Most Metal Bands I've seen rely on the pa to deafen the audience and use side fill/foldback/in-ears for the musos, so the bass rig probably doesn't matter much.
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Most iconic hard rock/metal amp & speaker?
- Thread starter agedhorse
- Start date
I have pretty much obsessed on collecting my favorite and iconic bass amps. Lots big loud iconic amps have made it into my collection. And I gig with them too.
Ampeg SVT VR w/810 AV - it truly is the gold standard. Strong loud mids just work in a really loud mix. For me, even on the lower volume gigs the 810 just fills the stage.
Acoustic 360/361 - how can a cab with one 18" speaker compete with an 810 cabinet?But it does... the folded horn design works really well, but it is very heavy. Crazy loud, the further you move away from the cab. The head has a unique tone that works great in loud rock/metal bands.
Ampeg V4B (1970's) with V4B cabinet (2x15 folded horn) - A 100 watt head through that cab might just be my favorite bass tone. Period. Very loud too. That rig can keep up with a Marshall stack in a band all day long.
Marshal Major (year 1971) w/4x12 Marshall bass cabinet or Marshall 8x10 bass cabinet - Why wasn't this beast more popular? It is a 200 watt tube head that is crazy powerful. Side by side with the SVT's 300 watts the Marshal seems more powerful. Great tone, stupid loud, looks very cool.
Ampeg SVT VR w/810 AV - it truly is the gold standard. Strong loud mids just work in a really loud mix. For me, even on the lower volume gigs the 810 just fills the stage.
Acoustic 360/361 - how can a cab with one 18" speaker compete with an 810 cabinet?But it does... the folded horn design works really well, but it is very heavy. Crazy loud, the further you move away from the cab. The head has a unique tone that works great in loud rock/metal bands.
Ampeg V4B (1970's) with V4B cabinet (2x15 folded horn) - A 100 watt head through that cab might just be my favorite bass tone. Period. Very loud too. That rig can keep up with a Marshall stack in a band all day long.
Marshal Major (year 1971) w/4x12 Marshall bass cabinet or Marshall 8x10 bass cabinet - Why wasn't this beast more popular? It is a 200 watt tube head that is crazy powerful. Side by side with the SVT's 300 watts the Marshal seems more powerful. Great tone, stupid loud, looks very cool.
LMAO @ fartbox!
I had the Crate BX160 1x15 combo in the early 90's... a cube fartbox that I could barely fit in the back seat of my car. The cover bands I played in had set lists with metal songs. I put that amp through hell for 5 years and it didn't die. Ended up upgrading to a Carvin stack in the mid 90's.
Peavey gear was heavily used in late 80' and 90', preamps, mosfet amps, cabs...
Trace Elliot green heads, 4x10" cabs.
In france the Peavey TNT115 combo was the most used amps because every music shop had at least of these.
Swr Redhead combo is not far behind with Ampeg and Fender Combo maybe.
Trace Elliot green heads, 4x10" cabs.
In france the Peavey TNT115 combo was the most used amps because every music shop had at least of these.
Swr Redhead combo is not far behind with Ampeg and Fender Combo maybe.
I believe the 4/5 button only effects the bass frequency. IMO, adding more low-end to a de-tuned bass is a big mistake and often just adds mud.
Whether or not it makes sense to add lows with detuned instruments, might it make sense to shift the center frequencies of those knobs or sliders anyway, maybe even to tame them? (Honest question; I'm not informed enough to argue even if I were inclined to do so.)
kinda.
Technically a de tuned bass is making lower frequencies.
but drop tuning is crushing and heavy in person or as a band live
far as tone and the whole picture.
detuning is more about string tone. and the evil garble you get from technique.
so yes it not about boosting or trying bring in more lows. it does that on its own.
mid tone and technique really make it shine specially with distortion.
Technically a de tuned bass is making lower frequencies.
but drop tuning is crushing and heavy in person or as a band live
far as tone and the whole picture.
detuning is more about string tone. and the evil garble you get from technique.
so yes it not about boosting or trying bring in more lows. it does that on its own.
mid tone and technique really make it shine specially with distortion.
