At first, you might try moving the Spectrum plugin around occasionally, or place one before and one after the EQ8, to see how your changes are effecting the signal.