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Robert Trujillo's live tone. . . Damn!!

  • Thread starter Thread starter jhan
  • Start date Start date
Actually you are wrong hehe =P



But his tone was pretty clean on Kill 'em All



uhh dude thats still a clean sound, not processed at all. All that is, is brand new rotosound steel round wounds and the mid turned up way too high almost to the point of where it starts to sound distorted (Lemmy from Motorhead actually got his sound distored from using alot of mids and nothing else in his sound). Besides that he is just plucking the crap out of it, theres no processing in his sound, thats still 100% clean.
 
Actually Rob Trujillo's live sound is very processed. He uses preamp racks and pedals although i'm not for sure how much he uses or what brands but I know that his sound isn't clean, it is indeed processed to a certain extent. The sound is amazing too.

Besides Jason Newsted using the Sans Amp DI pedal to produce his signature tone, I think he also used preamps and racks to really shape his tone too.

From what I can tell when Cliff is playing bass (not soloing with wah and fuzz) he actually runs a clean sound not processed at all. I'm almost positive his recording and live sounds aren't processed and they are 100% clean. I could be wrong though.

Cliff's solo tone was definitely not his regular ensemble playing tone. Although, the latter was still very aggressive and snarly, though it just seems to be from turning the gain up on the amp than from any processing. He had a fairly low-tech rig.

Jason and Rob both have much more shaping of their tone going on, though I like both of their sounds. The three definitely sound very different, but good, to me.
 
Cliff's solo tone was definitely not his regular ensemble playing tone. Although, the latter was still very aggressive and snarly, though it just seems to be from turning the gain up on the amp than from any processing. He had a fairly low-tech rig.

Jason and Rob both have much more shaping of their tone going on, though I like both of their sounds. The three definitely sound very different, but good, to me.

Yeah I know I wasn't talking about his solo tone because he uses effects. I was talking about his normal playing tone because its not processed in anyway.

And that is very true the three are very different but all sound good.
 
Yes, I was agreeing with you, lol.


lol yeah I was kinda hoping you didn't take that one the wrong way.

I am a HUGE Cliff Burton fan. I have studied his sound and style so much that I can actually mimic his ensemble sound and the riffs and playing style he does when improvising. But to tell you the truth I never was really into the whole fuzz/wah/distortion thing while soloing. I mean I don't really believe in if I am doing technical stuff to show off that I would use wah and fuzz and stuff with it. I mean its different like if it was just a groove or a jam your playing I could see using effects or distortion if you want it to have a certain sound or attitude to it, kinda like Rob did in this video



But thats just a groove thing he was playing for a short time too, I would do that but as far as like roaming all over the fret board trying to do a real technical complex solo and really fast runs and stuff I always use just use my clean sound and never put any effects on it, it seems like all the people I play to if they hear me do it in my clean sound where they can easily hear individual notes and can watch my techinique while I do it that it is kinda more impressing.

But then again the stuff Cliff did made him a virtuoso of a bass player and earned him alot of respect and got him alot of fans because he was an awsome bass player. Its all personal preference I guess weather effects or not and Cliff wanted it to rock so much that maybe if he played the same solos clean it wouldn't have anywhere near the same effect. I mean if the distortion was taken away it just wouldn't be Cliff.
 
Saw them at The Allstate Arena out near Chicago - I was on the upper deck and his tone was complete garbage. Massive low end, next to nothing in the mids, and distortion which seem to only affect the 900hz-5khz range. He has a bunch of units producing his tone and I could not pick any of them out. I swear the 3 PRO and the Tech 21 BDDI would have made the same sound. Even during his solo on For Whom The Bell Tolls, I barely could hear the distortion nor could I hear what he was doing for the rest of the song. I heard the solo and my goodness, what a thin tone! I could hear him when the drums and bass were soloed - during Cyanide, but otherwise it was fairly pathetic mix wise for Rob.

The guitars sounded awesome and did not get out of hand volume wise. Lars sounded awesome and all this talk about his sloppy playing and what not....who the heck cares? He was digging the music and I did not notice anything bad about his playing. Served the songs and was solid the entire show.

As for Machine Head - they are one of my favorite bands, but I heard them do a sound check and got quite frustrated. They were doing Rob Flyn's guitar tone and the moment he started to play, I heard this very full sounding guitar, heavy lows, distorted mids and good definition. Then I heard something awful: I listened to the soundman suck all of the mids out of the guitar tone. It became a mess of low end and high end. Machine Head was playing songs that I am VERY FAMILIAR WITH and I could not figure out what song it was, where they were in the song at MANY points throughout their slot.
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To the person looking for Rob's tone, set the 3 PRO flat, turn the 600hz slider on the EQ down a little and turn up the 80hz slider a little, along with increasing the Treble knob. Should be close enough. I will suggest not wasting your time trying to get his exact tone - there are way too many recording tricks to get the sounds you hear on your headphones. Follow your ears and you will be fine.
 
