11.5

Effects and effect plug-ins 129
www.magix.com
Pre & post gain
You can set up the desired amplification factor with
the pre and post gain controllers. The pre-gain
controller corresponds to the normal "gain" controller
on most amps.
Using the post-gain controller, the currently active channel's overall volume
may be adjusted to another channel, or a certain channel may be raised (e.g.
for a solo).
Don't worry about switching settings around in the middle of things; the
amplifier will remember the gain settings when channels are changed.
Voicing
There are a number of more or less open secrets with
regard to the different signature sounds of guitar
amps. This one might sound "bluesy", but doesn't
sound so great with more gain, and the other is
contoured for grindcore metal and fat sounds, but
maybe it's a little anemic otherwise... How does this
work?
Most amps in the real world use more or less the same or similar circuitry
designs. The important thing is the number of amplification stages involved.
Each new stage not only increases the level of audio complexity, it also has a
large influence on how the way the signal is treated before and after that stage.
Filtering is the key:
In addition to preset filtering circuits between the amplification stages, we gave
VANDAL a little something we call "curve EQ". Assuming that you are using an
EQ pedal before the amp, you can change the distorted sound drastically,
because instead on the overall sound, you can favor certain frequencies. Curve
EQ does something similar: it's located (in some cases in multiple instances) at
strategic points between individual amplifier stages, and it filters the signal
before it is distorted by the next stage. This is known as "voicing". For fun, turn
a curve in both directions and move around a bit with the frequency controller
in the spectrum. This will give the amp a completely different character. By
combining channels, pre-amp modes and voicing, you can create a completely
individual amp sound and even imitate other amps.