Humm and bleed on the recording track

[Icedfirefly]

Hello guys.

I'm having a humm and bleed on the recording track, here is an example, you can hear a bit of the humm, the drums and the click in the background, but is only the guitar recording channel solo and no metronome active at playback (It was active on recording)



My path is this

Guitar - (3 differents guitars)
Interface audio - Focusrite scarlett solo 3rd gen (Instrument channel, buttong active and gain at 0, and PodX3Live using the dry channel, not used at the same time of course
Computers - tried with 2 desktops (Plugged everything in the same power strip) and a laptop not connected to a power outlet
DAW - Reaper and Ableton live
Plugin - Neural DSP Nolly, gain at 3, gate at 80, input at -6.7 output at 0

Tried with different cables, the monitoring was with IEM running on my back, as far as possible from the guitar and the guitar cable.

If i record a dry track and then later add the amp plugin you can hear again the humm and the bleed.

Drivers are updated, tried with different sample rates and buffer sizes

Volume in the recording track is at 0 and when playing the meter is around -18 db

Maybe is something really simple that I'm overlooking...


Thanks.

 

[Drew]

Hum doesn't seem abnormally pronounced compared to what I'd expect from a somewhat distorted amp.

Definitely a bit of bleed in there though. If you're using in ear monitors it's *probably* not the pickups capturing the sound coming out of speakers in the room or anything. But, what you want to do here is systematically work through every possible source of that bleed, to see if you can find out where it's coming from. Off the top of my head, I'd look at:

*make sure there's really nothing playing back sound live in the room, to rule out slightly microphonic pickups.
*stop using the in-ears (whch shouldn't matter, normally, with a direct guitar track) and instead play back over your monitors in your room, to rule out something in that signal chain causing problems. Literally disconnect them and set the headphone output at zero
*I don't follow what you're referring with the signal chain, but try both the Scarlett alone, and the Pod alone, if you're somehow using both
*check your interface settings carefully and make sure there's nothing there allowing it to bleed.
*check any sends or returns on the track, and see if the vu meter is moving a little anyway with nothing being recorded, to see if somethings happening here - maybe a channel strip with a "cross-talk" bleed modeled.
*try a different amp vST to see if that's your issue.

Get creative, check every single point in your signal chain and any DAW send/returns to see if you can figure out where that's coming from. I'm less worried about the hum because that's probaby just from the amp sim itself - distorted amps hum - but that bleed shouldn't be happening.

 

[Icedfirefly]

Hello Drew, thanks for taking the time to answer!

I think i isolated the issue, sadly i messed up at some point, i tried first the Scarlett, then disconected it and tried the Pod, in both cases i swear i heard the metronome and the drums in the back of the recorded track.

But now, i tried again with the Pod and in the first try there was no metronome bleed at all, then i tried again but cranking up the metronome volume pretty high and there was a really really faint bleed but i would never use that metronome volume to monitor, so i guess my Focusrite is the problem, i got it for a couple years and never had any issue until now, will try some older drivers, see what other solutions there might be and contact the vendor, but if needed i will just get a new audio interface, or keep using the Pod for the time being.

I will repeat everything in another computer, just in case, but i think the issue has been solved.

Thanks!

 

[Icedfirefly]

A bit of an update, just bough a new audio interface, no more bleed, no more humm... now i got a bit of static/air/hiss right after I mute a stroke, even with the gate active, but that's a problem for later.

Thanks!

 

[Drew]

Could be your gate settings too and just taking a miment to clamp down (better a little long than too short!). Distorted amps are SUPPOSED to hum and hiss a little. Dead silence is an effect, not the norm.