Ambience and "washed out" guitars - how to do it?

[LedAstray]

Hi All.

Please be patient with me, I'm a noob and may or may not be half-retarded.

Influenced by my recurring obsession with some specific bands and their tone and atmosphere I started to wonder how would I reproduce this kind of stuff in my own playing (covers, mainly).
On the surface it looks like there are two things that I am asking today, but I thin they have something in common.

So without further ado:

1. Really, reallly washed out guitars in some black metal bands - e.g. Akhlys and Aoratos.
These two bands are really two projects of the same guy, and they both sound quite similar. In any case, it's a good representation of what I have in mind.







Is that just... reverb and nothing more?
There surely must be something else going on, when I try to do something similar with just reverb I do not get comparable results at all.

2. Ambience.
We can use the same examples as above, both albums have copious amounts of ambient sounds.
Also one of my other fav bands - Obscure Sphinx - uses this kind of stuff that I have no clue how to make.
Where do I start? Synths maybe?

 

[ArtDecade]

You need some Winger in your life because those bands are terrible. That said, yup. It is mostly reverb and not high-fidelity ones. You could probably just get some old Boss 12-bit Reverb pedal and call it a day. If you want an even more dirty room, run the reverb into the front end of the amps and you can get some shoegazey stuff. The combination of verb and not separating the instruments in the mix makes it sound like a washy mess.

But... really.... Winger, man. Give Kip a chance.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

This is my jam. I play heavy drone and ambient guitar, and sometimes people even pay me money to do it.

Hard to say what they're using, but "just" reverb is a good start. Reverb before dirt (if you're using pedals, or into the front of a dirty amp, but reverb into a dirt pedal is bestest) goes from sparkly, gritty slapback to fully-blown shoegaze mess when running into a fuzz (boost it with a RAT to get really ugly) or similarly nasty dirtbox. A little of each goes a long way.

Personally, I use reverb in multiple spots in my chain. I have an EQD Afterneath the goes before the dirt section, and a few after my dirt section. They fulfill different roles. The Afterneath is for everything from adding a little sparkle to nasty shoegaze "leads" and fat fuzzed out messes when playing chords. I have an OBNE Dark Star after my dirt and volume pedal that can go full-wet, I use it for pads and swells. This one feeds into a Vox Time Machine delay so that I can smear out the swells even further. After that everything goes into a modulated big-hall stereo reverb for maximum Ambient Largeness (currently Alesis Quadraverb, soon to be Meris Mercury 7).

The My Bloody Valentine formula is basically very wet reverse reverb into fuzz. Not my taste personally, but it's an absolutely classic shoegaze sound and if you want that, you'll need that reverse.

If I were to recommend you one pedal it would be a reverb that has some more "standard" hall and plate algos and can go full-wet. The longer the feedback time the better, and if it can self-oscillate that's even betterer. A delay after it gets you the best of both worlds, you can do the 'verbed out melody lines thing and also turn up the wetness and delay for padded ambience. Every pedal is different and they all interact differently, so your results will depend a lot on what pedals you choose and your experimentation with them.

I also highly recommend Chords of Orion on YT, he's the Bob Ross of ambient guitar and I've learned a lot from him. He's more on the "new age" end of the ambient spectrum but his advice is very solid and he does an awesome job of explaining the how-and-why of ambient guitar.

 

[LedAstray]

(if you're using pedals, or into the front of a dirty amp, but reverb into a dirt pedal is bestest)

All VSTs... I am experimenting with NDSP Nameless and Valhalla Supermassive reverb.
So far what I used to be getting is just guitar with some reverb in the background, and all instruments were very separated. It wasn't a solid, massive wall of sound that I am looking for.
For now I am goofing around with Supermassive and am getting better results, tho it could just as well be new monitors since I just replaced my old stereo with them.

Is your advice suitable for BM as well as shoegaze?

 

[ArtDecade]

All VSTs... I am experimenting with NDSP Nameless and Valhalla Supermassive reverb.
So far what I used to be getting is just guitar with some reverb in the background, and all instruments were very separated. It wasn't a solid, massive wall of sound that I am looking for.
For now I am goofing around with Supermassive and am getting better results, tho it could just as well be new monitors since I just replaced my old stereo with them.

Is your advice suitable for BM as well as shoegaze?

Your clips sound more in line with newer shoegazey Black Metal.

The older stuff was either bone dry - or - the whole mix would go through a hall reverb.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

Is your advice suitable for BM as well as shoegaze?

I would call what I do BM-adjacent, so yes, but also, my setup is the result of a lot of years of experimentation and is very specific to what I do and my personal tastes. I think it will get you pointed in the right direction, though. Do you get to play with the order of effects and such on VSTs? I'd say that's probably one of the biggest factors. Reverb before dirt (whether amp or pedal) gets you that "distorting the reverb" sound which gives big washouts, extra sustain, and can introduce all kinds of weird little artifacts.

 

[LedAstray]

Do you get to play with the order of effects and such on VSTs?

Yes, but if I put SuperMassive before the amp/distortion I get a lot of noise / feedback.
Now I'm starting to think I chose wrong reverb as it is integrated with delay that is always on.

I will play with it for a bit more to get the feel of it, I am guessing that how it all sits in a mix will be a big factor - unfortunately most of my DAW projects are gone so I'd need to spend a bit of time programming drums and bass

 

[budda]

hall/space/cavern reverb parallel to output after amp/cab with 100% mix and use level to add in.

