Q. Recording 3-channel guitar (stereo + dry) for revamping

My project output will be stereo, but I need to record 3 channels for each electric guitar part recorded vi Kemper Profiling Amp: the Kemper’s main stereo out + the dry DI (used only iff need to reamp). It’s important to record all three to one clip, so any edits are applied to both signals.

I thought I’d try making these tracks LRS, and then just using the stereo front channels unless reamping, but Cubase takes away the panner for the track if LRS - even if it’s sent to an LRS buss.

Anybody have any ideas on the best way to do this? Maybe I’m going about it all wrong.

thanks,

– jdm

One way could be to record as one Mono and one Stereo track
Place both Into Folder Track
Edit only the folder track

Hippo

Yes, that’s true. I’ll try that. pretty clunky, as you have to create a folder, then a stereo track and map it, then a mono track and map it.

The other workaround I’m trying is to create one LRS track for recording, and then move the 3-channel clips to a stereo track. that’s not exactly elegant, either.

IMHO the better solution would be to have the channel management done in the output buss assignment. that way you could map just about anything to anything. in my case, I’d have the LR channels sent to a stereo group buss - and if you think about it, this is really no different than a mono channel to a stereo buss.

But perhaps I’m asking too much of Cubase? The recent releases show a clear preference for EDM, and I’m just an old rocker, making old-fashioned linear songs, with real instruments. I don’t give a rats about a sampler track, groove fitting, yada yada.

Another place where I desperately want a track type to be more flexible - and arguably this one is not an exotic feature request, but IMHO a bug that it doesn’t work this way: Instrument tracks using External synths. The behavior right now is that you can only have a single Instrument track with any External instrument! You can’t even Freeze it to release it to record another one - even tho there is a checkbox labeled “Release VST instrument” on the Freeze dialog box. I’ve reported this and Steinberg said “that’s the way it’s supposed to work,” which is utter BS. Now, instead of an simple, elegant workflow: 1) record a synth line in MIDI, 2) edit MIDI, 3) Freeze audio, 4) Lather, rinse, repeat. I have to create a folder for each track, with a MIDI track and an Audio track in it. Notice that there is no limit to MIDI tracks using an External instrument, just Instrument tracks. SAD!!

My beef here is that Steinberg seems to not care so much about non-EDM production these days, so we’re stuck with clunky, inflexible workflows for non soft-synth music. I’ve been a Cubase & Nuendo user for 20+ years, but maybe it’s time to look around.

If you just need to keep edits together you could use the group tracks function in the arrange window to keep basic cut and move edits in sync.
As for the rest of your post ,how would you have done this in the old pre EDM days?

Hippo

My EDM comment was more about Steinberg Support’s response to my pointing out the bug with Instrument tracks - surely now that they’re owned by Yamaha, they’d care about external synths like Motif etc. The response? Nope, Motif is multi-timbral, so don’t care. The hell with minimoogs, ARPs, Prophets, et al, I guess.

The 3-track audio for guitar re-amping is a little bit more esoteric, I grant you, but then again this is hardly an obscure practice these days. I hadn’t used the Cubase surround features before, so thought I could do it that way, and that maybe I’m just not setting it up right or something.

Another useful way to address this - and the perennial “should i record a mono or stereo track?” issue: allow the audio track type to be changed at any time. For the mono/stereo case, one could record voice and mono instruments on a mono track, but later decide to change the track type to stereo, so you can use stereo insert effects, without having to create a stereo track and move the parts, or send to a stereo buss. In my case, I could record 3-channel audio, then change the track type to stereo and ignore the third track. Note that this is exactly what happens if I move a 3-channel audio clip to a stereo track, so the engine can handle this w/o modification. Even more elegant and straight-forward: allow audio tracks to define their number of input and output channels indpendently. In the above case, vocal track inputs: 1 channel, outs: 2 channels, if I wanted stereo processing.

Again, note that the engine can do this already: you can create a stereo track and choose a mono source (actually one side of a stereo), and it will record a mono clip. I’m just suggesting that this could be made more straight-forward and consistent, and it would apply not just to mono/stereo, but higher track counts, too. Like 3, for example.

Good luck mate
I’ve looked through you post history and it seems your way above my pay grade with a very expert agenda rather than someone genuinely asking for fellow user help.
I hope someone will solve your problems and I hope the bill will not be too large.

Yes I use a di thru a pre and mic the amp also ,then I can use some plugs for the guitar,and there are some good ones out there even free

I can’t say enough good things about the Kemper. It’s certainly not free, but IMHO puts everything else to shame. Check out the blind test Rob Chapman did with his signature Victory amp and the Kemper profiled version of it. Both he and Lee Anderton swore the Kemper was the real deal - and the one they preferred.

Technology-wise, it appears to be similar to impulse-response reverbs, but with guitar amps. i.e., think of it as “sampled” instead of modeled or synthesized. And, at last check, there are over 10,000 amp profiles on their Rig Exchange, from people sampling / profiling their own amps.

I own Vox and Marshall all-tube amps, but honestly I hardly play them at all anymore - and never for recording. The Kemper is just too good, too easy, and much more reproducible for later overdubs than trying to mic a cabinet.

i currently like to record 2,3, or 4 tracks for guitar. I have to use two normal stereo or a combination of stereo and mono. It’s a shame it couldn’t work like suggested… Maybe it can… I would be happy if I could use some kind of surround type channel and submix via surround mixer plugin… I’d try it at least. Probably wouldn’t be too hard to allow for it as a feature request…
And it would work for EDM or any kind of music or production.

I always record guitar amp using one dynamic one ribbon, and a DI, as 3 mono tracks.
I use folders to keep them in sync when editing.
It makes it easier for me when I later on find phase problems and i need to delay a track slightly.
Or just for that fat 80’s sound when i Pan them hard LR and delay one track 40+ms
I guess some of it could be done with a macro or track archive.

An idea is grouping of events - according to manual all events should be affected the same way by editing.
Grouping can be done on clips on several tracks together.
For folders there is a simple button to activate to handle all tracks as a group.

Another wild idea I’m a bit curious of is if you could use lock event attributes - can be set for every clip.

You can decide if lock on a track affect position, size and the rest of editing separately.
But unclear what happends if you split a clip and want to remove a part.

There is a preference setting what is default.

Great to see other peoples’ workarounds! Sounds like we’ve all tried a bunch of ways and found something that works, even if it isn’t entirely satisfactory.

Which is kinda my point: your DAW should make it easier and faster to get work done, using modern equipment (e.g., Kemper) and workflow (re-amping). All DAWs have the basic MIDI and Audio capabilities; workflow productivity boosters are soon going to be the real differentiator between DAWs, if it isn’t already…

In the Feature Requests section I detailed my desire for two new tracks (or one new and one greatly improved):

  • the Reamp track, as we’ve been discussing here, which manages (and that’s a good word to use here) both the original performance and the processed audio, able to go back and forth, and managing it all as one track in the Project
  • the MIDI/Audio track, which does the same thing, but the original performance is MIDI instead of DI audio. This is sorta like today’s Instrument tracks, but instead of Freeze making a track completely, well, frozen, it merely switches from MIDI mode to Audio mode; the resulting audio track can be edited and otherwise manipulated like any other Audio track. Right now, with Instrument tracks, the visual representation stays as MIDI (instead of switching to show the underlying audio) and you can’t do anything to the track: trim, duplicate, etc. You can’t even delete the damn thing without unfreezing first!!

– jdm