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B standard under Drop B guitar tuning

Piggy8692

Piggy8692

Oct 2, 2010
265
23
Northern Utah
#1
How would this work? I think this is how Mudvayne tunes.
I don't want to tune my E, a, d, and g strings up to make my Low B dropped, and I don't want to drop my 4 string that far down. I want to avoid any neck tension issues. That's my main concern.

We're probably going to be playing a lot of straight forward metal. Hopefully with some different stuff in between. What are the possible complications I might run into using there mismatched tunings? I can really only see problems that might arise in the event that we are both going to do some complicated runs together.

Has anyone else played with a guitarist that tunes to drop B? If I was a guitarist I would just get a flibbin 7. But then you can barre power chords:crying:

For what it's worth, I've never been a fan of dropped tunings. D standard, Eb standard, B standard. That's where it's at. :D
 
#6
A guitar tuned to B standard would be BEADgb. Drop B is when only the lowest string is dropped, in this case I guess the E string would be dropped all the way down to B. That's how I've always referred to it anyway.

If I already have a 5 string tuned to B standard (BEADG) I'd just leave it as such. The only time I've had to drop tune was either to reach a lower note on my B string, or to facilitate songs that use a lot of drop tuned open string riffs.
 
#10
I'm sure it can work fine as long as the guitarist doesnt get crazy with the open strings. The cool thing about playing the bass guitar is that you usually dont need to play chords or double stops (although thats really up to you of course) so I'd just keep it in standard. Then if a problem presents itself you can try experimenting with your tuning.

Remember that in classical music, even the bass is tuned to EADG, while most everything else seems to be tuned to 5ths, such as GDAE on a violin, and CGDA for a cello (classical nerds, please correct me if I'm wrong!).

Just because the guitarist is using some wacked out tuning doesnt mean you necessarily need to tune like him/her.
 
#12
Epitaph04 said:
But why would you tune your bass up? By drop B guitar I assume you mean a guitar tuned BADGbe?
Click to expand...

Drop B in its common definition (I only know of one song using your definition, and that's by Tool) is BF#BEG#C# I believe. Drop D 3 semitones down.

Yes, it will work fine. I have done it with a band before. IN a 4ths tuned instrument, there should not be any runs that are impossible for you to find a fingering for. However, if they're doing something like pedaling off the F# open string, you'll have to find an alternative.
 
#13
Interesting. I've never heard of drop B being that. I always thought that whenever you used the word "drop" it was a tuning where only the lowest string is drop tuned, as opposed to B standard or whatever. That's why I was confused.

Anyway, yeah a 5 string tuned BEADG should work just fine.
 
#14
My guitarist plays in drop D. In one band I play a 4-string tuned in drop D and in the other one I play a 5-string in standard tuning. Both works but the bands are different styles.
What I wanted to say is, I'm sometimes a bit annoyed by that drop D tuning since it makes simple runs sometimes unnecessarily difficult and for most of the songs I will get a bass that I'll tune to D standard while the guitar player stays in drop D. I don't need to play single finger powerchords so why would I play in drop D?
I would go for the BEADG-tuning.

The annoying thing is that he got himself a 7-string that he tunes to drop A. He thinks it sounds awesome but it's just all muddy on guitar as well as on bass. And what's the point of getting a 7-string if you drop-tune it anyway??? Sorry for that rant.
 
#17
It depends what kind of music you are playing. For something like Tool where you are doing lots of hammer-ons off of open strings and using lots of "pedal tones" as someone mentioned earlier tuning to B standard just won't cut it. If you are just playing more traditional bass lines that you can play anywhere on the neck it won't matter. You'll have to make a decision based on the sound and the riffs. I would tune the bass up a step (except for the B string) myself. You WILL need new strings though.
 
#18
It's basically a preference really. some guitarists prefer 6-string guitars while other guitarists like playing 7-string guitars. I play 5-string basses and I play 7-string guitars and I have no trouble with it what so ever. in fact, I play 5-string basses with my band. a lot of songs I play in my band are in a low B tuning. when it comes to recording music, it's what I use for bass tracks. as for guitar tracks, I use 7-string guitars. personally I find low B strings awesome sounding and pretty versatile when it come to lower tunings. if you happen to like 7-string guitars and 5-string basses, go with it.
 
#19
I play in a bar band and while my guitards have to switch instruments that are tuned differently I just pre transposed all the songs on my 6 string bass tuned to b standard. tux guitar is a great free program that does this for you. tux guitar plays all guitar pro and powertab files. good luck man
 

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