I see alot of the metal guys playing Ampeg(most commond for all bassists) or Orange, both the AD200 and the smaller Terror Bass are popular among heavy players from what I have gathered. Also in the metal community its pretty normal too go ampless/kemper etc etc these days
I don't want to go too far out on a tangent here, but I just have to say I really appreciate hearing somebody else remembering that detuning isn't (just) about extending that lower range. I can think of some reasonable arguments for getting super heavy gauge strings and tuning really low, but if somebody's trying to maintain the tension/stiffness/whatever of EADG, they're missing (at least) half the point of detuning. The tone of slackened strings does more to get to heavy than the extended lower range to me.
Put another way: to my ears, the lower range of a four-string strung .105–.045 and tuned CGCF sounds so much heavier than that of a similar five-string strung .130–.045 and tuned BEADG; I'd go so far as to say the lower range on my 28.6" scale Ibanez Mikro strung .105–.045 and tuned EADG sounds burlier than a lot of instruments capable of producing lower notes.
I was not surprised to see detuning turn into the pissing contest it has; we did have a few good years where everybody seemed to have called a truce at C standard, but clearly it couldn't last, haha/groan.
To bring this back to the point of this thread: I don't know enough about electronics to suggest specific methods by which to do this, but when designing the next iconic metal bass rig, I think it's worth considering that we can safely assume the target demographic for this rig will play detuned and/or extended range instruments and that the design should account for that.
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Setup is different for sure with drop. Depends
105 works well for normal tuning, but yes you can use a lighter string to get more overtone.
I bought my first P bass actually to have a drop setup. Eventually you have to set up the bass to get good detune
110 is more feasible. but a 110 set and the heavier a d g strings are pain in the but to work with and get the neck right.
eventually i learned setting the neck up was easier with a huge chunker munker 110 E and then using lighter 43 G
and then pretty standard 80 A and 65 D
I was a Cliff / Geezer poser for sure LOL and could tear up the lighter strings easier for noodle smoodle stuff
and then not have a flubber butt E with the 110
as far as the next amazing " metal" amp. it wont be a class D and a weezy 2x12, when you drop the amp, it should damage the ground, not the amp LOL !!!
105 works well for normal tuning, but yes you can use a lighter string to get more overtone.
I bought my first P bass actually to have a drop setup. Eventually you have to set up the bass to get good detune
110 is more feasible. but a 110 set and the heavier a d g strings are pain in the but to work with and get the neck right.
eventually i learned setting the neck up was easier with a huge chunker munker 110 E and then using lighter 43 G
and then pretty standard 80 A and 65 D
I was a Cliff / Geezer poser for sure LOL and could tear up the lighter strings easier for noodle smoodle stuff
and then not have a flubber butt E with the 110
as far as the next amazing " metal" amp. it wont be a class D and a weezy 2x12, when you drop the amp, it should damage the ground, not the amp LOL !!!
1000% because you're saying they are all flavors of great. We are all different and so are our ears and tastes!
When I think of iconic, I think of shows I've seen in the past, and spent the trip home compiling, discussing and trying to figure how the bass sounds were amped. Here's my memories. Mesa bb750 into a ph 4x12. Or a couple of hartkey kilo's into a couple of hd 8x10s. Or ashdown abm 1000 into ashdown 8x10s. Those concerts are imprinted in me.
Whoops, old post. Chants: RISE, NECROPOST AND DO MY BIDDING AS THOR WILLS IT.
Whoops, old post. Chants: RISE, NECROPOST AND DO MY BIDDING AS THOR WILLS IT.
that SWR period for jeff was my favorite..,#1 - GK 800 (Did that w Hartke's)
#2 - Trace Elliot (AH600 with a Trace 410h and a pair of Bag End S15b-d's came next. Good to have friends schlepping that one. Would crush anything in it's path and sounded crazy good.)
#3 - Let's not forget SWR. (SM-900 and a Goliath SR. was a really loud one-cab stage rig. IIRC the Goliath SR. was designed in conjunction with Jeff Ament. That was my "I need to downsize" rig)
I still have #2 and #3
such clarity all across the board…
