Recording electric guitar into whilst speaker monitoring - noise issues

[Polytrix]

Hi!

 

This is probably a dumb question so sorry if it is!

 

I know I should probably just be using headphones whilst jamming along to tracks with my e guitar going into my interface and then playing via a virtual amp plugin...but...I'm not a big fan of using headphones...I like to monitor via speakers.

 

What I've noticed is that my e guitar channel recordings - i.e. my attempt to record JUST the guitar signal are affected by the noise from the speakers at very low volumes. I can EQ it out but then I feel as though I lose high end on the guitar track recordings. I'm assuming its the beats from the speakers vibrating the guitar strings meaning there is a faint impact of that on the final recording? 

 

Either that or I'm doing something wrong? Should I just simply stop being a fool and record in/jam with headphones on to minimise that or should I have some kind of noise gate on the amp simulator so it doesn't happen?

 

Is this a common issue?! By default I didn't think I'd have to deal with that issue as in my mind there shouldn't be bleed but perhaps it's something to do with my guitar pick ups or something...my guitar is quite shit. 

 

Anyway, hope you're all well. Really appreciate advice.

 

P

[sheatheman]

I use the same setup as you. Electric guitar into interface, playback on monitors.

 

I did get a tiny bit of bleed the other day, some of my vocals got through the pick ups, but I thing it’s due to sympathetic frequencies.

 

If you’re getting tons of bleed, I would guess it’s the pick ups.

[cheeseburgerwalrus]

I'm assuming its the beats from the speakers vibrating the guitar strings meaning there is a faint impact of that on the final recording?

 

 

Dang you're using high volumes, aren't u?

[Polytrix]

Thanks! Possibly too loud yeah! Cheers

[modey]

Hmm, sounds strange. I've recorded guitar while sitting directly in front of my speakers, playing music back pretty loud, and using distortion, and haven't had any issues.

 

What kind of guitar are you using? It almost sounds like the pickups are microphonic. Can you post a recording of the sound that's being recorded?

 

edit: unless you mean hum, which can happen especially when sitting in front of a computer, but then again that'd appear in headphones as well. If you're playing distorted, some hum can be expected, and these days a noise gate is pretty much essential unless you have amazing pickups.

[Polytrix]

It's an epiphone Sg special and basically I just get a very faint remnance of the beat coming through but mostly just the highs of that. No idea.

Not hum, it's proper audio.

[Zephyr_Nova]

Yeah, that happens with pretty much any guitar if you're playing along with the track via studio monitors as opposed to headphones.  I prefer playing along with the monitors as well, so I just make sure I'm playing along to the percussion I want... and if I do end up wanting to mute it during section x, I just replay the bit where bleed's occurring.  But yeah, totally normal problem.  It means your pickups work.  Side note - I always get a kick out of hearing click-track and other percussion bleed that's obviously not supposed to be there on other peoples' recordings.  I started a list of songs that did it on my old phone... going to see if the document still exists.  i didn't get very far.

[modey]

Huh?! I never get any speaker bleed through my pickups.. unless I'm going for feedback. How close are you guys sitting to your speakers?

 

We're talking direct recording here and not a mic'd up amp, right?

[Zephyr_Nova]

If there's a click track, pretty much anywhere in the room's going to pick it up (and that's true for multiple guitars/basses I've tried).  Ditto for drums.  Sometimes you can hear the vocals coming through too, which is kind of neat.  

[Polytrix]

Im pretty close - yeah direct input monitoring. Fair enough, I thought i was just being a bit weird in how ive set it up. I dont like the bleed at all but im somewhat perfectionistic perhaps. If you've nailed a take and then hear the click in the background even if its faint it's a disappointment to me

[Zephyr_Nova]

Usually if there's any percussion at the same time no listener alive will ever hear it.  Or if it's got bleed of elements that are already in the track it just adds to the realness of it.  But a click track in a quiet section is like a nail in the canvass.

[Polytrix]

Yeah the reality is that the listener would have no idea especially if i ended up using the same perc backing track. Just being a perfectionist I suppose. It was more that I thought my guitar was fucked. Thanks all.

[Zephyr_Nova]

Nah, it just means your pickups are good.

[marf]

Sit behind a chair with a cushion

[modey]

Crazy. I still haven't encountered this in all my years playing guitar. Perhaps I haven't had the speakers loud enough, or have been sitting at a 90º angle, or maybe it's the pickups I use (mostly Mustang single coils, EMG-60/81, cheap Epiphone humbuckers). 

 

Perhaps try using a click/mono percussion track, and putting one channel out of phase? If your pickups are picking up the sound from the speakers, there should be a spot where you can sit and have the left and right signals cancel out by the time they hit the pickups..

[Polytrix]

Thanks all!

[sheatheman]

Multitrack bleed is part of my sound.

 

One thing that helps is change the click track in ableton to the little pop sound

[user]

Bleed is one of those things you worry about a lot at first and then you find out it really doesn't matter, if anything it might add a little magic/texture/whatever to the recording. Same with background noise when recording, it's just cool for the listener if they find out after the 1000th listen they can spot a moped passing by in the second verse.

 

#freebleeding

[Polytrix]

Fair enough yeah!

[Zephyr_Nova]

Found a fix - the ableton metronome was coming through every pickup on every take, bass and guitar alike, on this band demo I was doing (BEEP boop boop boop).  Very annoying on the sparse end section.  So I redid that part using the cutoff trail of a ride cymbal as a metronome (so like, start the sample a while after the initial hit so there's little in the way of attack).  Voila!  No bleed.  At least, not on a casual listen.  I bet if I compressed the shit out of the guitars and cranked my headphones I could hear something... but nothing any reasonable listener would care about.

[Zephyr_Nova]

update: through headphones it's still apparent but not offensive (aesthetically appropriate at least).

[Polytrix]

Fair! Thank you! Yeah I think you might be right. The metronome is piercing as fuck in old Abletony