Strong but not overpowering mids and low gain tone (with Helix)

[the-trooper]

There was a thread, but I can't find it now. It was about Matteo Mancuso sounding great in this video:



I added to that that I love that strong mids / low gain tone and when I try to get it, I end up with playing through a phone tone.
Another example Rick Grahams tone, magnificent.



Anyhow, I discovered if you plop a Dhyana drive in front of, pretty much any amp, it'll get you in the ballpark with some Voice and Tone tinkering.

Here's a minute of my wankery on a preset created literally in minutes with Placater and stock speakers.

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[Eagle]

Rick always sounds amazing. He is just Axe2 in to studio monitors though.

 

[DrewJD82]

Mod hat: Mids are either strident or haunting. I don’t want to see this ”overpowering” sh*t again.

 

[the-trooper]

Mod hat: Mids are either strident or haunting.

Non English speaker: is this a serious answer?
Google: define strident...

 

[DrewJD82]

Non English speaker: is this a serious answer?
Google: define strident...

Not at all, my friend. My bad, I didn’t even know English wasn’t your first language!

Some of the advertising with guitar amps or pedals have gotten ridiculous with their adjectives, “strident” and “haunting” are the two that I laughed at the most when reading them for the first time. I want to say it was a Mesa ad for “strident” and….damn, who was “haunting” with the mids? It was a popular one….

Oh, strident is basically overpowering. Like if someone is trying to prove a point in an argument, they’ll start speaking in a strident tone of voice. Forthcoming/loud/overbearing. We got too many f*ckin’ words to describe the same thing. My favorite English language BS words are accept and except. They mean totally opposite things and sound exactly the same.

 

[the-trooper]

want to say it was a Mesa ad for “strident”

Silly them, Mesa mids are so clearly stentorious.

 

[Alex Kenivel]

who was “haunting” with the mids? It was a popular one

JHS

 

[Sascha Franck]

Got plenty of mids baked into my favourite 2-3 live IRs. No idea whether they're haunting, stentorious, strident just-not-overpowering or whatever - for me they just work.
Can post those IRs in case anyone's interested.

 

[V|J]

Matteo uses the valve driver in the Helix.
I’ve also tried it and it does the Eric Johnson thing for sure.
Didn’t work for neck humbuckers that well.

Besides that, his isolated tone might not be as pleasing but sits in a mix quite well.

I’ve been in your situation but have stopped worrying about itnow.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Not that this would try to mimic any of the above tones, but I think this is a pretty suitable tone for some mid-rich fusion kinda lead.