running guitar through the nord (G1)

[OAO3]

i'm wondering what techniques people have been using if any to run guitar through the nord. so far i've been running mine from the send on my noisey old marshall, which can be somewhat limiting giving that it constantly generates noise. one of these days i'll get a proper direct box, any suggestions?

anyway, always the late bloomer, i've had my baby (g1) for almost two years and have only recently started running my other baby (guitar) through it. okay, that sounds kind of gross. anyway, even though i'm just starting i'm already running into a creative wall and making mostly what i think of as glorified wah pedal effects. the vocodor didn't do much for me either, but i'm sure i can explore it a little more. i've done some nifty stuff modulating the amp with some LFO's as well so i get a weird choppy sound. i'm interested in doing more triggering of other sounds with my guitar, in addition to the usual sound manipulation.

i'm not really looking for full on "here's what you should do...", although i'm sure it would be helpful. just little ideas or experiments to try out that for whatever reason just haven't hit me yet would be awesome. also, if people want to talk about running other sound sources through the nord that would be cool too. i'm just now starting to explore my "audio in" capabilities...

corey // team:abunai // oao

[mosc]

to the forum, Teamabunai.

I moved this topic to the new forum dedicated to the NM Classic.

I got rid of my G1 when I got my G2 so can't answer you. I'm sure some people will have some good ideas.

[elektro80]

[paul e.]

i tend to think that guitar is one of those instuments that does not take to sonic modification very well..


usually what ends up happening to me, is that i have used so much 'creative' processing that i end up making the guitar sound like a cheap synth

other than envelope followers, wah's, the old chorus and delay, reverb etc etc, i believe not much can really be done to make a guitar sound different without actually making it sound totally like something else, yet in an inadequate fashion

or, one can go the way of fripp et. al. and simply use the guitar to interface with synths...but that really is just a kind of midi controller and not really modified guitar tones

funny, the best results i have had is with using graphic eq's as filters..this can alter the tone quite dramatically..

but not exactly ground breaking stuff

[OAO3]

that definitely seems to be the case. i guess for now i'm just going to hope my stubborn determination can help me run across some good ideas. i'll post whatever i come up with in this realm soon... but for now i just posted all my favorite patches at http://www.teamabunai.org/nord (there is a zip file in there if would rather just download them all and go at it. at 88 kb, you might as well....)

corey

[davep]

Regarding the noise from the Marshall direct out, remember that the NM Compressor module includes a noise gate feature. Try placing this module right after the audio in module to clean things up before you do any further processing. And if you don't like the response of the compressors noise gate, you could make a custom noise gate using envelope followers, compare modules, gain multipliers (VCA), etc.

A few ideas in addition to the usual filtersweep & chopper effects:

1. Try some of the stranger modules, like the wavewrapper.
2. Or multiple vocal filters.
3. Or run the guitar through the vocoder, and also run it through a swept resonant LPF as the control signal for the vocoder, but scramble the vocoder bands.
4. Or run the guitar through resonant filters and try using the guitar's own audio signal for a filter modulation signal.
5. You can get some really extreme and unique distortion effects if you want. I made a patch called "EXT UpToEleven!.pch" that uses multimode filters to split the audio into three bands, and then gives each band a different type of distortion.
6. In addition to things like the Chorus module, you can 'stereo-ize' the guitar by sending the guitar through a panner and using the guitar's audio signal as an audio-rate mod signal for the panner.
7. And make your own unique choruses using multiple parallel swept delays (little flangers), maybe with swept notch filters or vocal filters or whatever in the feedback loops.

8. Remember to include a crossfader or some othe method of balancing the dry signal with the post-NM FX signal. I find that a lot of times the effect is way too much all by itself, and it's much better to mix in a bit of the effect along with the dry signal.

9. To prevent an effect from sounding too static, use an Envelope Follower so that elements of the patch react to the guitar's dynamics. Try controlling things like the rate of phasing, flanging, panning, etc., or sweep depth, or overall FX mix. This can make the whole thing sound more musical and integrated.

[rnp]

for awesome DI boxes check out http://www.radialeng.com/ - I'm using a JD6 to patch guitar into the G2 and other fx - and I also patch all of the Nord's outputs into the DI again before recording. great investment.

[mosc]