Saw them at The Allstate Arena out near Chicago - I was on the upper deck and his tone was complete garbage. Massive low end, next to nothing in the mids, and distortion which seem to only affect the 900hz-5khz range. He has a bunch of units producing his tone and I could not pick any of them out. I swear the 3 PRO and the Tech 21 BDDI would have made the same sound. Even during his solo on For Whom The Bell Tolls, I barely could hear the distortion nor could I hear what he was doing for the rest of the song. I heard the solo and my goodness, what a thin tone! I could hear him when the drums and bass were soloed - during Cyanide, but otherwise it was fairly pathetic mix wise for Rob.

The guitars sounded awesome and did not get out of hand volume wise. Lars sounded awesome and all this talk about his sloppy playing and what not....who the heck cares? He was digging the music and I did not notice anything bad about his playing. Served the songs and was solid the entire show.

As for Machine Head - they are one of my favorite bands, but I heard them do a sound check and got quite frustrated. They were doing Rob Flyn's guitar tone and the moment he started to play, I heard this very full sounding guitar, heavy lows, distorted mids and good definition. Then I heard something awful: I listened to the soundman suck all of the mids out of the guitar tone. It became a mess of low end and high end. Machine Head was playing songs that I am VERY FAMILIAR WITH and I could not figure out what song it was, where they were in the song at MANY points throughout their slot.
_________________

To the person looking for Rob's tone, set the 3 PRO flat, turn the 600hz slider on the EQ down a little and turn up the 80hz slider a little, along with increasing the Treble knob. Should be close enough. I will suggest not wasting your time trying to get his exact tone - there are way too many recording tricks to get the sounds you hear on your headphones. Follow your ears and you will be fine.

I think this was probably a case of soundman bungling. Or just not very good acoustics in the venue.
 
i saw them at leeds 08 and they were awesome! robs tone was so ridiculous! his distorted tone is so cool! and his clean sound is really nice and fat and in the videos and two times that ive seen them not boomy!

also people who judge bands on one performance are in my opinion very narrow minded, there could be bad acoustics or of had an of night! im sure for the most of the time tallica are awesome!

andy
 
I think Metallica are a fantastic band, been into their music since the MOP days. I've seen them live a few times, and the Milton Keynes Bowl gig in '93 remains probably the best show I've ever been to (but only because Megadeth were the outstanding band that day!).

However, I think nowadays Metallica are far too sanitised and boring; there's no edge or danger to them any more. I think a lot of this is to do with James and his new found sobriety which, although I applaud him for having the guts to enter rehab to find, has rendered him pretty safe these days. Gone is the growling, angry Het who stalked the stage calling the whole world out, to be replaced by the James Hetfield who tells the crowd that he loves them, and has them singing Happy Birthday to his kids! Come on, it's a metal show for crying out loud!!! Not to mention that the performances are nowhere near as tight as they used to be, and as someone mentioned elsewhere it sounds like a Metallica tribute band badly covering Metallica songs. Even Lars plays like he's going through the motions. There's no passion there at all.

IMHO Rob is probably the best fit of all the bassists that Metallica have had, but his tone sounds very scooped to me and he seems to disappear in the clips I've seen/heard.
 
As for Machine Head - they are one of my favorite bands, but I heard them do a sound check and got quite frustrated. They were doing Rob Flyn's guitar tone and the moment he started to play, I heard this very full sounding guitar, heavy lows, distorted mids and good definition. Then I heard something awful: I listened to the soundman suck all of the mids out of the guitar tone. It became a mess of low end and high end. Machine Head was playing songs that I am VERY FAMILIAR WITH and I could not figure out what song it was, where they were in the song at MANY points throughout their slot.

As an old school Machine Head fan that makes me sad :(
 
When I saw them few years ago I remember thinking that his tone was huge but undefined.. It was only clear at solo parts.. I was at front row center so that might be part of the problem. (he played mostly Fernandes at that gig)
Based on videos I`v seen, he sounds best with P-bass (like when they did the Sabbath thing.. Growly mid range!) Tobias sounded really good with Ozzy tho..
Trujillo and P-bass in action:
with Metallica http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06C2DYlz7bY
and with Black Label Society http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAodnkz6AI4
I think he should use it more often.. :bassist:

And based on one video I saw, hes Rick definatelly doesn`t sound like one..

LOL the Black Label video is like a "who can wear their guitar lower" contest.

ps- this wasn't the only reason i bumped this. i was actually looking into rob's tone a bit, and he is added to the list of reasons i need get me a BDDI. I'm just scared I won't know how to use it properly lol
 
watched the vids with BLS again. I think if rob played bass for them instead of metallica I'd like him a whole lot more. Newsted was one of my favorite members of the band, so to see him go stung a bit. If Rob was in a band with more of the same "image" as he has, I think I'd like him a lot. I am warming up to him lately though.