Covering Amp / Mic with thick layers of cloth with good result

Normally when I record my bass / guitar, I plug the instrument directly into the hi-z input of my audio interface.
 
Lately I've been experimenting with the Ibanez Promethean bass amp and Eden World Tour pre-amp and got a sound that I like - so I wanted to record it by placing the mic in front of the bass amp. However, my room air-cond noise is quite loud and there is a construction going on opposite my house. After setting the mic, I cover up the amp/mic with a few layers of cloth, towels, including a piece of deflated single air-bed, which is quite thick.
 
After covering up the amp/mic, it sounded much softer in front of the amp and I record using headphones.
 
The result is very good, sounded very much like when I'm playing directly over the amp and none noticeable background noise.

Interesting... I always DI because I don't want to upset the neighbours.

Might try the blanket idea. My amp isn't great, a low end Blackstar combi but still, it's worth giving it a go.

I only have a choice of three mics, two condenser and an SM58 beta. Which do you think is the best to use?

cheers

andy

Mosvalve
I recorded several guitar tracks placing my amp on a couch covering it with 5 heavy moving blankets with the mic placed inside. I had it covered so well you can hardly hear it and I had it fairly loud. The results was excellent. I didn't think it would sound good but it sounded really good. I haven't tried it with bass yet.

Mine is a 9-string Ibanez RG-9, the 3 low strings is replaced with actual bass strings. It come quite close sounding like a bass guitar at the bottom end.

gswitz
Idk why but it is much easier to get great sound with the amp above five.

I started out to reduce the room air cond noise :)

synkrotron
Another thought that I have had, regarding this method is, you lose out on that feeling you get when you are "fighting" the guitar/amp not to feedback, if you know what I mean... It's right on the edge and you know that if you let it, the strings would scream, but they don't because you are holding it back with your hands on the neck and at the bridge.
 
It's hard for me to explain, because, although I have been trying to play guitar, I've never been that good and most of the time I have simply DI'd. But, when I was in my early twenties and I didn't care much about my neighbours, I turned my Park amp up to that point I am trying to explain, and it sounded a whole lot different, and the guitar played a lot different, with the interaction between the sound from the amp, trying to set the stings to vibrate, and back through the pick-up and so on.
 
With this method, you will lose that "feeling."
 
Does any of that make sense?

I think you need the volume to play with feedback, and that's going to be problematic if you've got neighbours.  I don't think there's a quiet way to do that.
Unless perhaps there's a way to route inside Sonar that would give you the feedback...

Slugbaby
I think you need the volume to play with feedback, and that's going to be problematic if you've got neighbours.  I don't think there's a quiet way to do that.
Unless perhaps there's a way to route inside Sonar that would give you the feedback...

Guitar "feedback" - the kind of self-sustaining note kind not random squeals from unpotted pickups - has at least as much to do with gain as it does volume.

I can kick my SG into it in front of nearfields running at 85dBA fed by a Sansamp pedal pretty easily, and yes, it records as guitar feedback even though there's no mic involved. Because that kind of feedback has nothing to do with the kind you get when a mic picks up it's own signal.

I can do a similar trick using a sub-one Watt guitar amp and a 10" Greenback so long as there's something like a Muff or cranked Fuzz Face involved. And the noise is barely audible through house plasterboard walls or doors even though it feels like it ought to be. It's amazing just how big and loud a good quarter or half Watt amp can sound and feel.

To get power amp overdrive amps do need to be cranked a bit. Which is why anything usable on stage doesn't sound so good at domestic levels. Even 5 Watt "home practice amps" are really only half as loud as a 50 Watter through the same speaker. An awful lot of good music has been recorded using overdriving Tweed and Blackface era Fender Champs and similar small combos.