Getting Legendary Tone Options

[Todd Simpson]

Back in the day, way back, a band called Metallica made an album called "MASTER OF PUPPETS" This bit of music has impacted nearly every heavy tune you have ever heard in one way or another. This was made when folks were using real amps, and recording to tape. To get the krushing tone, they used a Boogie Mark IIC+ (This amp is legendary and is one of the most often used in digital processors and plugins due to it's killer tone) which was run via line out in to a modded Marshall JCM 800 which bypassed the Marshall preamp and just used the power section.

Also, the guitars were tuned down a bit so that the tape could be run faster on playback and be in tune. Why? Well, the riffs are complex and playing them tight meant the band had to slow down just a pinch. So they tuned the guitars down and then speed up the tape on playback. What? Can this Be? NO!! Not Metallica doing the same thing people are moaning about so much on youtube ? Using sped up playback to sound like they are playing faster? Yup. Of course, they played these songs for years on the road after the studio so they could play them at speed in the end. They did have to "cheat it" a bit in the studio.

6. Metallica tuned lower than usual when recording the title track to get the sound as tight as possible "Back then, it was all about getting it tight," Ulrich told us in 2017. "'It's gotta be tight! Every guitar track has to be totally tight to the other guitar tracks!'" Rasmussen recalls that in order to achieve the desired optimal sonic tightness, he had Metallica tune their instruments slightly lower than usual when recording "Master of Puppets" so they could mix with the tapes running faster and still have the end result sound in tune. "We banged it out a couple of times and decided on the one with the best feeling," the producer said to Rolling Stone, "because they'd have to play it live."
Here is OLA, (any video the man makes gets tens of thousands of views, no matter what the vid is about. Congrats there) with an actual mesa amp, (yup, they still have amps these days!) breaking it down.

[Kristofer Dahl]

Hehe this very interesting, considering how people are going mad about this phenomenon at instagram!

[Madfish]

Hehe this very interesting, considering how people are going mad about this phenomenon at instagram!

I don't think anyone expects a full blown live performance on an album. Just the fact that you have everything glued together from multiple takes can be seen as fake. Not to mention quantization or other engineering tricks tweaking the real performance.

[Adam]

I'm not mad at them. Metallica actually has this "Can you keep up?" thing going on between each other, where they push their speed beyond what mere mortals are capable of.

And as far as I know, they only used a little bit of autotune in S&M out of their all albums, because it was something else. What can I say? They know the real music, they aren't just a bunch of posers, so that one time with Master is not a big deal

As for the amps, I think that's the amp of choice for Petrucci. I think I've seen that vid before but I still don't get it, why Marshall of all brands. Especially with Mesa stuff they had.

[Todd Simpson]

I know right? People on gram are FREAKING OUT over players speeding up their playing in post production and here is the kind of Metal bands doing it in the studio on one of their best albums ever.

Hehe this very interesting, considering how people are going mad about this phenomenon at instagram!

I"m not mad at them Just thought I'd share this as people flipping out over youtube/instagram players that are speeding up their playing using a similar trick. I've never had to do this myself, thankfully, but I can see how it might need to be done to make an album sound right.

As for amps, yeah, Mr P LOVES these amps. They are some of the best Metal amps ever built and people hunt them down to this day. Finally Mr P had his own version of this amp made just for him with two sets of EQ on it. which is what folks have been asking about for years. Many folks had to carry two amps just to have different EQ on each one.

About the Marshal, it was a heavily modded JCM 800 that added more girth to the tone via the power tubes. So they were getting the best parts of both amps to get that krushing tone.

I'm not mad at them. Metallica actually has this "Can you keep up?" thing going on between each other, where they push their speed beyond what mere mortals are capable of.

And as far as I know, they only used a little bit of autotune in S&M out of their all albums, because it was something else. What can I say? They know the real music, they aren't just a bunch of posers, so that one time with Master is not a big deal

As for the amps, I think that's the amp of choice for Petrucci. I think I've seen that vid before but I still don't get it, why Marshall of all brands. Especially with Mesa stuff they had.