Or run everything into said types for cohesion as mentioned.

 

[LedAstray]

hall/space/cavern reverb parallel to output after amp/cab with 100% mix and use level to add in.

That's actually what I learned to do on all of my mixes - works great.


I played a bit, and maybe just overdid it lol - but here's what I came up with:



Tested 3 or so different reverbs/settings, but now that I listen to it after it rendered it may be a touch too much.

 

[ArtDecade]

That's actually what I learned to do on all of my mixes - works great.


I played a bit, and maybe just overdid it lol - but here's what I came up with:



Tested 3 or so different reverbs/settings, but now that I listen to it after it rendered it may be a touch too much.

To be honest, I actually like what you did better than the examples that you posted. I still think it needs a killer solo, lyrics about a good time, and spandex, but you do you.

 

[Drew]

I

Hi All.

Please be patient with me, I'm a noob and may or may not be half-retarded.

Influenced by my recurring obsession with some specific bands and their tone and atmosphere I started to wonder how would I reproduce this kind of stuff in my own playing (covers, mainly).
On the surface it looks like there are two things that I am asking today, but I thin they have something in common.

So without further ado:

1. Really, reallly washed out guitars in some black metal bands - e.g. Akhlys and Aoratos.
These two bands are really two projects of the same guy, and they both sound quite similar. In any case, it's a good representation of what I have in mind.







Is that just... reverb and nothing more?
There surely must be something else going on, when I try to do something similar with just reverb I do not get comparable results at all.

2. Ambience.
We can use the same examples as above, both albums have copious amounts of ambient sounds.
Also one of my other fav bands - Obscure Sphinx - uses this kind of stuff that I have no clue how to make.
Where do I start? Synths maybe?

I'm listening on REALLY shitty headphones.

But, I don't think reverb is the majority of what you're hearing and responding to here. It's in there, but I think it's mostly the core guitar tone.

Jack the shit up out of the gain. Scoop the mids a little. Maybe still high-pass in the 60-120hz range, but don't low-pass at all, leave in as much of th wash of presence as you can. You want to turn your guitars into loosely tonal white noise.

I've also - and I'm not hearing this here, but it's worth a try in case it works for you - aways found a slow chorus is really good at making guitars sit back in the mix and robbing them of punch and impact. Maybe a light, slow, subtle chorus, too?

As far as reverb, in like 90% of mix situations, you want your tracks dry, and then use a FX send to a wet-only reverb bus to add ambience. Here, if you intentionally want to wash something out, I'd add reverb directly to the track, and just use a very subtle reverb with 100% wet mix, because you're intentionally trying to create some distance between the listener and the guitars.

For ambience I do a ton with guitar string noise personally, always worth a shot.

 

[LedAstray]

I kinda noticed that the tones I am after have very little to none of the guitar attack (transient / body / whatever you want to call it). This might be it.

 

[FutileExercises]

Dave Otero mixed Melinoe (I love that record), and there is a nail the mix for one of the tracks over at URM academy.
I can't link it directly as I don't have an active subscription there, but had a test subscription when Dave Otero was on it.
If you are interested, log in and then I think you can buy the akhlys nail the mix session.

Basically, the guy behind akhlys quad-tracked most guitars to a varying degree. Sometimes there are 4 different guitar lines layered, sometimes it's the same riff but played 4 times on each channel. Totalling 8 guitar tracks at all times is part of the chorus effect mentioned earlier.
Additionally, if I remember correctly, naas alcameth used an octaver or something to record his DIs, so what you hear through the reamped guitar tracks is part "as played" and part "one octave higher" going into the amp (in a contrast to doing that after the distorted signal). It's a weird sound and hard to describe with words, so I'd really recommend checking it out.

You get the multi tracks if you buy the package and just listening to naas alcameth's vocal layers is nightmare material.

Here is a snippet of the vocal tracks, I think it should link to the mix session. (Edit: apparently can't link to YouTube. Search "Dave Otero akhlys and you should find it)

 

[LedAstray]

Dave Otero mixed Melinoe (I love that record), and there is a nail the mix for one of the tracks over at URM academy.
I can't link it directly as I don't have an active subscription there, but had a test subscription when Dave Otero was on it.
If you are interested, log in and then I think you can buy the akhlys nail the mix session.

Yeah I know, I've seen the YT vid on it (the vocals one) - I don't know how subscription works there and would prefer to avoid throwing cash in the mud if I can't get this specific lesson and / or it is expensive.

Basically, the guy behind akhlys quad-tracked most guitars to a varying degree. Sometimes there are 4 different guitar lines layered, sometimes it's the same riff but played 4 times on each channel. Totalling 8 guitar tracks at all times is part of the chorus effect mentioned earlier

That's how I do it on pretty much all my recordings. Gets massive tones, and can recommend that to everybody.

Additionally, if I remember correctly, naas alcameth used an octaver or something to record his DIs, so what you hear through the reamped guitar tracks is part "as played" and part "one octave higher" going into the amp (in a contrast to doing that after the distorted signal). It's a weird sound and hard to describe with words, so I'd really recommend checking it out.

That explains a lot actually, I experimented with pitch shifters previously but did not do it that way last time I was playing Akhlys stuff.