Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Stoner/Doom Bassists Thread, Part 90: Maxed Out
- Thread starter Korladis
- Start date
Just the YouTube algorithm. Saw the picture of that album cover and was intrigued.
Agreed. I usually keep bass around 1:30ish, but treble around 10:00. Plenty of lows. And it can be surprisingly versatile within that extreme gain range with the EQ. I've debated getting one of the clones with an added gain knob, but don't use my current clone enough to justify it.
A Metal Zone can get close to the Death Metal sound. Those also have a ton of low end!
I Googled them, which I should have done in the first place(just being lazy)ā¦ theyāre Croatian, the band formed 10 years ago.
Never tried one, but I hear they're better than their reputation. Which doesn't say much... But I've had plenty of luck using "bad" pedals in the past!
I use a Waza Craft Metal Zone for bass and guitar and it rules! Acid Bath and Crowbar are two sludge bands known for using them
The EQ range is so vast, it's very easy to make bad sounds if you don't know what you're doing
Don't try to talk me into one! Sounds like my beloved Swollen Pickle, where a single tiny knob adjustment can change everything. Maybe one day I'll grab one for my guitar rig. I feel like they go pretty cheap most of the time. I get the feeling it won't do much for me on bass, and I'm actively trying (emphasis on trying as I recently bought another bass fuzz...) to limit my pedal collection and get rid of stuff I don't need or don't use.
Can't say I'm familiar with either of those, besides knowing their names.
Related question - what's the difference between doom and sludge? I hear both, know and love doom, but couldn't tell you a sludge band at all. To me, they seem to be the same thing? (Which I'm sure is an uninformed statement.) As someone who actively tries to understand/experience/analyze all of the various facets of metal, I've never really had any direct experience with sludge. What do I need to know? Who do I need to listen to?
Sludge tends to have more hardcore punk influence than most doom. Usually screamed vocals, lyrical themes can be pretty nihilistic or political (like Dystopia), but still maintains groove. My favorite sludge band is Admiral Angry but they're not pure sludge. They used to be a grindcore band.
For sludge recommendations. I suggest Eyehategod, Crowbar, Acid Bath, Dystopia, Admiral Angry, Od Vratot Nadolu, Iron Buddha, Black Sheep Wall, Love Sex Machine, Primitive Man, General Grievous, and Grim Van Doom. A great introduction to the genre would be Acid Bath's When The Kite String Pops, pretty great album, great place to start. They're getting back together for shows next year, they broke up a long time ago after their bassist died in a car crash. Very, very sad. If you like Admiral Angry, you might like Khanate which is more drone doom, they have similar vocals. Their vocalists sound like they were separated at birth haha.
Not sludge but I have some other crazy metal/grindcore recs. An Isle Ate Her is a mathcore/grind band that just absolutely blows me away. Their vocalist sounds like two different people, his highs and lows are vastly different. Also crazy guitar wankery. The bass is higher in the mix on their first EP than Phrenia. Discordance Axis and Gridlink are two great grind bands. Same with Insect Warfare and Human Remains. Early Carcass was goregrind back in the 80s, Napalm Death's Scum was released around that time. For dissonant death metal, I love Gorguts, ESPECIALLY their album Obscura, another great band in that vein is AD Nauseam. The first death metal band I ever heard was Dying Fetus, their song Grotesque Impalement specifically, I went straight from Slayer to that. Gojira is another band I love, decently popular, they played at the Olympics! Sepultura, FIELDS (the drone band, you can find them on Sentient Recordings's bandcamp), Sunn O))), Earth (the drone band), Mortician, FLUIDS, Pound, Coma Hole, Frontierer, Car Bomb, Meshuggah, and Mr Bungle (specifically their thrash albums) are all pretty diverse recs, I hope I gave you at least one band you don't know to check out! I love sharing music
The Metal Zone got a bad reputation because in the 90s, everyone had tiny Crate combo amps and Metal Zones... the big thing then was scooped mids=heavy, so you have a bunch of kids scooping the mids to 0 on the Metal Zone and wondering why they sound like an undefined can of bees instead of Metallica. Instead of figuring out how to use the pedal, they blamed it instead. The Metal Zones have 3 band EQ plus a semi-parametric mid frequency selector for which midrange frequency you want to boost/cut, also volume and gain. It works great as a boost for amp gain, as a preamp into the fx loop return or a standalone power amp, or as a dirtbox in itself! Very wide range of EQ, you move the knobs a millimeter and it can make or break your tone. Very touchy, but once it's dialed in, it's very rewarding. The Waza Metal Zone (the one I have) has the standard Metal Zone circuit plus a different voicing called Custom mode, I always use Custom mode because I like it better, but the original Metal Zones aren't bad by any means
Crowbar:
And mixing a Mosky Black Rat in Turbo Rat mode and a Metal Zone in parallel sounds monstrously heavy and ballsy.