This post has been edited by Todd Simpson: Nov 25 2019, 08:01 PM

[Mertay]

I think you guys have it slightly wrong;

1-Ever recorded a song later realized the tempo is too slow for the feel you want? you speed-up from computer slightly but that doesn't work at all.

2-Using whammy to shred, usually feels as if you're are or can play faster than you can. The pitch-change thing has such affect.

So to get that slight excitement feel (and because using tape, faster means pitch change) they did the slight detuning. 435 is really a small different to compensate from tape speed, nothing compared to stuff on instagram.

It's quite clever idea actually, this is a cool example of "sound" I referred to in a different topic which is becoming a lost art.

This post has been edited by Mertay: Nov 26 2019, 06:02 PM

[AK Rich]

Ever been to a Metallica concert? What does it all mean when you consider that when they play those songs live they are most often faster than the tempos on the albums? Something common with many bands.

[klasaine]

Speeding up for 'arts' sake is way different than doing it as competition.
Les Paul sped stuff up to get a higher octave effect and the funk/soul Band Zapp did it to get a certain texture to the rhythm guitar.
They both recorded down an octave and at 1/2 speed then brought it back up to the track speed. It's a cool effect. None of it faster than they could play but the space between the notes is exaggerated. The same reason Metallica did it. It's tighter.

This post has been edited by klasaine: Nov 27 2019, 03:29 AM

[Todd Simpson]

Killer live band IMHO. Play songs at nearly double tempo sometimes They just wanted to get a really tight sound so they tweaked things a bit. It's very different than shredders doubling or tripling speed to compete against each other and fight over views/likes.

I only bring this up as I thought it was interesting that a band like metallica did this, as many bands do for various reasons, while it's getting such harsh treatment on social media. I do think it's a crutch for shredders to double their recording speed just to sound fast, but that's really a separate issue. Also, no way to stop it. It's a bit lame to fake being that much better than one is, but in the end, it's really about the result, the music. If I liked a song that was sped up twice, I'd listen to it even if I knew the guy couldn't have played it.

Ever been to a Metallica concert? What does it all mean when you consider that when they play those songs live they are most often faster than the tempos on the albums? Something common with many bands.

It's really a different thing than what is getting so much heat on social media. It was just close enough to be interesting It all comes down to the track in the end. Does is sound good? is it worth listening to again? IF so, I don't really care what tricks were used in making the sausage.

Speeding up for 'arts' sake is way different than doing it as competition.
Les Paul sped stuff up to get a higher octave effect and the funk/soul Band Zapp did it to get a certain texture to the rhythm guitar.
They both recorded down an octave and at 1/2 speed then brought it back up to the track speed. It's a cool effect. None of it faster than they could play but the space between the notes is exaggerated. The same reason Metallica did it. It's tighter.

This post has been edited by Todd Simpson: Nov 27 2019, 03:40 AM

[klasaine]

I think the reason it's getting so much heat is that a lot of the social media guitar community were fooled and they're a bit embarrassed so now they're 'outraged'. Experienced guitar players know. The first time I heard one of those clips I was like, "that's totally fuckin fake". The speed was impressive but there was too much separation between the notes and it sounded like a midi guitar patch. I know the sound of a sped up guitar (more than few percentage points). Shawn Lane could play as fast as some of these guys fake it. Holdsworth, Govan, Marty Friedman too but at that velocity, even with the best technique and a hair scrunchy on the neck, notes will blur into each other just due to all the harmonic information a vibrating string against wood produces.

This post has been edited by klasaine: Nov 27 2019, 05:57 AM

[Kristofer Dahl]

Speeding up for 'arts' sake is way different than doing it as competition.

Yes - this is important!

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About Metallica - I haven't been to any of their live gigs but from what I gather - they do punch-ins and post edits often when they release "live" material.

