MHM!
The guitar itself is a JS32-7 with the DiMarzio D Activator 7 set installed. The JS32-7 is actually a 7-string guitar, which means although a lot of people would argue that it's a normal guitar with an extra string on the bottom, it's actually a whole other instrument altogether because you have to learn new finger patterns and grips.
The guitar is normally tuned to Drop G, and I've once used it in Drop F# (and that song I used it in Drop F# can also be found in the album), which is G-D-G-C-F-A-D. I'm using the D'Addario Round Wound XL 10-52 set along with an additional 70 on the bottom. There's a very high chance, however, that I'm going to switch out the 70 to an even heavier gauge because of how flabby the 70 happens to be. People around me are kind of shocked to see me play gauges like this because 70 is already 8-string territory... ^^;;
I also use a 5-string bass. The 5-string bass is an Ibanez SR405EQM with a discontinued blue finish (and that's how I got it cheaper than normal price but I still got charged like $600+).
I record everything through a Behringer DI-20 and then into the AudioBox USB. A DI box allows you to not only increase the power of your instruments' signal, but some of them, such as the DI-20, also feature an attenuator, which is really handy when you're recording instruments with active circuitry such as the bass.
As for the plugin signal chain, there's a lot that goes on.
When it comes to the rhythm tone, I use the JST Toneforge Jason Richardson plugin as the main source of the tone, set to Rhythm with the tone stacks set to the following: low - 30%, mid - 30%, treble - 85%, presence - 100%, clarity - 67%, range - 50%. Then it goes through FabFilter Pro-Q for a little bit of cleanup, and then into the JST Joel Wanasek BusGlue Guitars plugin so that the palm mutes and the actual strums can all be heard clearly. Then it goes into another FabFilter Pro-Q but this time I take out some of the 300Hz area by 3dB and I also attenuate the 4kHz at a thin Q by 6dB.
When it comes to the bass, the original album consists of the Darkglass B7K Ultra in plugin form by Neural DSP. Its quality can only be set to Low at best because otherwise my computer freezes and crashes, even if my DAW is the only thing that's running on my computer (even though it's a goshdang hex-core computer... @.@). Then I run that through Thermionik Bassmensch into NadIR loaded with the Ampeg IR from 3 Sigma Audio, then through Mixtool to adjust the levels a little, then through FabFilter Pro-Q to get a special EQ curve that only it can provide (I can't tell you how I got it). At the end of the chain is the JST Joel Wanasek BusGlue Bass to make all of the notes come out clear.
By the way, if you have the JST Joel Wanasek BusGlue suite (which you can't buy the individual plugins of by themselves), it's well worth the investment, especially bass-wise, because you can actually get a completely mix-ready bass tone with just that Joel Wanasek BusGlue Bass plugin alone. I did it in a way that's a little more complicated because I really couldn't pass up the B7K plugin.
The new bass tone, which you will hear in the bonus tracks from the upcoming Special Edition of the same album, I'm running a simpler setup, which starts with Pro-Q to attenuate out some of the unwanted string noise, and then JST Gain Reduction for compression, then the B7K Ultra, then EZMix with the Corn preset from the Metal Amps expansion, then Pro-Q again, but this time I do a lot of EQ moves so that all the weird frequencies are attenuated, then I use Limiter No 6 (I finally got the white and blue skin I wanted >3<) for the last round of evening out the notes.
For the lead guitars, it's the same as the rhythm guitars for the most part except depending on the tone it calls for I will either switch the plugin's channel to Lead with the default settings except with the Edge increased to about 60-67% or I will use the Blue channel on Thermionik Psycho C along with the Mesa OS Rectifier IR from 3 Sigma Audio loaded on NadIR right after. In both cases I run the TSE 808 in front with all knobs at max, but with the Psycho C's case, I run a before-amp Pro-Q where I make a large dip at 300Hz and 600Hz, each reduced by 4dB, and then a wide 8kHz bell boost.
I hope I didn't bore you with all these details but I pay attention to details so much! I'm so sorry! >.<
WintermintP
