I've been listening to some older albums...

[misterwhizzy]

And it made me realize I play with too much gain. Some of the early 80's Ozzy stuff, Permission to Land from the Darkness, etc. They sound great without going really thick on the front end. It really is the player that makes the tone, and I think that's my problem.

 

[JOLLY]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I back my gain way way back sometimes just for the hell of it, and I still sound heavy just because of the way in which I play.

 

[DankStar]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I hear ya! There's a point where the sound of the note disappears - I don't like going too far beyond that point. I'll listen to the James Gang and think - wow, Joe was ripping all that out with not a lot of gain.

 

[Aceman]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

The older I get, I use less and less gain.

 

[Lazarus1140]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

The older I get the more I gain.

I was listening to some Stones in the truck just a few minutes ago. Keith Richards' tone through a cranked Deluxe (or whatever) is about as close to metal I'll probably ever get outside of beating my lawnmower to death with an axe..

 

[Agileguy_101]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I'd back off the gain too if I could pull off a live version of multitracking.

 

[JeffB]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I play with half as much gain as I did 20 years ago.

I find it much harder to play some.things,but t it really lets all the nuances of your style, fingets, and your gear come through.

In general I think volume and speakers begging for mercy is far more powerful sounding than preamp gain rode up.

 

[erksin]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

Super high gain with all it's compression kills dynamics and makes you disappear in a mix real fast. Listen to old Sabbath - as heavy as it gets and he's using 1/2 the gain you hear on Metallica records. I wish more players understood that it's not high gain that makes something heavy - it's dynamics. High gain smooths everything out to the point that it loses punch - and to keep high gain from turning to mush you have to attenuate a bunch of low end which robs you of additional beef.

 

[dominus]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

You guys are all old.

:firedevil

 

[erksin]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

You guys are all old.

:firedevil

Old-er and wise-er. :naughty:

 

[Andrew Lamprecht]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I play clean most of the time but I do enjoy the occasional wall of METAL!

 

[Bludave]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I like playing clean with just a hint of hair. It's good to be able to hear what the guitar sounds like

 

[JeffB]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

You guys are all old.

:firedevil

The OP is 2 years younger than you, gramps

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

For me it really depends on the context. If your playing 70's metal sure dial it back but modern metal isnt the same without it. You can make it sound cool without it but its not the same. Also live i use less gain than I do in my bedroom mostly because I dont need to cut through a mix in my bedroom I can enjoy the fuzzy goodness all I want.

 

[misterwhizzy]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

For me it really depends on the context. If your playing 70's metal sure dial it back but modern metal isnt the same without it. You can make it sound cool without it but its not the same. Also live i use less gain than I do in my bedroom mostly because I dont need to cut through a mix in my bedroom I can enjoy the fuzzy goodness all I want.

I guess the Yellow and Green albums from Baroness speak against this. Even going back to the Red Album, you see a whole range of tones, but never over the top. I guess a lot of the modern metal just isn't my thing, and I even think Youthanasia-era Megadeth is about the extent of what I like to hear in terms of gain. So to each his own, of course, and I'm not going to dial it back to Jimmy Page levels, but too much is too much, and I think most people can find where it hits that point.

 

[EET_FUK]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

Since I've mostly played in 2 guitar bands, I use a lot less gain than I normally would.

Recording, I still don't use a whole lot of it, as I double track my rhythms most of the time.

 

[erksin]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

Listen to Soundgarden or QOTSA - both of those bands use way less gain than people think they do.

 

[Jack_TriPpEr]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

I agree that you get lost in the mix and lose nuance quickly when you set the gain too high. It takes some time playing with your gear to find that narrow sweet spot where you've got as much gain dialed in as you can without crossing the line into lost clarity and nuance. I end up not having as much gain set as I'd like rather than sounding like mush. So I am also always searching for the next dirt pedal that delivers that. We all have never-ending tone quests in one regard or another. That one's mine.

 

[xxxplorer]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

Black Sabbath is a perfect example... Those riffs sound bad with too much gain. There are times where tons is called for... Like pissing off people at guitar center

 

[dominus]

Re: I've been listening to some older albums...

Black Sabbath is a perfect example... Those riffs sound bad with too much gain. There are times where tons is called for... Like pissing off people at guitar center

Nonsense.