I would suspect this is the case with the live performance embedded in his thread as well (it does sound very tight)

[Todd Simpson]

Safe bet Many artist do punch in for live work to fix a mistake or cover when a monitor blew out or something. I don't mind that so much. The only way to see what most artists sound like live to to be in the crowd these days. So many live albums are sorta "mostly live".

This drama over folks doing "sped up fake" playing on instagram is getting a LOT of traction on youtube. Some folks saying dudes like Charles Caswell are dead fake other folks saying it's not fake etc. I've never gotten accused of fake playing, then again I'm not doing insane riffs with whammy dives on a guitar with no trem bar, etc. Still, anything that brings more ears and eyes to guitar is IMHO a good thing as long as it gets interest. Controversy can be a good thing in some ways. It's too bad that it's about something sorta negative, but at least the word "guitar" is gaining in search rankings which I'll take as a good thing

Yes - this is important!

----

About Metallica - I haven't been to any of their live gigs but from what I gather - they do punch-ins and post edits often when they release "live" material.

I would suspect this is the case with the live performance embedded in his thread as well (it does sound very tight)

Yup. People feel duped and boy are they irritated!! I must say some of charles caswells stuff does sound just a pinch fake and his fingers don't always match up. I realize he is recording the music first so we are seeing a sort of mime of his actual playing. It's gotten to be a bigger issue as so many players try to compete with the flood of killer talent on instagram. Many players are shockingly fast. For a first or 3rd year player, it must seem nearly impossible to ever reach this so they just take the easy way out and figure they will work it out along the way. (cough) rings of saturn (cough)

I think the reason it's getting so much heat is that a lot of the social media guitar community were fooled and they're a bit embarrassed so now they're 'outraged'. Experienced guitar players know. The first time I heard one of those clips I was like, "that's totally fuckin fake". The speed was impressive but there was too much separation between the notes and it sounded like a midi guitar patch. I know the sound of a sped up guitar (more than few percentage points). Shawn Lane could play as fast as some of these guys fake it. Holdsworth, Govan, Marty Friedman too but at that velocity, even with the best technique and a hair scrunchy on the neck, notes will blur into each other just due to all the harmonic information a vibrating string against wood produces.

[Kristofer Dahl]

I think the reason it's getting so much heat is that a lot of the social media guitar community were fooled and they're a bit embarrassed so now they're 'outraged'. Experienced guitar players know. The first time I heard one of those clips I was like, "that's totally fuckin fake". The speed was impressive but there was too much separation between the notes and it sounded like a midi guitar patch. I know the sound of a sped up guitar (more than few percentage points). Shawn Lane could play as fast as some of these guys fake it. Holdsworth, Govan, Marty Friedman too but at that velocity, even with the best technique and a hair scrunchy on the neck, notes will blur into each other just due to all the harmonic information a vibrating string against wood produces.

Yes I think this analysis is spot on!

Once the current frenzy calms down, people will realise this is nothing new and it's actually to be expected.

Safe bet Many artist do punch in for live work to fix a mistake or cover when a monitor blew out or something. I don't mind that so much.

Well I actually welcome it, makes the music sound so much better! And to be honest I don't really like listening back to an unedited Metallica show, especially the vocals suffer too much.

[Todd Simpson]

Well said sir.

Yes I think this analysis is spot on!

Once the current frenzy calms down, people will realise this is nothing new and it's actually to be expected.



Well I actually welcome it, makes the music sound so much better! And to be honest I don't really like listening back to an unedited Metallica show, especially the vocals suffer too much.

[Kristofer Dahl]

For the records, I still have to say that Hetfield is probably my all time hero. There is no denying!

[Todd Simpson]

Again, WELL SAID SIR!!!!!!!

His was the first rythm tone that I heard and just thought "WOW!! ONE DAY I WILL HAVE THAT TONE!!!!"""

Todd

For the records, I still have to say that Hetfield is probably my all time hero. There is no denying!