I actually prefer the standard mode over the custom one.The Metal Zone got a bad reputation because in the 90s, everyone had tiny Crate combo amps and Metal Zones... the big thing then was scooped mids=heavy, so you have a bunch of kids scooping the mids to 0 on the Metal Zone and wondering why they sound like an undefined can of bees instead of Metallica. Instead of figuring out how to use the pedal, they blamed it instead. The Metal Zones have 3 band EQ plus a semi-parametric mid frequency selector for which midrange frequency you want to boost/cut, also volume and gain. It works great as a boost for amp gain, as a preamp into the fx loop return or a standalone power amp, or as a dirtbox in itself! Very wide range of EQ, you move the knobs a millimeter and it can make or break your tone. Very touchy, but once it's dialed in, it's very rewarding. The Waza Metal Zone (the one I have) has the standard Metal Zone circuit plus a different voicing called Custom mode, I always use Custom mode because I like it better, but the original Metal Zones aren't bad by any means
Here's more on the Metal Zone, including a couple of great bass demos: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/the-power-of-the-metal-zone.1662100/
For the 90ās Swedish Black Metal sound, the settings on the Metal Zone were quite easy, dime everything!The Metal Zone got a bad reputation because in the 90s, everyone had tiny Crate combo amps and Metal Zones... the big thing then was scooped mids=heavy, so you have a bunch of kids scooping the mids to 0 on the Metal Zone and wondering why they sound like an undefined can of bees instead of Metallica. Instead of figuring out how to use the pedal, they blamed it instead. The Metal Zones have 3 band EQ plus a semi-parametric mid frequency selector for which midrange frequency you want to boost/cut, also volume and gain. It works great as a boost for amp gain, as a preamp into the fx loop return or a standalone power amp, or as a dirtbox in itself! Very wide range of EQ, you move the knobs a millimeter and it can make or break your tone. Very touchy, but once it's dialed in, it's very rewarding. The Waza Metal Zone (the one I have) has the standard Metal Zone circuit plus a different voicing called Custom mode, I always use Custom mode because I like it better, but the original Metal Zones aren't bad by any means
Sure you are not thinking of the Boss HM-2 Heavy Metal pedal, and Swedish Death Metal?
That is at least what is famously known.
Never heard anything like you are claiming.
I very much doubt diming all knobs on a Metal Zone will produce a useful tone, even for Black Metal (perhaps a great setting for Harsh Noise though).
The Metal Zone can be dialed in to deliver a really great Black Metal tone though, and is a perfect pedal for that Blackgaze post reverb high gain distortion sound.
Last edited:
Where would you place Boris?Not sludge but I have some other crazy metal/grindcore recs. An Isle Ate Her is a mathcore/grind band that just absolutely blows me away. Their vocalist sounds like two different people, his highs and lows are vastly different. Also crazy guitar wankery. The bass is higher in the mix on their first EP than Phrenia. Discordance Axis and Gridlink are two great grind bands. Same with Insect Warfare and Human Remains. Early Carcass was goregrind back in the 80s, Napalm Death's Scum was released around that time. For dissonant death metal, I love Gorguts, ESPECIALLY their album Obscura, another great band in that vein is AD Nauseam. The first death metal band I ever heard was Dying Fetus, their song Grotesque Impalement specifically, I went straight from Slayer to that. Gojira is another band I love, decently popular, they played at the Olympics! Sepultura, FIELDS (the drone band, you can find them on Sentient Recordings's bandcamp), Sunn O))), Earth (the drone band), Mortician, FLUIDS, Pound, Coma Hole, Frontierer, Car Bomb, Meshuggah, and Mr Bungle (specifically their thrash albums) are all pretty diverse recs, I hope I gave you at least one band you don't know to check out! I love sharing music
